ull disclosure. I'm from Ireland. But, I think most Irish bands are crap. It's been going on for 20 years now, ever since U2 went stratospheric. Dublin is essentially a small town and in small towns bad bands tend to get noticed; An Emotional Fish, Lir, Picturehouse, The Thrills, the list goes on and on. I had no reason to think that The Frames were anything other than another over-hyped Dublin band. For a long time, their biggest claim to fame was that their frontman, Glen Hansard, was the guitarist in The Commitments. Then a few years ago, I noticed their album, For the Birds, crop up on a couple of year-end lists. And it's a damn good album; one in which they realized they could be The Frames instead of trying to emulate someone else.

Set List, which was released in Ireland and Australia last year finally gets a stateside release thanks to a new licensing deal the band has signed with Anti Records, serves as a fine document both of the bands material, and the reverence with which they are held in their home town. It's also a smashing live album. With a lot of live albums the crowd is often an amorphous white noise, but with Set List you feel like you're actually at the gig. As the CD opens you hear the excited babble of the crowd morph into a roar as The Frames take the stage and launch into ?Revelate', the kind of song that every spotty teenager with dreams of rock stardom wishes he could write; a crunching, dirty guitars, pounding drums, and a fiddle solo that would put Slash to shame -- if he played fiddle.

Essentially, this is a document of the love affair between a band and their hometown audience, who literally know every word to every song; at one stage even prompting a bemused "wow" by Hansard. The band, and Hansard are in fine form as well with impromptu renditions of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" and Bob Marley's "Redemption Son", and an extended introduction to "What Happens When the Heart Just Stops" featuring a dearly departed canine.

Other highlights include ?Pavement Tune', an intense version of "Fitzcarraldo" -- so intense that an amplifier apparently catches fire about half way through -- and "Santa Maria ", with its sleepy, languorous bass line.

There are a few weak spots. "God Bless Mom" quickly degenerates into a bad case of the la-la's, and "Your Face" plods along with piercing lyrics like "and I'm gonna wait for you / cause I know something about you / something about the things you do." But overall this is a worthwhile purchase, and will probably leave you wanting to see The Frames live for yourself.

Note: The Frames will be touring the U.S. with Damien Rice in March and April but will unfortunately not be coming to D.C.