Next weekend's Hard Working Class Heroes festival in Dublin offers gig after gig after gig by emerging Irish and Scottish bands. Don't miss it, writes Brian Boyd

'TOMORROW'S Stars, Today!" is the unofficial slogan of Dublin's annual Hard Working Class Heroes Festival, which takes over Temple Bar next weekend. It was always strange that a country which liked to shout about its musical presence on the world stage had no dedicated showcase festival for emerging new talent.

Similar mini-festivals such as CMJ in New York, In The City in Manchester and SXSW in Texas have a history of helping to break new talent, and in its sixth year of existence, Hard Working Class Heroes is beginning to become an equivalent fixture on the music calendar. In previous years, artists such as Duke Special and Fionn Regan have used the festival as a stepping stone to bigger things.

The one hundred bands who invade Dublin next weekend will all be given the chance to display their wares in front of usually full venues instead of the usual 1pm-in-a-field slots they are allotted at the bigger festivals. The bands get the chance not only to win over new fans but also to impress the small army of music industry folk who are travelling to Dublin for the festival.

Whether it's A&R people, management/ agents or label bosses, there will be a wealth of musical knowledge for all the new contenders to draw on.

Typically, they are three strands to Hard Working Class Heroes. There's the live strand - which sees the bands playing in venues all around Temple Bar (including The Button Factory and Eamon Doran's) on the Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights.

There are also the "Mentoring Sessions", where on Saturday and Sunday mornings in The Button Factory. These are a type of musical "speed dating" in which bands get a few minutes with experts from all areas of the industry - touring, merchandise, labels etc.

The seminar strand of the festival takes place in The Button Factory on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, and the experts invited over to talk and dispense advice this year include Braden Merrick (ex-manager of The Killers), Sal Bisla (who heads up the "A&R Worldwide" company) and the people behind Musexpo (a major Los Angeles music showcase).

Set up by Angela Dorgan and Brian Carroll, HWCH has added a few new features this year - most prominently, a HWCH Download Chart which allows people to hear free songs by participating bands.

"When you're faced with a wall of 100 bands, it's important that people be given the chance to familiarise themselves with them before the festival starts," says Dorgan. "We've put the free songs into a download chart so people who can see who are being most listened to. Whether for people going to the gigs who want a bit of a map, or for industry people who want to focus on a few bands, the chart is a big help."

• Hard Working Class Heroes takes places in venues all around Temple Bar from Friday September 12th to Sunday 14th. www.hwch.net

• A one-day wristband (which allows you in to all venues) costs €18.50, while a weekend wristband is €44.50. Both are available from www.ticketmaster.ie