My first visit to this venue – it’s a pub with a room for gigs upstairs, so it’s not the world’s biggest venue but, having said that, give me an intimate pub gig over a stadium one any day.

The support was an acoustic set from Jump who I’m only familiar with from their previous support to Lifesigns at the Borderline, however they put in a fine set which went down very well with the audience and this is a band I will be checking out properly.

Lifesigns manage to squash themselves onto a small stage and went down a storm with the 100 or so people present. The atmosphere was better than the Borderline as the crowd were even more enthusiastic this time. The sound was fantastic, courtesy of album engineer Steve Rispin. The set was the one on their recently released Live in London CD/DVD i.e. the debut album plus a number of new tracks which all bode well for the next album. “Impossible” should be a hit single if there’s any justice in this world. Mind you, if there was Lifesigns would be playing to thousands of people and not 100 (although then I wouldn’t be able to see them in these sort of venues). Their enthusiasm for their music definitely comes across, all 4 of them are brilliant musicians and they manage to play these complex numbers with ease. Jon Poole still managed to find room for his characteristic jumps on the small stage (and thanks to Jon for answering my question in the bar after the gig).

If you haven’t caught this band yet, check them out. They’re booked into the Ramblin’ Man and Cropredy festivals next year and hopefully there will be a new album as well.