NEWS

Tour DATES

CATHERINE ANNE DAVIES - PRODUCTION & CO-WRITING

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PRODUCTION

Catherine Anne Davies is a producer, multi-instrumentalist and songwriter originally from Wales. Her artist project, The Anchoress, has seen her twice nominated for the Welsh Music Prize and named an Album of the Year by everyone from Elton John to The Sunday Times, to Record Collector and Prog Magazine

A three times nominee for the prestigious Music Producers Guild Awards, Catherine’s early roots as a classically-trained flautist have seen her journey from her engineering and co-writing credits on Top 20 albums, to recently being appointed as Professor of Music Production and Songwriting at ICMP & SAE.

Since winning a PRS Writer/Producer award in 2019,  she has spent much of the last six years on her current obsession with vintage synthesizers.

Her Welsh Music Prize nominated self-produced second album as The Anchoress, The Art of Losing was both critically-lauded and achieved a Top 10 position in the UK physical album charts, as well as the #1 spot on iTunes. Album of the Year plaudits came from the Sunday Times, Record Collector, Line of Best Fit, Mail on Sunday, The Sun, and Prog Magazine.

Catherine’s recent production projects include the lead radio single for Dot Allison’s remix project, producing and mixing on the forthcoming Hen Hoose collective volume 2 compilation, co-producing her BBC 6 Music supported collaboration with Band Spectra, and producing and mixing the forthcoming Liberty’s album. 

She has also built a growing reputation as a go-to remixer for alternative artists such Bishi, Thea Gilmore, and Roxanne DeBastion, and 
Other recent projects also include co-production for Band Spectra, and a 5 track co-writing, engineering, and production contribution to the Top 20 UK album ‘Spooky Action’ by ​Paul Draper​.

Her self-produced debut album as ​The Anchoress, ​Confessions of A Romance Novelist​ (2016) was named amongst the Guardian critics’ Albums of the Year, won ​HMV’s Welsh Album of the Year​, ​Best Newcomer at the PROG​ awards, and a nomination for the ​Welsh Music Prize​.

In Memory of My Feelings, her collaborative album with ​Bernard Butler (Duffy, Suede) - including 10 original co-written tracks  - was released in October 2020 via Needle Mythology. 

Catherine currently lectures on the MA programme at ICMP in London and co-leads the ‘Culture of Belonging’ studio workshops for women and gender minorities - a joint project between Miloco Studios and The F-List.

She is currently producing and writing for the Creative Scotland funded project Hen Hoose - an all-female songwriting collective and sync project, including a collaboration with 3 time BBC Folk Award winner Karine Polwart.

CO-WRITING

Catherine has co-written with and worked alongside a variety of prominent industry names including ​Ed Harcourt (Paloma Faith & James Bay), ​Liam Howe (Jessie Ware, Marina) and ​Paul Statham (Kylie, Dido). She has also co-written with artists outside of the alternative rock genre, including MOBO-nominated singer-songwriter/cellist ​Ayanna Witter-Johnson ​and British rapper ​Riz MC​.

Alongside writing and producing, over the past few years Catherine also brought a new generation of ears to legendary Scottish rock band ​Simple Minds​. She joined the line-up in 2014, bringing a fresh sound and look to the legendary Scottish band, appearing on the ​Big Music ​(2015) and ​Walk Between Worlds(2019) albums as well as touring on keyboards, guitar, and additional vocals. 

As a member of the ​Dark Flowers supergroup (alongside Jim Kerr (​Simple Minds​), Pete Murphy (​Bauhaus​), Kate Havenevik, Gabrielle Cilmi, and Shelley Poole (​Alisha’s Attic​), Catherine co-wrote 6 tracks and appears as a featured artist on both of the collective’s albums. 

While completing her PhD, Catherine was appointed ‘Emerging Artist in Residence’ at the Southbank Centre in London. During this 18 month-long tenure she collaborated on a new song cycle with ​Nitin Sawhney,​ as well as working with the London Philharmonic on new collaborative work.

LIVE SESSION WORK

Live work includes TV performances on Strictly Come Dancing and the Billboard Awards with Simple Minds, Glastonbury and Isle of Wight Festival with Manic Street Preachers, Glastonbury and End of the Road festival with Ed Harcourt, Radio 1 live sessions with Riz MC, and a full length live Radio 2 show with Simple Minds. In 2018 she ​appeared on two tracks and duetted on "Dylan & Caitlin' from the No.2 album by the ​Manic Street Preachers ​“Resistance is Futile”​. She was also MD and played keyboards for the 2017 UK Paul Draper tour.

Catherine is currently a Senator for the Ivors Academy. She is also an ambassador for the FAC (Featured Artists Coalition) and Music Venues Trust, as well as previosuly sitting on the UK Music Diversity Committee for the Music Producer’s Guild.

The Anchoress

The Anchoress (aka Catherine Anne Davies) returns with As We Once Were - a bold, unflinching new album from one of the UK’s most distinctive voices. Landing this August via Last Night From Glasgow, the 14-track record marks her third studio release, following the Welsh Music Prize-nominated The Art Of Losing and the cult favourite Confessions Of A Romance Novelist.

As We Once Were is the long-awaited follow-up to the UK Top 40 album The Art Of Losing, which received wall-to-wall critical plaudits upon its release in 2021 and scooped up a raft of Album of The Year nods from The Sunday Times, to Prog, to the Mail on Sunday. With Sir Elton John naming it “one of my favourite records of the year” and Caitlin Moran calling it “the inadvertent, beautiful and truthful soundtrack to this moment”, it went on to sell over 10,000 physical copies via the power of pure word of mouth.


