Nina Hynes & Katell Keineg

There has always been something infinitely endearing about Nina Hynes, and tonight, without a backing band and only her trusty beatbox and cute cerise handbag for company, she is more so than ever. Hynes could be described as Dublin’s DIY doyenne, the Betty Boop of Bedsit-land – equal parts unassuming sexiness, finely-honed kookiness, and sassy originality. Hynes’ voice is throaty, sexy, at times childlike, yet arrestingly earnest.
Her songs are simple yet rich in imagery, and it becomes clear that she is writing and singing from a good and honest place. The cosmosphere’s loss, it would seem, is the Irish music scene’s gain. Scorn not her simplicity, for we are so lucky to have her.

By the time Katell Keineg reaches the stage, the audience can barely believe their luck. After her last trip to Dublin (two sweaty, packed-out shows in Whelan’s), the comparatively intimate surroundings of the Sugar Club are a delight. Her voice, predictably, is incredible, yet there is something utterly beguiling about her presence onstage – she is defiant, proud, graceful and somehow very…fucking…alive.

Man, woman and amplifier have fallen madly in love with her for it too. Members of the audience sit, moist-eyed and helpless, and Keineg fills our heads us with promises of heady cappuccino-filled afternoons on Paris boulevards and musings at dusk on Manhattan fire escapes. Keineg has variously resided in Ireland, Wales, France and the US, and it comes as no surprise that each territory has eagerly claimed her as their own.
Ultimately, the woman with the extraordinary name has, not for the first time, given us an extraordinary night out.