{"id":28339,"date":"2026-04-17T11:51:23","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T10:51:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/?p=28339"},"modified":"2026-04-17T11:51:27","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T10:51:27","slug":"the-sideshows-marc-valentine-the-water-rats-london-10-04-26","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/?p=28339","title":{"rendered":"The Sideshows \/ Marc Valentine – The Water Rats, London 10\/04\/26"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Sold-out shows are pretty cool, right? Album launch shows are always pretty cool, but when you have two for the price of one at the same show, it kinda raises the bar. I find myself in London for the weekend after booking to see the Damned almost a year ago so imagine my joy of finding out The Sideshows were launching their debut album the night before and had Marc Valentine as support, what a result that is. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

First up tonight was Marc Valentine with his third long player in the bag, ‘Uncommon Side Effects’, and I think it’s fair to say his best as well. Having been lucky enough to have had the album for a few weeks and familiarised myself with the new tunes Marc and his band ripped through the new songs like they were old friends and were well worn into the set that was nothing short of a masterclass in loud power pop with some awesome accompaniments from his band with Richard Davies laying down some fantastic licks on his trusty Les Paul Jr and birthday boy Neil tinkling the ivories. <\/p>\n\n\n

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Marc has perfected the ragged rock n roll love letter to the underground that has a far wider appeal, be it the fantastic ‘You Are The Jet’ or ‘NY UAP’ the support set didn’t do him or his band proper justice they could have headlined and given us twice as long and I’ve no doubt the audience would have stayed with them lapping up every second. The feel-good Friday night was up and running to a wonderful starter choc-full of catchy melodies played with passion and a true belief in what they do. Marc Valnetine laid down the marker for The Sideshows to follow, and the bar was set pretty bloody high. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can catch the band live all over the place in the coming weeks, and I would highly recommend you do so and get hold of that album, it’s a belter. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the opening slot lighting the way, The Sideshows have been in rehearsals in Spain for the last week or so and are rightly taking this seriously, with the show being sold out months ago. The self-titled debut album was also released on this day, and if you’re asking, yeah, I think it’s the best work Rags has delivered since the first Role Models album. The thing stinks of great melodies, well-worn stories, and having Sami Yaffa on board shows the level of pedigree you can expect from this record. <\/p>\n\n\n

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The set begins with ‘Brand New’, and for the next hour we are taken on a rock n roll journey through some pretty wicked tunes, and having Gaff joining for added guitar licks and general oomph. The sound is fantastic. We were promised the album in full as well as other gems from the band’s catalogues, so it didn’t take long before Yaffa stepped to the centre of the stage to deliver a thumping ‘Selling Me Shit’ from his solo material, which wasn’t something I was expecting, but a most welcome addition it was too. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Role Models ‘Saturday Night Sailor’ sounded awesome, and it’s hard to believe this is their first live show the sound was exciting and as tight as you’d want for for a first outing the packed room was clearly enjoying it as much as I was and the fact most people in here hadn’t ever heard most of the songs being played but had already bought into it 100%.<\/p>\n\n\n

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After the excellent tribute song to Scott Sorry ‘Not Sorry’ it was a treat to hear Hanoi Rocks ‘Lost In The City’ being bashed out complete with some pretty mean harmonica honking for added coolness. All in all the fifteen song set flew by and with it all being pretty upbeat I couldn’t think of anywhere I’d rather be on a Friday night in ole London Town and to cap it all off with a brief encore they return to lap up the well deserved rapturous applause and a run through the Johnny Tunders classic ‘I Wanna Be Loved’ well, seeing as you’re asking the answer is, The Water Rats Loved ya, lets do this again and if there is any chance of a follow up album down the line I’d be all in to hear what these talented guys can do next but for now lets bask in the glory of a mighty fine record and a memorable rock n roll show just like we used to get.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What a wonderful evening of Rock n Roll from two bands who deserve so much in return. If you can pick up their records and spread the word the world would be a better place and have the perfect Friday night soundtrack. If they hit your town don’t sit on it get out there and let em know the world needs bands like these.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marc Valentine<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Sideshows<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author: Dom Daley <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sold-out shows are pretty cool, right? Album launch shows are always pretty cool, but when you have two for the price of one at the same show, it kinda raises the bar. I find myself in London for the weekend after booking to see the Damned almost a year ago so imagine my joy of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":28342,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[123,4117,269,2373,9076,8920,8883],"class_list":["post-28339","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-live-review","tag-hanoi-rocks","tag-marc-valentine","tag-role-models","tag-running-blue","tag-simon","tag-the-sideshows","tag-water-rats"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28339","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28339"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28339\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28345,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28339\/revisions\/28345"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28342"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}