The lights in Vicar Street are turned way down, the 1960s tunes turned up and the smoky haze from cigarettes makes it near impossible to recognise anyone. We are thrown into a time warp for the launch of Mim Scala's book, Diary of a Teddy Boy, set in an era when acid was not something you put down drains to unblock them.
Scala and his publicist Liam Carson are looking the part, sporting tight-fitting teddy boy suits just for the occasion. Scala says he has had a terrific response to the book so far, but is waiting "to see if anybody hates me".
So if it's such an expose, why the book, why now? "I wrote it for my son," he says, pointing out that as a man of mature years with a son of only 10, he wanted to make sure he got a chance to explain how things were back in the 1960s and to "dispel the myths".
There are no myths to dispel about the absence of Marianne Faithfull, who is supposed to be launching the book. She broke her shoulder the previous night after a fall down the stairs, but the good John Hurt has stepped in at the last minute. "Mim is the perfect person to write this book. I would not have the same kind of objective mind," says Hurt, who reckons he was too close to what was going on way back then to write about it.
Hurt is one of many who concur that although the 1960s were great and all, man, they wouldn't exactly like to be back there. "You have to look forward. You can't just rap on about the old days," says Johnny Gilbert, who was the associate producer of the film Alfie. Young people now expect sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll, but "in those days we were innocent, it was all new". He adds that people in the 1960s would never, never have gone for boy bands.
Ireland's own ageing music watcher, Smiley Bolger, doesn't miss the 1960s but has some good words to say about present-day music. He hasn't read Scala's book, doesn't have a clue what it's about and sits up chatting with the DJ during the start of the evening.
There are some people who look as though they might not have lived through the 1960s. Katie Dickson and Anna Whilston look like they haven't even seen the 1980s and are here to get a glimpse of Faithfull. They look rather disappointed when told she is indisposed, but stay on for the funky songs that have surprisingly more chord changes than today's popular music.