Sophisticated Boom Boom

Teenagers Declan Lydon and his trusted friend Spit Maguire stand under lamp posts waiting to be overtaken by some hormonal storm, to be enveloped by strange women, to finally make some connection with the glorious, glamorous world they know is out there somewhere. Their salvation comes through music. When Thin Lizzy come to town, Declan goes in to the concert in his brown cardigan and emerges wearing a black leather jacket. Sophisticated Boom Boom is a tender, hilarious account of the agonies and absurdities of growing up in a backwater of pebbledash and Space Invaders. Crucially, though, this is a love-letter to the period and the place, and to the liberating, healing power of music that galvanises and transforms.