The Picture House

THE name Picture House may not ring a bell, but chances are that you've heard some of their songs somewhere before. The peripatetic Dublin band have been around longer than we'd care to remember, but it's only in the last couple of years that they've managed to release their own records and build their own loyal - if somewhat over-zealous - fan following.

The Picture House long ago swapped their electric guitars for acoustics, and they write pleasant, catchy ditties like I'll Know Better Now, Somebody" Somewhere and Heavenly Day, radio friendly tunes which get the crowd singing along every time.

The band's homecoming gig at the Olympia on Saturday night, concluding a seven week tour of Europe, showed a band which relies too much on cosy familiarity and easy audience rapport and too little on original ideas and inventive playing. The songs might be pleasant and poppy, but they're as old fashioned as a pint of plain, and sometimes a lot more stale.

The World And His Dog sounds like leftovers from the post U2 signing boom, while Moments Like These is too mawkish to stand the test of time. Like their mentors, The Saw Doctors, who gave them many a support slot, The Picture House are from another era, an Irish idyll where the pints flow freely, the crack is good and the next song is about how great life is. No wonder the Europeans love them - they're the rock music equivalent of a theme pub.

In the end, it wasn't the syrupy sentiments of songs like Fear Of Flying or the strident sentience of I'll Know Better Now which made me long for sweet release - it was the relentless sameness of the sound, a continuous, ever circling acoustic guitar strum which never took you anywhere higher, but just left you lurching in the middle of the road. I'll know better next time.