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CASUAL AFFAIR/Sacred Heart
Stripes Bar, Brentford FC Friday 17 December 2004

Casual Affair, the local band back after a 12-year gap, were playing their first Christmas gig in over 12 years. But first the rather tasty Scared Heart started the night of with a well-received set of melodic hard rock. They aired tracks of their new album including ‘N.Y.C.’ plus their ‘hit-in-waiting’ ‘Lost’. Yet again the band picked up some new fans and it proves that you can’t do enough gigs in order to build up your fanbase and following.

Casual Affair were playing a longer set than they did at their gig a few months back and some old favourites were back including a rip roaring version of Rush’s ‘Spirit Of Radio’. In fact a few covers were aired tonight including Bryan Adams ‘Kids Wanna Rock’ (something sadly Mr Adams hasn’t done since the early 90’s), a Floyd-tastic medley including ‘Run Like Hell’ and Free’s ‘Wishing Well’.

But Casual Affair are not a covers band as they have some fine songs in their repertoire including ‘Whisper In The Wind’ and the hard rock of ‘One More Time’ and ‘Play With Fire’. Musically it reminds of Fish-era Marillion vocally with hints of Magnum, Crowded House and Rush. Encore time saw Queen’s ‘Tie Your Mother Down’ and Led Zep’s ‘Rock ‘N’ Roll’ bring the evening to a fine close.

Two very talented bands and well worth seeing live if you enjoy quality rock music.

Review: Jason Ritchie