release date: May 16, 2003
format: cd
[album rate: 4 / 5] [3,78]
producer: John Reynolds
label: Clear Records - nationality: Ireland
Track highlights: 1. "Negative Vibes" - 2. "Ghosts of Overdoses" - 3. "It's All Good" (live) - 4. "Factories" - 5. "Jar Song" - 6. "Celtic Tiger" - 7. "Apple of My Eye" - 11. "Seize the Day"
2nd studio album by Irish singer / songwriter Damien Dempsey following They Don't Teach This Shit at School (Mar. 2000). The album is released on his and producer John Reynolds' own now defunct label.
The name Damien Dempsey may not ring a bell in many people's ears but he has become no less than a national icon in Ireland thanks to his many albums blending traditional folk and storytelling with a contemporary mindset, while connecting with both modern folk pop and traditionally-shaped songwriting. Sinéad O'Connor provides backing vocals on three tracks (tracks #1, #3, and #6). Prior to the recording of this album, O'Connor invited Dempsey on a live tour as supporting act when she performed with some of the material that ended up on her Irish folk album Sean-Nós Nua (Oct. 2002). John Reynolds has produced and / or played on the majority of O'Connor's albums, and he caught up with Dempsey as O'Connor had praised his songwriter talent.
Dempsey plays modernised Irish folk, which both bonds to The Dubliners as well as The Pogues, or should I perhaps say Shane MacGowan - another artist with his heart for Irish tradtions as well as being an Irish icon himself.
Seize the Day is a great album with songs about contemporary life for working class people and songs about what really matters in life, and then he's got a fine and gentle vocal. The song "It's All Good" is also found on O'Connor's album Collaborations (2005). Paste Magazine review by Andy Whitman (from 2004) says much of Dempsey's status: "Irish soul is a notoriously elusive quality. Van Morrison has it, at least when he still cares. Sinéad O’Connor has it. Bono, for all his other undeniably great musical attributes, does not. Twenty-nine-year-old Dublin native Damien Dempsey has it, and his barely contained passion and grit lift the songs on his second album, Seize the Day, from good into frequently sublime territory."
Highly recommended.
[ allmusic.com 3 / 5, 👉Paste Magazine 3,5 / 5, Sputnik Music 4,5 / 5 stars ]
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| alt. 2004 cover |