The new album features an all-star cast of guest appearances, including guest vocals from Mercury Music Prize nominated Welsh-Cornish musician Gwenno, with many more to be announced.

Self-produced by the three-times Music Producers’ Guild nominated Davies at Black Lodge, mixed by Dave Eringa (Manic Street Preachers, Idlewild), and mastered by Jon Astley (The Who, Tori Amos), the new album was developed over the past two years, with Davies stockpiling musical ideas after the birth of her daughter.

She describes the album as “a conversation across four generations of women”, born out of the collision of two moments from the recent past: being given access to work with all of Pete Townshend’s vintage synths at the Townshend Studios in West London, against the backdrop of the birth of her first child (after numerous losses), and the discovery of her grandmother’s voice on a cassette tape in her mother’s loft: 

“I found myself diving backwards to go forwards. Hands on the keys of synths once played by the legendary genius of Townshend, tongue in the words uttered by my grandmother, as well as those beginning to emerge from the mouth of my own young daughter. Holding a conversation across the generations, asking questions of the past as a way to propel myself forwards to a future that might look different.”

As We Once Were probes themes of loss, trauma and parenthood, and the rebirth that emerges from these experiences: 

“As I pulled on these threads, I began a journey into my genetic past and our cultural past in order to piece myself back together. It became something akin to the art of Japanese kintsugi - a symbolic process which teaches us that through healing and transformation we can create something more valuable than before.”

The album announcement follows hot on the heels of the release of lead single I Had A Baby Not A Lobotomy on BBC Radio 6 Music, which premiered with an exclusive live interview with Steve Lamacq speaking about “being let loose on Pete Townshend's synths, and how tripping over a cassette tape gave rise to the new 14 track concept album about the nature of time”.

The album also arrives alongside the launch of her new podcast in May, The Milk & The Music, a series of solutions-focused conversations exploring how the music industry grapples with its "Motherhood Penalty". Forthcoming guests include MPG award winner Lau.ra, Charlotte Hatherley (Ash), and Ivor Novello nominee Gazelle Twin.

The Anchoress will play a one-off album launch show at London’s legendary 100 Club - the oldest independent venue in the world - on Saturday 22nd August to celebrate the release of the new record. The show will be an early curfew of 10pm with a parent-friendly stage time.

As We Once Were is available to pre-order from www.lastnightfromglasgow.com on 2LP etched leopard print vinyl, gatefold CD, deluxe 2CD mediabook, and limited edition cassette.

www.theanchoress.co.uk

Praise for The Art of Losing:

"Skewers the messy, chaotic nature of grief. Intense…” ☆☆☆☆ NME
"Davies has given a powerful, challenging voice to her grief.” ☆☆☆☆  THE OBSERVER
"A brave and inspirational album.”  SUNDAY TIMES - ALBUM OF THE WEEK
"Cuts latter-day Bowie art rock shapes." ☆☆☆☆  MOJO
"Intense, insistent and inspired. Existential torment has never sounded so alluring…"   ☆☆☆☆☆ PROG
"Shining alt-pop from an artisan of darkness. A bold voice in the darkest shadows." ☆☆☆☆  RECORD COLLECTOR
"Quotable, immersive, moving, imaginative, delicate, and dramatic. A stellar achievement.” THE QUIETUS
"A defiant and glorious second album.... An intensely compelling record."☆☆☆☆  CLASSIC POP
"A lyrically bold, musically lush art rock investigation of grief… like Chrissie Hynde and David Bowie on a synth-pop death trip.” THE TELEGRAPH - ALBUM OF THE WEEK
"Swaggering synthpop... Infectiously buoyant." ☆☆☆☆ UNCUT
"Determined and rapturous. 9/10.” THE LINE OF BEST FIT - ALBUM OF THE WEEK
"Serious, accomplished art rock." ☆☆☆☆ THE TIMES
"Grief and loss are its themes, rendered in handsomely wrought tones of orchestral rock.” ☆☆☆☆ FT
"Davies’ voice, like Annie Lennox’s, mixes vulnerability with verve. She gets to the heart of grief, showing it’s not so much five stages as six emotions at the same time. And she turns it into something life-enhancing.” ☆☆☆☆  MAIL ON SUNDAY - ALBUM OF THE WEEK
"The Welsh Renaissance woman harnesses grief, fury, and love of storytelling on a compelling sequel.” 8/10 CLASH

Praise for Confessions of a Romance Novelist:

"A devastatingly powerful voice ☆☆☆☆" MOJO
"Davies is making music like nobody else at the moment."  NME
"One of the year’s most affecting records... a collection of songs that sets a high bar for intense, soul-tearing pop music. 9/10." THE LINE OF BEST FIT
"Addresses the peaks and troughs of love, commitment and betrayal...Fascinating."   SUNDAY TIMES
"A rich and complex debut...a blackly witty breakup album...Compelling." THE OBSERVER
"A flawless and sophisticated hyper-literate pop record." GQ
"Karen Carpenter singing John Grant." UNCUT
"Hounds Of Love, updated for the 21st century." PROG
"A record which could sneak big ideas past the listeners of daytime radio." Q
"Rich and satisfyingly poptastic." THE QUIETUS