At this year’s Meteor Awards ceremony Damien Dempsey once again proved to be a lonely voice taking up the torch for decent music in a sea of blandness.

Having spent some time last year launching Shots in the US, he is now back home where he is working on an album of the ballads he grew up listening to himself, part as a way of breathing life into them for the young audience he has built up and part as a way of preparing himself for the writing of his next original album.
I’d say the big fella enjoyed himself much more the week before, when himself and Christy Moore took a trip down Leeson Street. Only as far as the Sugar Club, mind. None of that dirty thinking now. Along with the rest of the occupants of a packed to the gills Sugar Club, Damien and Christy were there to see Jinx Lennon and Miss Paula Flynn (pictured) turn in one of the best gigs of their career.
Although the Dundalk funk-punk-folk-fun-poking word tornado has a hardcore following of his own the audience at this gig was a mix of long time aficionados and converts who have come to appreciate him in the light of last year’s Noisemaker documentary. Noisemaker itself was transformed into a crowd chant with a couple of rows near the front giving it socks. It was an incongruous moment where the familiarity brought by the documentary momentarily detuned the fundamental righteous anger which underpins Jinx’s performance.
There were a few spikier moments though, especially the almost NRA-like zeal of ‘Protect Yourself At Home’ in which the audience is exhorted to defend themselves against intruders by whatever means possible. In the way that familiarity can sometimes strip away the rawness of the message, here the lack of familiarity pushed the message home with visceral clarity and you could see the more politically correct fade into their seats. What made the show such a revelation though was the switch between songs like that and the delicacy of a vignette like ‘Triffid Lamps Of Bellingham’ where he proves himself a master of working a song up from the smallest of details or the epic cry for freedom ‘Planet Of The Apes’ where his own gruff vocal is perfectly counterpointed by the gossamer shimmer of Miss Paula Flynn. There is a natural flow to the show with Paula joining him onstage throughout the show like moments of calm between the storms.
Dave Geraghty must have been disappointed too, not to walk away with at least one of the Meteors for which he was nominated but as the international buzz around his album starts to take hold he will be putting his solo career temporarily on hold while he joins the rest of Bell X1 in the United States.
He has announced a couple of Irish dates for the end of Spring with dates in Belfast’s Auntie Annie’s on Thursday May 8 and Dublin’s Button Factory on Friday May 9. Having had to cancel a couple of shows on his last tour as a mark of respect for a band member whose father had died, Geraghty and his band will be keen to make amends on their next outing.
His former bandmate Damien Rice is keeping a relatively low profile at the minute after a full on year last year. The only gigs being talked of at the moment are a few fairly high profile benefits in the US. Having played the Global Green Pre-Oscar party in Hollywood he’ll be returning there on Saturday March 1 to take part in a benefit concert in support of the campaign for Human Rights and Democracy in Burma, a cause he has been long associated with, but one which has a renewed urgency after the crackdown which followed the peaceful mass demonstrations there in September of last year.
On Tuesday March 18 he will be in New York where he take place in a benefit concert for Peace In Iraq which is taking place in St. Ann’s Warehouse.
Not many artists tour in support of their novel, but Willy Vlautin, of Richmond Fontaine the ‘Kings of Americana’, has just released his second Faber & Faber published novel, Northline and it comes with its own soundtrack and it sees him take to the road once more. With the novel being compared to the writing of American literary giants such as Raymond Carver and John Steinbeck and the accompanying album seeing him compared to the likes of Tom Waits and Bruce Springsteen the stakes are being pitched very high. Vlautin plays upstairs at Whelan’s on Friday April 25 in what promises to be a very intimate gig, accompanied by Paul Brainard of the Sadies on pedal steel and trumpet.
Another icon of Americana, former buffalo, Grant Lee Philips will be making a return to Dublin on Monday April 28 when he plays a show at Whelan’s as part of the continuing tour in support of last year’s Strangelet album. The album, which featured musical cameos from REM’s Peter Buck and ex-Ministry drummer Bill Rieflin, is his most immediate solo offering and although the show also revisits other points in his musical past it’s the new material which he enjoys playing most as its immediacy translates perfectly into the live domain.
Paddy’s Day this year seems to be creeping up on us with much less than the usual hype although Kila are pretty buzzed at the moment what with being nominated for the Choice Music Prize this year. They’ll be playing in the Olympia on Saint Patrick’s night itself – a venue that should suit their slightly baroque sense of theatricality perfectly. Across the city Mary Black will be making an extremely rare live appearance in the National Concert Hall.
Down the country the people of Slieve Bloom will be treating themselves, and anyone else who cares to come along, to the Music of the Mountain festival which will be rolling out between Friday March 14 and Sunday March 16. The centrepiece of the festival is a concerts on the Saturday and Sunday nights in the banqueting hall of Kinnity Castle. The concert on Saturday March 15 features Sean Keane, Allan MacDonald, Mary Greene and Noel Shine and the Paddy Buckley Band, while the show on the Sunday night features Alec Finn, Sean Ryan, David Kinsella, Denis Ryan and special guest Dolores Keane.