SOUNDTRACK: KATE DAVIS-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #59 (August 4, 2020).
I hadn’t heard of Kate Davis before this Home Concert.
Her songs are simple and straightforward with a real timeless quality. She reminds me a lot of Kathleen Edwards. Turns out that she also co-wrote Sharon van Etten’s “Seventeen.”
Like so many artists, Kate Davis was to be on tour during the spring and summer of 2020. She was scheduled to play a concert at my desk in May. Sitting by her desk at home, Kate Davis is marking time by writing new music…. She’s an extraordinary lyricist. Her 2019 album, Trophy, was a sharply worded collection of songs, many about growing up and a powerful tune about her father’s death.
“Cloud” has a great melody throughout, and the chorus is great–with her falsetto moment an unexpected bonus. The slow middle section is also a really nice surprise.
“Open Heart,” the second song performed for her Tiny Desk (home) concert, is about a broken heart. It’s a subject tackled by many, but her lyrical prowess sets the scene in the hospital, where the doctor cuts her open, sees her critical condition, and takes out her broken heart. She sings, “Put the pieces back together, looks like it’s been shattered by a bad love,” later adding, “You’d rather feel this pain than have a broken heart.”
This song features another great delivery as she sings the lyric high but then adds a lower almost spoken word during the bridge “deep…breath.” The song builds and builds to the end and I love that the chugging guitar chords ends with a slightly-off-ringing note that adds a cool amount of dissonance to a song about a broken heart.
I guess these songs sound different on the record since the blurb says:
Hearing these songs stripped to their essence–just Kate Davis and her guitar–exposes her charm and wit.
“I Like Myself” is a finger-picked style of playing–sounding quite different from the other songs. The lyrics are very thoughtful:
I kind of like myself
Cause she likes me
And since I think the world of her
And she of me
Then I’m exactly who and where I want to be
Who and where I want to be
“Ride or Die,” was written before quarantine and its perspective has changed since. The chord structure and vocal melody is unusual and very cool. I especially like the way she adds a really slow section in the middle–a picked melody (of more unusual chords). This is my favorite of her songs and I’m looking forward top hearing more.
Davis looks at the camera a lot during this performance–making her seem very confident, which I gather she is.
[READ: August 1, 2020] “Dalton’s Box”
I loved this story. It was fast and colloquial. It was funny and dark and I want to read more stories like it.
The story is basically a conversation between two brothers. The one brother asks if the other remembers Mick Dalton. He does.
A few months back, Dalton won the Lottery. Not a huge amount though, about 3,000 quid. And Dalton, who is usually in trouble for some petty crime or another, says he’s going to invest it.
That means a get rich quick(ish) scheme selling contraband. But this time Dalton is smart, you see. He’;s going to sell contraband Marlboro cigarettes (I have no idea how that’s going to work).
He plans to buy 2,500 quid worth of the cigs. He calls his contact who says they can do it, but it has to be done properly so that customs doesn’t inquire into it.
Dalton has to create a company (British Drain) and rents a small property (100 quid a month, but that’s okay). He gets a delivery, but it is so large that he needs a forklift to unload it. So he asks his mate who works around the corner if he can bring the forklift over. When all is said and done he has paid out a few hundred more quid.
He opens the huge crate to find a lot of pipes and a few cartons of cigs –a fraction of what he requested. He calls his contact, fearing he’s been ripped off. But the contact says he wanted to do a trial run first. Since it went well, the rest will come soon.
A short time later a huge crate arrives at his property, but it is surrounded by customs agents. What is he going to do? If he leaves it there, someone is just going to steal it. If he takes it, he’ll get in trouble with customs.
He decides to ask a friend to steal it–if he gets caught Dalton won’t press charges so no big concern. They will need a large truck though–so that’s a bit more money to lay out,.
This story was short and I don’t want to spoil any more, but what a great little tale. I will definitely look for other stories from Barry.
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