You don't get anywhere that matters without good songs, a strong live presence and a clear connection with whatever the identity of the band is all about.

It sounds easy.

But as tides of hopefuls come and go, it appears that sometimes even those fundamentals aren't enough.

Sometimes it's just as simple as a band's chemistry either working for audiences, or not.

Two Ironworks gigs featuring young Highland bands making leaps and bounds along the way to stardom were a reminder of how rich the area is in those fundamentals – plus some X factor (the magic, not the brand!), determination and the ability to slog it out for that dream.

Over the past year, there has been a flowering of Highland bands including The Cinematics, Jyrojets and not more than a step or two behind them, bands such as Theatre Fall, Call To Mind, Our Lunar Activities and Drive By Argument.

All six were on show in two festive Ironworks gigs that ended up as celebrations fit to bust your chest with pride. First up, were the three bands set to head to Austin, Texas, in March for the prestigious music convention South By South West – Call To Mind, Our Lunar Activities and Jyrojets.

Dressed in rain capes, CALL TO MIND didn't take long to use their surging musicscapes to take you to a deeper level.

Hole In The Heart, the opener, set the tone for songs that are never more majestic than old favourite Breathe.

Next up, OUR LUNAR ACTIVITIES proved that their stint in America – including recording their debut album with Blink 182 and +44's Mark Hoppus – has hardened up a sound that seemed a bit tough to pin down the last time they played the venue.

Now the self-assessment of their sound as "post grunge and lo-fi" which seems odd on paper, seems bang on the money live. Hard, attacking rhythms from gorgeously-tattooed drummer Kevin Clark on drums and bassist James Reeve and the fizzing energy of frontman Charles Clark sear the live experience of the band on your eyes, while your ears are wooed with some gorgeously simple, powerful songs – such as Break My Fall, A Little Piece, Fire 2 and The Fire. It makes it hard to wait for what promises to be a startlingly accomplished debut album, very soon.

JYROJETS have had a busy year – touring America, gigging nationwide, recording their album – that still hasn't quite lived up to their hopes to have their debut album unleashed on the world.

But the delay is probably no bad thing, given the way the songs – and the band – have blossomed in the time in between.

Live, just when you thought the band were doing everything right the way they were, they go and push it all to another level. Even their encore, Beatles' track And Your Bird Can Sing and The Who's Substitute, was just one more treat in a vintage showing for Jyrojets.

Colin Fraser of Jyrojets. Iona Spence

Slick touches, such as using footage from the Russian movie 50 Cigarettes whose soundtrack includes a Jyros song, made a classy opening to the set – enhanced by a searingly powerful performance of that song, Dead On Arrival. All the favourite numbers Inverness fans must be able to sing in their sleep seem to have been tweaked to sharpen them up – All The Rage, Little Sister, Wishing You Well, come up well thanks to their mini-makeovers. And rockier treatment rescues lottery winner fantasy I Just Wrote To Tell You from the uncharacteristically cheesy element the band always worried about before.

But the real good news from this set, was the way newer numbers such as Rock Singer slotted right in with the best. And the new songs OutFit (Out Of It) and big, emotional Bound To Burn, both unveiled for their home crowd, proved that that magic porridge pot of songs is still on the boil.

Before The Cinematics, the crowd had been well warmed up by THEATRE FALL and DRIVE BY ARGUMENT.

Theatre Fall continue to harden up their sound – as they have since the arrival of new frontman Phil Taylor, now clearly at ease at the centre of the line-up. Can the band mount a one-band, bring-back-Creamola-Foam campaign? If anyone can do it they can, if all the energy of tracks such as No Broadcast Messages and 1981 And Everything After (one of the tracks due for release on their promised EP out in February) are anything to go by.

It's possible DRIVE BY ARGUMENT lost some of their momentum with record company changes.

Live, there's no question they make all the right moves – not least our own Ryan Drever on bass. But it's just ever so slightly worrying that The Sega Method is still their best tune.

THE CINEMATICS, like Jyrojets, spent much of the early part of last year in America. And it looks as if the Dingwall boys have mastered the art of being better-known Stateside with appearances on national TV and high-profile support and headlining tours under their belts. But the good news is that there's still time for them to become equally feted in their home country, on the evidence of their reception at the Ironworks.

As soon as headliners The Cinematics hit the stage, the capacity crowd were buzzing with excitement to see "their" band after years of waiting to see them play Inverness.The years have been generous to the band. For those of a certain age, it's still possible to see the boys that once dreamed of band success as members of Dingwall line-ups Snodgrass and Minus Another in the polished men onstage in The Cinematics.

But the years of recording, performing, touring together and playing the songs from album Strange Education, have added an almost psychic bond that meant the set zinged with steely precision.

But Cinematics is a band with a heart too. And under the stylish haircut and fashionably clean-cut shirt, frontman Scott Rinning can still tap into the fire and emotion that, even as a bright-eyed teen, made him stand apart.

Wasted In The City rode the huge cheer that greeted the band, but it was the old favourites such as Break and Falling Asleep At The Wheel that were always going to do it for this crowd, along to celebrate.

m.chrystall@highland-news.co.uk

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