Sunday 28/01/07 Nightmare Of You @ Kings College, London

Writing love songs has never been easy. There’s an art to it you see. An aorta tugging feeling needs to be conveyed - but without that serious slice of cheese that usually accompanies many an ode d’amour. Long Island lovesters Nightmare Of You have the perfect recipe. Their debut album is an eleven tracker of lurrrve-ing and longing vacuum packed pop gems. And they’re just as good live as on record.

Heart jerking indie nugget ‘Thumbelina’ is the epitome of this perfect romance the band do so well. But, showing that they’re not afraid to lower the tone, it gets a shout out to some guy that it helped get laid. Charming. Lead singer Brandon Reilly smirks he’s glad it got this guy’s “dick wet.” Thanks for reminding us, in case we hadn’t forgotten, that romance isn’t all chocolate boxes and roses. Especially if the mountain of groping kids on the stairs is anything to go by.

Disco-sampled ‘My Name Is Trouble’ sees the picture-perfect Brandon kick up the slow pace into a muted Panic! At The Disco-esque number that thuds and paps through the venue. Squirming and squealing through the chorus it’s easy to see why he’s every emo girl’s wet dream. All floppy black hair, skinny jeans and I’m-going-to-fit-as-many-words-as-I-possibly-can-into-this-verse vocals he’ll be venturing into many dirty thought tonight.

So, music for girls it may be, but if the crowd are anything to go by there’s a fair few hairier testosterone filled romantics out there too. NOY are bringing the campness back to rock, and about time too. Ace stuff.