This Year's Girl
Courtesy of Kerrang Magazine
Written By- Allison Stuart
 
Catherine recorded their second full-length album, Hot Saki and Bedtime Stories, in a home studio on drummer Kerry Brown's 70-acre apple farm in southern Michigan, a place sufficiently removed from civilization to make finding a female duet partner for the song "Four Leaf Clover" difficult.  The
members of Catherine ultimately turned to Brown's wife, Smashing Pumpkins' bassist D'Arcy Brown, for help, although not, they will tell you, without considerable agonizing.

 "I really didn't want to use any of those guys in any capacity, but we were right in the middle of fucking nowhere and there's no one around but her," says lead singer Mark Rew.  "She's a good singer and we wanted a female voice, so it was better to use her than to drive two hours to Chicago to try to find someone else, even though I really wanted to sever that {Pumpkins}
connection."

 Though "Four Leaf Clover" is wonderfully catchy, a natural first single, Catherine's members were reluctant to release it, not wanting their first ecposure to most of America to come courtesy of Brown's wife.  Their objections were ultimately overridden by the president of their record label,
a decision none of the band's members seem happy about, though Brown tries to put a positve spin on things.  "I wanted it to be the second single, actually, but when it's all said and done, it's a good predicament to be in, to argue about what's gonna be the first single, what's gonna be the second
single.  At least they think we have more than one single in us, you know?"

Having Billy Corgan produce the band's debut, the 1993 EP Sleepy, helped distinguish them from the then-burgeoning Chicago scean's numerous Urge/Veruca/Pumpkins clones, although Rew now downplays Corgan's input.

 "Honestly, Billy was there for the recording of Sleepy, but he only actually did, like, one or two songs; he really didn't have a lot to do with it."

 Since Catherine's two founding members have left, taking most of the knowledge of Catherine's past with them, the current members have only indistinct memories of the band's pre-Sleepy existence.  None know where the band's name came from, for example (no one thought to ask the original
members before they left), and anything more than a vague recollection of the band's first single, the Brad Wood-produced "Charmed," is similarly lost to history.  Most questions about their revolving-door lineup (now seemingly solidified), are met with "I don't know" or, "Nobody remembers."

 Even though past records have shown the band's affection for all things '70's, with "Hot Saki" Catherine seem to be moving ever closer to glam rock, with a timing that, given the attention currently awarded acts like Nancy Boy and Jonathan Fire*Eater, couldn't be better:  "Four Leaf Clover" has a knowingly kitschy, Sonny and Cher-type vibe that, in combination with Hot
Saki's psychedelic feel and the band's stated fondness for Syd Barrett, has led even Catherine's own record label to tag them "modern day retro."

 No one in the band can figure out whether this is a compliment or not, but, says Rew,
"It doesn't bother me.  For us, it's just {our own} new music that we're writing - we're not trying to find an era and say, 'Let's sound like that.'  We're not trying to emulate anybody else.  It's not our total image that's glam, it's really the one song that's glam.  Or maybe a couple of songs.  But we're just trying to be us, that's all.  We don't know how to be anything else."