No one would have believed, in the last years of the nineteenth century, that human affairs were being watched from the timeless worlds of space.

Friday 5 June - we've seen a lot of covers bands recently so tonight we dipped our toes in the younger local scene with four bands at The Duchess. We missed the first band, The Strides, sorry guys. More disturbing was the average age of the audience which left us more mature folk looking like mums and dads at a school disco.

Anyway, band number two took to the stage to the delight of the screaming children who insisted on hugging each other and jumping up and down in delight. Dressed In Their Best come, I think from York, a four piece consisting of James Shaw (vocals/rhythm guitar), Danny Petrie (lead), Robbie Johnson (drums), and Shane Hunter (bass). They sounded like a very young, raw Jimmy Eat World but with a more fractured way of playing their songs. The sound was a bit muddy, this seemed to apply to all three bands tonight, but there were definitely a couple of reasonable tunes in there and the drumming was particularly good.

Next up were The Gilligans a band we've missed on previous occasions. Five cheeky chaps from York; James, Mike, Ben, Andy (the drummer I think), and Rince (Tyler?). It was difficult to concentrate on the music given the games of British Bulldog and sliding across the floor on your knees that the males in the audience were indulging in. That doesn't scan very well but I think you get what I mean. There was a good tune in there somewhere but I might have missed it.

Finally we heard The Station Club, a four piece, rock/indie/new wave band from York. The band are: Mikey Wilson (vocals/guitar), Tommy Martin (bass), Jimmy Martin (synths), and Dan (drums). These were much better than their predecessors, especially towards the end. They started, I think, with Streetlights a new song, and somewhere along the line they played Let's Start Again, Stars, and Only We Know. They rounded off with what was, for me, their best track, Brand New Day.

Given the youthfulness of the audience, it's not surprising that the gig ended fairly early in the evening so 'A' and I made our way to The Roman Bath where we were expecting to see Angerbart but when we got there the Bath it was bare so we dashed down Parliament Street to The Terrace instead. Tonight singer/acoustic guitarist Marc Atkinson was playing. Marc provides a list of songs he knows and lets the audience select their favourites from the list, so you get to listen to exactly what you want. He plays a good mixture of Crowded House, James Blunt, Van Morrison, Snow Patrol, Bon Jovi, Seal, Don Mclean... There wasn't a lot of people in The Terrace, the silenced TVs showed some boxing and highlights from the Twenty20 England match against the Netherlands (oh dear). The beer was good and Marc's playing provided the perfect backdrop to a chilled out end to the evening.