|
|
On an apple farm somewhere in the American state of Michigan, a pie is cooking. You might recognise the smell- It's something like Pumpkin- but the seasoning is slightly different from the regular Pumpkin pie. The after taste is familiar too, but sweeter than what you'd come to expect.
On this apple farm in Michigan you'll find Kerry and D'Arcy. Kerry plays in 'Catherine' D'Arcy plays in 'Smashing Pumpkins'. People say Catherine sounds like Smashing Pumpkins. The band are surely sick of hearing that.
In fact, the vocals on Catherine's new record 'Hot Saki and Bedtime Stories' are sometimes more reminisent of the Smashing Pumpkins record 'Gish'. he whole tone is much more like early Smashing Pumpkins than the band's angst driven efforts of late. If you're going to talk about Catherine in the context of the Pumpkins (and that's only valid some of the time), it must be qualified with reference to Billy Corgan as introspective thought provoker, rather than Billy the rat in a cage bully boy.
The apple farm in Michigan is a place where Catherine spends a fair swag of it's off-the-road time.
"We have a studio here" explains the corgan-esque vocalist Mark Rew. "I'm in the house right now, but our studio is situated within the apple farm. It's a farm, only a farm for music"
It's on this farm for music that Catherine bakes it's peculiar Pumpkin pie. The pop they peddle cuts the swathe across the decades, melding everything from heighty '60's hooks to '90's down home rock. It was the heavy rock and glam periods falling slap in the middle that had Kansas-bred Rew most inspired to hitch a ride down the rock highway, his journey eventually taking him to Chicago where Catherine is now based.
"As a teenager? I was into Alice Cooper, Black Sabbath, Led Zepplin, all the normal rock stuff and some of the glam rock stuff (like) the Sweet. I saw Bowie on Mother's day during the heroes tour and I took my mom"
It's a considerable distance from Kansas teenager to rising Chicago pop star however, and Catherine's journey has seen the band touring the USA extensively, as well as through Canada and Europe and the UK. The tough shell of success is starting to crack, due in part to the helpful exposure of having D'Arcy sing on the single 'four leaf clover'. The band has also just completed a video shoot for it's Hot Saki cut 'whisper' (which also features on the scream soundtrack) with director Wes Craven's son, Jonathan as director, which will only help it's profile. If Catherine ever reaches heights close to the Pumpkins', Rew won't be thanking radio in the US for giving the band a leg-up.
"America is weird right now because of the radio format" he explains "I don't know if you have top 40 in Australia? Well, the top 40 a few years ago is kind of what radio is like right now across the board. It's really predictable and boring"
What radio lacks in excitement for Catherine, the band more than makes up for it in personnel. Scott Evers better known as 'Fever', was a long term touring fixture in Urge Overkill before he took up full time residency as lead guitarist in Catherine.
"He'd never really been in a band" says Rew "He'd always just been a touring member and he really wanted to be a true member of a band"
And with the exception of those Smashing Pumpkins celebrity spots (James Iha also gets a mention in Hot Saki" the Catherine line-up is completed by brothers Keith and Kerry Brown.
Big bundles of brotherly love all 'round?
"You know how the Oasis thing was?" asks Rew "Well it's a lot worse than that. I'll leave it up to your imagination"