Cathy Davey goes Electric
February is a big month for the wonderfully talented Cathy Davey. She is nominated for 2 awards (Best Irish Album, Best Irish Female) at the Meteors next Friday where she also plays live. Then she is hot favourite to pick up the Choice Music Award for best Irish Album of 2007 at Vicar Street at the end of the month. In between, she plays her biggest headline show to date at the 1400 capacity Tripod in Dublin which is already sold out, and the night before (20 Feb) she plays her debut Waterford show at Electric Avenue.
All the fuss and attention on Cathy has come about as a result of the release of her fantastic second album “Tales Of Silversleeve”. It has already been voted CD of the year on Beat102103’s Irish Beats programme and it was the biggest selling CD at BPM Records in Waterford over the Xmas period. If you heard Cathy’s 2004 debut ‘Something Ilk’, you’ll have been aware that at some stage during her career, there was a very real possibility that she was going to make a great, great record. It’s doubtful that anyone would have seen it coming so soon though. “Tales of Silversleeve” is an immediately captivating collection, with the first four tracks as good an opening quartet as any you’ll have heard anywhere before. “Sing For Your Supper” is a mesmerising, shiver-inducing Sundays-style jangle-beat, “Reuben”s quirky, memorable pop gallop sees Davey swap guitar for a capricious piano riff, “The Collector” slams a dose of sassy jazz-meets-nineties-indie on the table, while “Moving”s superbly-delivered, slick electro-pop is just simply gorgeous. Without doubt, Cathy Davey has made one of the best albums of the last year.
As an added bonus, Cathy’s special guests for the Electric Avenue show are The Chapters, who are fast becoming one of the most talked about bands to come out of Ireland in many years. Their debut “Looking For Love” EP in 2007 topped the influential Phantom FM’s chart for most of the summer, and Hot Press editor Niall Stokes described it as the best Irish debut he has heard in a decade. Tickets for the gig at Electric Avenue on 20 Feb are available now at BPM Records and Ticketmaster and are expected to sell out in advance.