16 of the most memorable gigs of 2023

Franz Ferdinand

Collins Barracks, Dublin

Sunday, August 27th

★★★★☆

Franz Ferdinand blast straight out of the traps with The Dark of the Matinée, from their eponymous 2004 debut, a blistering reminder of their angular pop prowess – with a timeless Terry Wogan name-check to boot. The show is surprisingly loud for an outdoor one, but the sound is perfectly contained within the courtyard of Collins Barracks, quickly shutting out the strains of Noel Gallagher and company wafting across the Liffey from Royal Hospital Kilmainham.

[ Franz Ferdinand: Read the full review here ]

Lizzo

3Arena, Dublin

Monday, March 13th

★★★★☆

It’s hard to describe the intensity of the screams that greet Lizzo as she arrives in Dublin. This is the Special tour, with Lizzo’s feelgood approach – positive, celebratory, uplifting, defiant – continuing to strike a cultural chord that encompasses self-care, self-love and body positivity. This message stretches itself across almost two hours at the 3Arena. There’s some filler, sure, but does it matter when everyone in the room is clearly so delighted? Throwing roses into the crowd to a chorus of Olé, Olé, the crowd breaks into an extended cheer. Lizzo – mouthing “what the f***?” – appears genuinely taken aback by the enthusiasm.

[ Lizzo: Read the full review here ]

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band

RDS Main Arena, Dublin

Friday, May 5th

★★★★☆

Bruce Springsteen and his ever-impressive E Street Band, including brass and backing vocals, returned to Dublin’s RDS Main Arena for a three-hour show filled with energy, humour and invention but also tinged with a sense of poignancy as he recalled the friends he has lost along the way. They delivered 27 songs, kicking off under a lovely summer-evening sky with the defiant No Surrender. Thereafter, Springsteen’s mastery of stagecraft ensured the concert maintained momentum. As darkness fell, the band hit the home straight with a bunch of rousing classics before a six-song encore.

[ Bruce Springsteen: Read the full review here ]

Pulp

St Anne’s Park, Dublin

Friday, June 9th

★★★☆☆

A big setting calls for big songs, and now and then Pulp deliver. Jarvis Cocker, the band’s frontman, greets the world as Pulp’s first tour in a decade touches down at St Anne’s Park, a low-ambience space on the northside of Dublin. It is a straightforward greatest-hits set – though one undermined slightly by the fact that Pulp, for all their importance to Britpop, didn’t necessarily have all that many stone-cold smashes. Or at least not the sort that will shine in an anonymous park on a random Friday.

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[ Pulp: Read the full review here ]

Kraftwerk

Trinity College Dublin

Thursday, June 29th

★★★★☆

Kraftwerk are resplendent in skintight fluorescent suits which, for four men of quite an advanced age, they pull off surprisingly well. It certainly helps if you’ve got one of the finest back catalogues in musical history at your disposal. A Kraftwerk live show in 2023 is anchored from stage right by lead singer and keyboardist Ralf Hütter, who cofounded the group in 1969. Hütter is flanked by Henning Schmitz, Falk Grieffenhagen and Georg Bongartz, none of whom were original members of this phenomenally pioneering band, who are undisputedly The Beatles of electronic music.

[ Kraftwerk: Read the full review here ]

Hozier

Malahide Castle, Co Dublin

Friday, June 30th

★★★★★

Andrew Hozier Byrne finds himself at the other side of Dublin Bay from his homestead of Wicklow on an evening that is somehow both sticky and fresh, at Malahide Castle. Opening with Eat Your Young, followed by Jackie and Wilson, the grey sky surrounding the arena – where about 20,000 people have gathered – could almost be an autumnal shade conjured for the occasion. Angel of Small Death and the Codeine Scene is an early highlight. But when Francesca lands, a song from his new album, Unreal Unearth, it rises in a way that signposts towards the epic.

[ Hozier: Read the full review here ]

Lana Del Rey

3Arena, Dublin

Friday, July 7th

★★★★★

Lana Del Rey walks on stage looking like a character from an old Hollywood movie or from an all-American fashion line going through a gloomy phase: Ralph Lauren with a splash of gothic. “They told me this was the land of the fairies and good luck,” she declares late in a rapturous concert. With the volume in the room already cranked up to “ear-splitting shriek”, she opens with A&W. It’s a brooding highlight from her latest album, Do You Know There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd?

[ Lana Del Ray: Read the full review here ]

The Pretenders

3Olympia, Dublin

Sunday, May 21st

★★★★☆

It’s not considered polite to discuss a woman’s age, but as Chrissie Hynde struts the 3Olympia stage in leather boots, defiantly wielding her Fender Telecaster, it’s clear the Pretenders leader is not fixing to get into any discussion about age. “We don’t have to get fat, we don’t have to get old,” she rebel-yells during the band’s latest single, Let the Sun Come In, from their album, Relentless. It’s the first of a three-song encore that ends in a total country-rock wigout of their 1985 song Thumbelina. Before that, Hynde and co deliver a quick-fire set that runs through some of the band’s beloved hits, along with plenty of other rockers and rollers from all points in the band’s 45-year career.

