As I lament my inability to travel to New York for this year for the 12th Annual
Craic Fest, I am ruminating on the events from 2009's Craic Fest, reposted from
Paddy-Whacked Radio™ here:
Concert Review: FairplayCollective, Colin Devlin, Foy Vance, Paddy Casey - Craic FestBy Natalie Herman
Saturday’s Craic Fest opened with
FairplayCollective. If you are new to Paddy-Whacked Radio™, you might not know about this innovative team of separate and independent artists who support one another both with musical performance and with everything that happens musically offstage. Formed in 2006 by
Michael Brunnock,
Mark Dignam,
Jenna Nicholls, and
Brendan O’Shea,
FairplayCollective has become a wonderful tool for these like-minded musicians to advance themselves down their musical paths.
This committedness to one another is very obvious onstage, and a
FairplayCollective set seems less like a show and more like a party where your extremely talented and fun friends have picked up their instruments for a bit of entertainment.
FAIRPLAYCOLLECTIVEMark Dignam, who is based in Pittsburgh, joined
Brunnock, Nicholls, and
O’Shea while still cooling his heels from his recent stint in Ireland, where he played with
Glen Hansard and
The Frames and
Liam O’Maonlai of
The Hothouse Flowers. He appeared to have not been able to shake off the remaining magic of the Isle as he executed an enchanted performance of “Crow” and “Stormy Summer.”
Jenna Nicholls opened the set with her stunning song, “Hallelujah,” displaying a champion vocal range. She also played an unreleased song, as yet untitled. Aided by
O’Shea on the electric guitar,
Nicholls silenced the crowd with her impeccable voice.
Her background vocals rang true and clear as ever on
Michael Brunnock's “
Man Overboard.”
Brunnock chose for this Craic Fest celebration two of his more Irish-themed songs: “Man Overboard” is about emigrating to America, and while the lyrics themselves convey confusion and disorientation, Brunnock has managed to infuse an energy of hopefulness and capability into the song. His ode to St. Patrick, “Sensation,” astonished the crowd as giant galaxies of sonic bliss issued from the well of genius inside him.
Brendan O’Shea, who has such a great way with the crowd - with every song, you feel like you’re a guest at his apartment on Avenue A - got everyone singing along to his feel-good anthem, “Pull Your Socks Up.” He then had everyone laughing when he leaned over and asked across
Nicholls and
Brunnock in the most polite-as-you-please way, “Mark, can I have the pic?” He needed it in order to sing the melancholic “Dismantled.”
COLIN DEVLINColin Devlin went on next, in the US from Dublin to support the release of his solo debut, Democracy of Now, not yet out in the states but available now in Ireland. “What Good is Love” and “Waiting” were the stand-out songs in this set of beautiful vocally-driven acoustic songs. Devlin, who is best known from the family band The Devlins (whose remixed single “Waiting” was included on the “Six Feet Under” soundtrack), has a tonally-superior voice that will carry him very nicely along his divergent path.
FOY VANCEFoy Vance took the stage next, in from Belfast.
Vance set up, took out his cell phone, turned it off, held it up, and said, “I suggest you do the same.”
Vance shouldn’t have worried, as the 300 people - all of which were him, it appears - who joined him onstage via his iMac and various gadgetry drowned out any chance of a cell phone interruption. “I am the son of a preacher,” Vance explained to the audience, and the charismatic way that he turned that intimate club into an arena-housed gospel revival tended to make you believe his s tatement. Somehow, though, while doing this,
Vance managed to remain completely non-pious, sharing with the audience a cute joke “you can tell your mum” and sharing an interesting anecdote about a barbecue, a swim mask, and flippers.
Perhaps the best way to understand what goes on in the consciousness of
Foy Vance is in the lyrics of the mind-blowing song, “Indiscriminate Act of Kindness.” There is no way to even begin to do justice to this song with any sort of talking about it - it is something that you have to experience for yourself. Please do me a personal favor: if you happen to run into
Taylor Hicks, tell him that while we indie music lovers appreciate the effort to bring this phenomenal song to light, he could never ever do with that song what
Foy Vance did onstage at Mercury Lounge for Craic Fest on March 14, 2009.
On behalf of all those in attendance, I would kindly request that when
Vance is finished with the hearts he snatched from all of our chests, he drop us a line as to when and where we can conveniently collect them.
PADDY CASEYFinally, in an act of bravery last seen with Brian Boru,
Paddy Casey took the stage, alone with his acoustic guitar.
Casey put on a special encore performance - he headlined Friday night, but due to a visa problem with
Duke Special, who was scheduled for Saturday night, he graciously followed
Vance’s life-changing performance. As a huge credit to
Paddy Casey’s musical talents and abilities, he pulled off a brilliant set. His onstage persona was humble and self-depricating, but his performance begged no apologies. A brilliant guitar player, Casey played a great mix of newer and older songs, reminding me again why this time last year, he was one of the people chosen for
MTV’s “Artist of the Week” promotion they were doing in March. A special thanks and gratitude is owed to
Casey for taking the request of “Bend Down Low,” a song written by a brilliant 15-year-old who was
Paddy Casey a number of years ago. Hopefully, having the entire audience sing along to it was satisfying enough to
Casey to justify adding it to his set list.
FINALEAlthough it was well after one o’clock, there were still a number of fans who remained and were treated when
FairplayCollective joined
Casey onstage for two energy-filled songs, inviting a sing-along from the audience.
It only goes to show that where there is Irish music, there is magic.
Copyright © 2009 Natalie Herman and Paddy-Whacked Radio™
