Welcome to the rock'n'roll lottery

THE brief was simple and direct: Take the A-Train to Cork to check out Murphy's Live Mix `96, a three day event that showcased a selection of

Irish rock bands at varying levels of quality and potential; to see how the general public, respond to them, and gauge whether or not this collection of Irish rock talent represents in any way the Class of `97.

There were 11 bands playing over three days, swapping places in a variety of Cork pubs. The bands were Revelino, The Revenants, The Ultra Montanes, Mesner, Watercress, The Prayer Boat, Reckless Pedestrians, Treehouse Diner, Judas Diary, The Kathleens, and Orange Fettishes. The fact that they were each performing in pubs across Cork at virtually the same time meant that your correspondent couldn't get to see them all, but with a hop, skip, jump, and a taxi or two, six of them got nabbed.

5pm. Thursday, November 14th

ON the train down to Cork, a businessman takes out a copy of Q magazine. As his colleagues operate laptops and thinkpads, he regales them with information such as: "Poor old Madonna - she only got a two-star rating for the Evita soundtrack." A band like The Ultra Montanes would, I hazard a guess, do him the world of good. Speaking of which.

9.30pm. Thursday, November 15th

TUCKED down a sidestreet is The Maltings, one of the many student pubs along Western Road. When the Boney M soundtrack is switched off, The Ultra Montanes assume the position of skinny white boy rockers, and slowly connect with the small crowd. Lead singer Rory O'Keefe looks the perfect brattish frontman, even if most of the people in the pub are in the front bar watching a football match. The Ultra Montanes have recently released their second single, Anyway (Lakota/Sony), and are young enough to embrace the myth of rock'n'roll shenanigens, but clever enough to play its marketing games. In short, they're gagging for it.

"We don't have any manifesto," explains Rory. "We're just making it up as we go along. It's pop music. We've got plenty of years to be making our spoken word albums. I'm exhausted with bands that have gameplans. It's more fun to do it this way. Lyrically, we play a voyeuristic game. You go out, get loaded, get ideas for songs, and make them up."

10.30pm. Thursday, November 15th

NANCY Spains is Cork's best known rock venue. Revelino are on stage when I walk in. The venue is packed. Currently on the crest of a small wave, Revelino are proving themselves to be one of the best Irish rock bands of the past five years. Along with The Revenants, they represent the older breed of the three-day Cork session. On stage, they appear to assiduously focus their energies onto their songs, hardly any of which are below average. Revelino have two albums to their credit, and are the event's justifiable headliners.

"We knew we'd never become an overnight success," says Revelino's lead vocalist and lyricist, Brendan Tallon. "So, we decided to build on things - that every record should be better than the previous one, that each gig should be better than the last one. Good songs eventually find their way out of the mire, and we've trusted the premise that quality songs market themselves. Word of mouth and positive reviews have sold our records much more than a thousand posters. We've relied on that, but that means you can never become mediocre. We concentrate on consistency more than anything else."

12.30am. Friday, November 16th

THE Half Moon Club is the only venue out of the dozen or so that the public has to pay into. On stage is The Prayer Boat. They have been around the block several times over the past six years, but appear to have resisted the temptation to split up. They remain to these ears one of the least appealing of current Irish rock groups, but that's not to denigrate the courage of their convictions or the fact that their songs speak to those members of the audience who sit and listen in rapt attention.

10pm. Friday, November 16th

IN Mollies, The Revenants are playing on a stage the size of a very large postage stamp. They bump into each other with monotonous regularity, all the while playing superior guitar-pop that manages to transcend its surroundings. The indifference of the audience is perplexing, until you realise that people who get their entertainment for free don't enter into the unwritten contractual obligation of attentiveness. The Revenants are an excellent band who no longer have the hunger for a rock'n'roll lifestyle, the complete antithesis of The Ultra Montanes. They mirror Revelino, for example, in that the most important aspect of their art is the craft of the song.

"I'm a very slow songwriter," is Stephen Ryan's excuse for The Revenants shamefully low profile. "In 1995, we did about three gigs, and I wrote about two new songs. This year we've been a bit busier - we recorded an album that didn't get released, and have played about 15 gigs so far. As is quite obvious, we're not out there battling for a major record deal. We're all sufficiently involved and interested in other areas of activity that we're happy enough to leave it that way. I'd love to do it full-time, bring out records, tour, but at 33 I find I have to be realistic about these things. I'm no spring chicken and I have responsibilities."

10.45pm. Friday, November 16th

AT The Crannog, Galway band The Kathleens suffer a similar audience ambivalence. They play tight melodic pop songs with a wordy, lyrical edge. You'd wonder how bands like this could play to such disinterest, until you realise that belief in oneself fuels the fire of success.

12.20am. Saturday, November 17th

IN The Half Moon Club for Belfast band Watercress. They are essentially a percussive outfit who bludgeon any pop sensibility they have with - a forced buffoonish sense of humour. The crowd love them, but my prejudice against the use of didgeridoos in rock music (let alone anywhere else, for that matter) remains firmly intact.

SO - a disparate collection of Irish rock talent with no hope for future success, or a finely tuned selection of the best of fin de siecle Irish rock?

Inevitably, it's a bit of both, although I'm sure some people would argue with a few of the choices.

Objectively speaking and irrespective of anything essential, such as innate creative talent - any of the bands who played could be commercially huge within the next three years, a possibility that the sponsors would undoubtedly brook no argument with, hence part of the reason for their involvement.

Equally, by that time the band names could just be memories on faded T-shirts, by which time sponsors - old or new - would have gone on to the class of 2000.

Two things are for certain. There will be no lack of aspiring bands eager to tap into the dream, and there will be far too many with regrets for what might have been. Welcome to the rock'n'roll lottery.