Dashboard Confessional

In anticipation of the money shot, eager to impress emo kids and bespectacled boffins alike, The Crimea pull out a roaring war epic of a performance. Thrusting and gaoling like a half dead man in a trench of rotten flesh, they scream and scream - and it's fucking awful. An overpowering mess of acidic guitars, mixing melody with out of synch loops and a growling, tunelessly painful vocal.

What a difference then, it is to be so threatened by the opening song of an opening band, working to understand them. Mid-way through, it finally clicks and all the sounds turn into lush harmonies. This is the point when we are ready to bow down and accept this band as our future heroes. And then, 'Do You Want To See My Happy Side' which, as it suggests, is a chirpy little number about some love or another and before we know it, we're back to the same as it always has been. We're left an American Travis whose only interesting factor is a mulleted bassist. Sadly depressing.

"This is about a girl who I used to care a lot about. I hate her now." So, the crowd cheers. And why? Because 600 hurt emo boys feel the emotional conflict of a girl who never loved them. Because 200 pissed swooning girls fancy the unfittingly tattooed lead singer. Because five or six press photographers have been told *DC* are the next big thing. Bullshit. I thought these guys would wreck my spleen and evoke feelings of suicide and pitiful self-loathing but all I got was bored before the fourth song.

A Wheatus tribute mid-set lasts too long and is an actual tribute. Without any irony the fans don't know what to do. Eventually, they leave, weep, but not because the band made them. Because their favourite fucking band, that kept them up as a child and kept them going as a teen, let them down tonight. A moderate band, a moderate rock. Leave it for the Dawson's Creek soundtrack to our prescribed teenage lives.