Photo by Shervin Lainez
“All-star group” (Rolling Stone) Fantastic Cat's "C'mon Armageddon" is featured in this week’s episode of the new Sylvester Stallone series Tulsa King, streaming now on Paramount+. The band also performed the freewheeling track, which kicks off their critically acclaimed debut, The Very Best Of Fantastic Cat, on CBS Saturday Morning.
After earning raves with the album everywhere from American Songwriter to No Depression here in the States, the instrument-swapping four-piece is headed to Europe for headline dates this spring before returning to the US for festival performances in the summer, including the just-announced In Between Days, which finds them sharing a bill with Lord Huron, Modest Mouse, Blitzen Trapper, and more.
They said it couldn’t be done. Four different songwriters joining forces to form a single band? There was simply no precedent (outside of CSNY, The Beatles, The Traveling Wilburys, The Highwaymen, Monsters of Folk, etc). And yet Fantastic Cat did it anyway, defying the odds and teaming up to record their highly unanticipated debut, The Very Best Of Fantastic Cat. Captured in the wilds of the Pocono Mountains, the album gleefully careens between genres and decades, mixing electrified 60’s folk and 70’s AM radio gold as it balances careful craftsmanship and ecstatic abandon in equal measure.
Individually, each member of Fantastic Cat boasts their own impressive resume along with a litany of critical acclaim. NPR said Anthony D’Amato “sings and writes in the tradition of Bruce Springsteen or Josh Ritter.” No Depression dubbed Don DiLego’s latest album “a masterpiece.” Rolling Stone called Brian Dunne’s latest single a “stunner” and praised Mike Montali’s band, Hollis Brown, as “the soundtrack for a late-night drive through the American heartland.” Collectively, though, the four transcend their respective roots, emerging as an instrument-swapping, harmony-trading, tear-jerking, wise-cracking rock and roll cooperative far greater than the sum of its parts.
FANTASTIC CAT TOUR DATES:
12 Jan Asbury Park, NJ - Asbury Lanes
14 Jan Red Bank, NJ - Hackensack Meridian Health Theatre at the Count Basie Center for the Arts
15 Jan Asbury Park, NJ - Songwriters By The Sea
25 Feb Woodbridge Township, NJ - Avenel Performing Arts Center
10 Mar Leffinge, Belgium - De Zwerver
11 Mar Amen, Netherlands - Café "De Amer"
12 Mar Dörphof, Germany - The Upstage
15 Mar Hagen Am Teutoburger Wald, Germany - Gaststätte Stock
16 Mar Essen, Germany - Jazz Im Jubb
17 Mar Altlandsberg, Germany - Buchholz Saloon
19 Mar Groningen, Netherlands - Oosterpoort
20 Mar Amsterdam, Netherlands - Paradiso
21 Mar Leiden, Netherlands - Qbus Club
25 Mar New York, NY - Webster Hall
28 Apr Kilkenny, Ireland - Kilkenny Roots Festival
29 Apr Kilkenny, Ireland - Kilkenny Roots Festival
30 Apr Lessines, Belgium - Roots & Roses Festival
01 May Lessines, Belgium - Roots & Roses Festival
02 Jun Kill Devil Hills, NC - Down The Hatch 2023
03 Jun Kill Devil Hills, NC - Down The Hatch 2023
20 Aug Quincy, MA - In Between Days Festival 2023
