David Kitt at Vicar Street: Hot Press critic Paul Nolan hails a superb St Patrick's Day show

On St Patrick's Day 2003, David Kitt played Vicar Street in Dublin. Ten days later, Hot Press published a review by Paul Nolan that stands among the most enthusiastic accounts of Kitt's live performances. Nolan described the show as superb and suggested it might be the best gig of the year, a bold claim to make in late March.

What Nolan responded to most was momentum. Kitt opened with crowd favourites, a choice that can leave a set with nowhere to go. According to the review, he avoided that trap, keeping energy and audience participation high for the rest of the evening. Nolan credited him with holding the room together rather than letting the early high points drain the night.

The review picked out several specific moments. A duet with Kitt's younger brother was a highlight, and the band's performance of I Wanna Be Sedated, the Ramones song, was described as blistering. Nolan also singled out an elaborate trumpet solo that unfolded during a stagedive and crowd-surf, a moment that stood out in his account of the night.

The verdict was clear. The audience left thoroughly satisfied, and Nolan's piece suggests a gig that combined careful song selection with a looser, more playful sense of occasion. The review carried no numerical rating, so its force rests entirely on the prose, and it is that tone of unreserved praise that makes it worth revisiting.

The piece also says something about how Kitt was regarded on stage in 2003. Here was a singer-songwriter whose Dublin headline show could be read as a party as much as a listening session, and a national music magazine critic who was willing to say so in strong terms. Two decades on, the review remains a useful marker of how well the act could work a room when everything came together.