other 9,999 people sardine-packed into the broiling RDS Simmonscourt on Saturday evening, it was akin to the Second Coming.
This was, perhaps, the apogee of country music crossover - a little less lachrymose than Garth Brooks, but effective, manipulative schlock that used every slick trick in the book. Musically, it was as if a bad version of Def Leppard had been raised on a diet of Dolly Parton instead of The Sweet: plodding heavy rock, a trio of hillbilly fiddlers, three guitarists in serious competition with each other, and an attractive lead singer in a leopard-skin catsuit who shouted "Dublin!!" far too many times.
All this aside, there was a genuine air of expectation about Shania Twain's Irish debut. One of the best selling female country artists of all time (she is overtaken only by Reba McEntire), the 40-something Twain has been performing on stage since she was three, winning talent shows and training as a Broadway-style singer and dancer. This background totally overshadows whatever country music credentials she might have.
The nearest she got to the dark heart of any matter (surely country music's main preserve) was during the show's few ballads, which included You've Got Away and Still The One I Want. Although these had all the emotional resonance of an episode of The Waltons, you could still detect in them a hint of either longing or desperation, or at least a contrivance of both.
The remainder of the show was more about style than substance, its values firmly rooted in popcorn and soft drinks. It crashed, banged and walloped like a mixture of an old fashioned circus and a Las Vegas revue show, not so much blinding you with fireworks (of which there were many) as numbing you with overkill.
Part of the encore witnessed Shania being ferried around the length and breadth of the venue on a podium. No lonesome whistles for our Shania, then, but the catcalls, whoops and outstretched hands of a thrilled crowd who knew they had a superstar in their sights. The crowd loved her, really loved her, but her ersatz everything didn't move me an inch.
"Dublin!!" Oh, go away.
