Starting off was local artist Craig White, accompanied by his “band of merry men”, and he played a selection of numbers, primarily from his recently released album, with the majority having some nice, leisurely melodies to them.

Craig himself was a fine vocalist and guitarist, and Doug was equally adept in those regions, while Graham and Steven paired up to bring us solid rhythms on the bass and drum respectively.

Doug would suddenly take over in the lead with one of his own, the pretty catchy Honestly, as well as a top-notch cover of Bryan Adams’ Summer Of 69, but Craig would regain the reins and finish off their set fashionably.

They had the tough task of needing to get the crowd going, but folk did stick around as they entered one by one and, while still, their attention was kept throughout.

Simple and rudimentary, sure, but a well done job in getting us and everybody else warmed up, and we’d be happy to see Craig and his crew again another day.

Aside from the headliners, Neonwaves were the only other act that we were acquainted with going in, and after enjoying the material that they shared with us to review, we were optimistic about getting similar results out of them live.

They entered with a cool intro and generated an obvious buzz, with the people becoming more alive, cheering loud and getting more into it on the whole, most notably this one fella at the front who made the space his own, displaying his phenomenal dance moves and occasionally booting the monitors. We hope the guys aren’t offended when we say we spent half their run too busy watching him make a killing.

Their tunes, including the likes of Surface Water, Wish To Be Seen and upcoming single Nostalgia, effectively hit a sweet middle ground between being rocky and being atmospheric, with the latter element being boosted by the keys and pedals. The drumming had a real kick to it, and that was only amplified by the bass tones, and it was all topped off by mild vocals and refined riffs.

It was an entertaining affair from Neonwaves that was better than we could have hoped for, and it earned an appropriately positive response from those in attendance.

Now for more new (and younger) faces in Plastic Poetry, whose big group of friends and fans were already planted by the stage before they even played a note.

They fired out some seriously infectious, melodic tracks with stand out choruses, and the appealing writing quickly got caught in our heads. Victor had a very striking and fluent voice, and the team of Adrien, Andrew and Tim delivered excellent performances in their respective roles, plus they threw in a few nifty keyboard sections for good measure.

The boys kept the vibe flowing throughout, and were also pretty active, swaying and hopping about, igniting a wave of clapping, nailing Pete Townshend poses and getting taps aff, and that made them all the more fun to watch.

They overran their allotted half hour, so they were cut off prematurely, much to everybody’s dismay, but until that point it was a roaring good time that introduced us to a cracking quartet.

Static Union had been in our radar for a number of years, and we’ve thought of them as one of the most promising young acts in the central belt. But in that whole time, for one reason or another, we kept missing them live. Now that the moment had arrived, was the wait finally worth it? It sure was.

Their sound was a 3 way bridge between indie rock, dark pop and post-punk, meaning that we got songs that had both a riveting sense of ambience and an intoxicating energy, with just some of the highlights being The Wanderer, Lost Control and Can I Be Loved.

Sean was a very good and confident vocalist and was also capably dishing out riffs; likewise with James, who additionally played some pristine synths, while the tight bass chords and beats from Liam and Cameron carried the hooking rhythms.

With the focus of the audience completely drawn onto them the entire period, it was a damn superb performance that was totally gripping and seamless, and absolutely worthy of being a headliner.

It honestly wouldn’t do much harm to see this lot get some wider attention in 2019…