[ The Pretenders: Read the full review here ]

The Waterboys

Iveagh Gardens, Dublin

Thursday, July 13th

★★★★☆

The Waterboys’ sell-out concert at Iveagh Gardens coincides with the 34th anniversary of the wistful And a Bang on the Ear topping the Irish charts. Mike Scott, the band’s singer, imparts this fact towards the end of a show that captures the mossy multitudes of the group’s sound, which sprints from Celtic prog to mystical postpunk via a sort of folk-horror garage rock.

[ The Waterboys: Read the full review here ]

First Aid Kit

Collins Barracks, Dublin

Monday, August 21st

★★★★☆

Four-thousand fans are packed into the courtyard of Collins Barracks, by the Liffey in Dublin, on a glorious night to hear the terrific songs and spellbinding harmonies of Johanna and Klara Söderberg, aka First Aid Kit. They open with Angel, from last year’s fifth studio album, Palomino, which, mourning a relationship on the verge of collapsing, is the perfect amuse-bouche for the Swedish sisters’ brand of lovelorn folk. They are visibly moved by the rapturous applause. “Wow, it’s been five years since we’ve been in Ireland, and we’re so excited,” Klara says.

[ First Aid Kit: Read the full review here ]

Future Islands

Collins Barracks, Dublin

Thursday, August 24th

★★★★☆

Future Islands have something of a returning-hero status at Collins Barracks. It’s certainly the biggest Irish headline show they’ve played since they first arrived in Dublin, in 2009, but in the courtyard of the National Museum, a cool summer breeze blowing across the cobblestones, Samuel T Herring and his bandmates seem unruffled. “We haven’t played in about five weeks,” Herring tells the crowd by way of introduction as they open with the sprightly For Sure. “Let’s kick off some rust!”

[ Future Islands: Read the full review here ]

Elvis Costello and Steve Nieve

National Concert Hall, Dublin

Thursday, September 7th

★★★★☆

They have spent the best part of 45 years together in tour buses, dressingrooms, hotel lounges, aeroplanes, recording studios, and stages, so it’s no real surprise that Elvis Costello and Steve Nieve slip and slide off each other’s backs like eels. They have an instinctive shorthand that may be indiscernible to the naked eye, but which they can each see coming almost without having to look up or over. Sure, they have a set list prepared and fit for purpose, and each show has a starting point, but, as Costello said to this newspaper, “after 10 minutes it all goes to hell and we change everything”.

[ Elvis Costello and Steve Nieve: Read the full review here ]

Muse

3Arena, Dublin

Wednesday, September 27th

★★★★☆

Muse deliver a staggering 24-song set of propulsive, power-pop-flavoured hard rock to thrill the faithful and convert the curious. It’s mad to think that the first time they played Dublin was a humble support slot to Elastica in the old Temple Bar Music Centre and appearing bottom of the bill at the Trinity Ball. Elastica split up decades ago, while Muse are still touring the world, giving a masterclass in the sublime and ridiculous.

[ Muse: Read the full review here ]

Arctic Monkeys

3Arena, Dublin

Sunday, October 15th

★★★★★

“Are we enjoying ourselves?” Arctic Monkeys’ frontman Alex Turner asked the crowd at the 3Arena who responded with ear-splitting screams. He spoke disappointingly, but apparently not unusually, little during the set. He kept, however, moving across the stage, either crooning over the newer material or switching between lead and rhythm guitar parts on older songs. Towards the end of the set, the band were joined by a sublime string section for 505, Do I Wanna Know? and Body Paint. “We’re back for some more,” from Turner kicked off a powerful encore that cemented a top class performance from the band that really was worth the wait after cancelling a sold-out Dublin date earlier in the year.

[ Arctic Monkeys: Read the full review here ]

The Streets

3Olympia Theatre, Dublin

Monday, October 23rd

★★★★☆

Mike Skinner, aka The Streets, is not so concerned with the new material and not precious enough to withhold the songs that his audience wants to hear. They come thick and fast, a wham-bam of Turn the Page, Let’s Push Things Forward and Don’t Mug Yourself arriving within the first 20 minutes – aided by a tight band and an impressive lighting rig – leaving barely any time for applause between tracks.

[ The Streets: Read the full review here ]

Kojaque

Vicar Street, Dublin

Thursday, November 16th

★★★★★

Kojaque, the Cabra rapper, producer, musician and artist with a broad vision, honing lyrical sharpness, and a vast creative palate, took to the Vicar Street stage bearing his third major musical project, the album Phantom of the Afters. For Phantom, he invents Jackie Dandelion who lies somewhere between a grubby politician and a crooked capitalist. However Kojaque dresses himself up – deli-worker, devil, or dodgy Dáil-adjacent wheeler-dealer – he is a gargantuan talent, his work full of complexities and heart. At Vicar Street, his boldness and ambition glows with tenderness and strength. He doesn’t put a foot wrong. Flawless.

[ Kojaque: Read the full review here ]