cat melodeon, adj. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

cat melodeon adj.

[? cat adj. (1) + the supposed tendency of accordion (melodeon) players to fluff their notes; ? or the howling of a cat on heat]

appalling, disastrous.

1987		Mayo News 29 Sept. 12/2: [headline] ‘Cat Melodeon’ traffic chaos.
1996		Irish Times 4 May n.p.: Carson even attempts to find a history for the greatest expression in Hiberno-English, namely cat melodeon [BS].
2003		Irish Examiner (Cork) 29 July 36: And what do you get? A train service which is cat melodeon. ‘We’re getting there,’ is the message from our rail body but what do the punters do while this torturous journev is in progress?
2005		posting at www.boards.ie 21 Jan. 🌐 It’s [i.e. cat = bad] short for ‘cat melodeon’, a reference to a cacophony reminiscent of a feline in heat combined with a badly-played squeezebox, and applied to all things of an equally unpleasant nature.
2016		Southern Star (Cork) 16 Apr. 1/7: Kinsale farmer Broadband service is ‘cat melodeon’.