It’s a pretty impressive rate of progress for any band when they go from playing for a handful of punters in a small venue to performing for over 4000 people in just under 12 months. But that’s exactly what Cork outfit Jodavino have managed to achieve since they first got it together in July of 2005.
The band, which includes brother and sister duo Joe and Aoibheann Carey along with former Ruby Horse man Joe Philpott, Humphry Murphy on bass and Trevor Kiely on drums, have just released their debut album and are in the middle of their first nationwide tour.
“It’s been a bit of a rollercoaster ride for us over the last year,” explains Aoibheann. “We got it all going last summer when we were offered a 12-week residency in Cyprus Avenue in Cork City. It started with only about ten or 15 people in the audience, but by the end of the run we were packing them in. When that was finished we rented a vacant house and started working on the album.”
Before they formed the band they had all been pursuing their own separate musical paths, according to Aoibheann. “Joe [Carey] was out on his own as a solo artist doing quite well; I was gigging out in Germany trying to make a living. Then Joe Philpott came back from the States and we asked him would he mind coming onboard. Humphrey was a fantastic bass player and he was free too so he was in, and Trevor completed the line-up. We began quite low-key but we got a bit more rocky as time went on.”
It’s not the first time a brother and sister have formed a band and it won’t be the last. But surely there must be difficulties when siblings work so closely together especially with Aoibheann being the only female? Not so, she says.
“Me and Joe always got on well together; we were the ones who were always out front in a family of five. But I think the voices work very well together too. When you’re siblings there’s a kind of similar quality in the timbre of the vocals and it just gels together. And as far as being the only woman in a band - there’s absolutely no problem. Having said that, you don’t want lads who are too laddish. Luckily they’re all perfect gentleman towards me.”
The eagle-eyed among you might have spotted that the band’s moniker is a clever combination of Joe and Aoibheann or rather her nickname which she says is “Vino”.
“It’s absolutely nothing to do with wine, I swear it,” she laughs. “It just sounded good and we banged it out in a few minutes and thought, yeah that’ll do fine.”
The band’s sound isn’t so easy to pin down. Essentially a guitar based one with a taut rhythm section, it recalls a broad range of styles and genres. One track, ‘Over And Above’ comes across as the kind of sound Kate Bush might have achieved had she fronted The Smiths, while the single ‘Move Me’ is a more melodic, jangly indie affair, reminiscent of Belle and Sebastian.
“With five people in the band, you’re going to get different influences,” she offers. “Joe (Philpott) would probably say he’s a big U2 and Americana fan. Joe, my brother and myself are very mixed in our tastes – I started out loving Madonna and The Cure then I went over to Billie Holiday. The strange thing is, it doesn’t really come out in the music. We thought it was really funny when someone compared us to Rage Against The Machine. But people will always identify bands with other artists; with two vocalists it’s probably going to happen even more.”
Jodavino recently supported Roxy Music at their Marquee gig in Cork, a high point of their short career, according to Aoibheann. “It was fantastic,” she enthuses. “It had the taste of more about it. It was by far the biggest crowd we’d ever played for – there must have been about 5,000 people there. It was all over so quickly but I felt I could have gone on all night. They were very nice to us backstage and very complimentary about our performance. We were given a little taste of what it would be like to be at this level all the time.”
Meanwhile they up the ante this month with the release of their debut album Deep End and the single ‘Move Me’, which has already been well received by radio.
As to whether they would now like a kind record company executive to come along with a large cheque, the answer is unequivocal.
“Would anyone say no to that kind of investment? Ireland is an important market and we’ve come this far on our own, so it’s not essential. But it would be nice!”