Single release: 'F U Cancer' by Catherine Britt and friends

Golden Guitar-winning singer-songwriter Catherine Britt is on the bright side of her treatment for breast cancer, and she's enlisted some friends to help her say, emphatically, 'F U Cancer'. The new single of that name was written by Britt with powerhouses Beccy Cole and Lyn Bowtell, who both sing on it, along with Kasey Chambers, Josh Pyke, Wes Carr and Wendy Matthews.

Anyone expecting a gloomy tune, however, should adjust their thinking as this is quite a catchy, upbeat number.

All proceeds from the single go to the McGrath Foundation. 

Visit Catherine's website for all the retailer purchase links: https://catherinebritt.lnk.to/FUCancer

Catherine Britt set to shine in The Man in Black

If you've seen Catherine Britt performing recently, you'll know that she is sounding better than ever - her voice has become an instrument of soaring, controlled power. Usually she applies that power to her own wonderful songs, but for a few days she is going to lend it to the music of June Carter Cash and Johnny Cash, as she joins Adam Harvey in the show The Man in Black. I spoke to Catherine about the show and her long friendship with Adam, plus the changes she's made in her life since her diagnosis of and treatment for breast cancer. Catch the inspiring, super-talented Catherine Britt with the always-wonderful Adam Harvey Friday 3 June at Frankston Arts Centre in Victoria - (03) 9784 1060: Tickets available online at www.thefac.com.au

Also showing on Tues 31 May – COPACC, Colac, Wed 1 June – Sale, Thurs 2 June – Warragul, Sat 4 June – Ulumbarra Theatre, Bendigo.

I’d like to start by addressing the obvious: you’ve been going through treatment for cancer that has included chemotherapy. A lot of people might want to have a rest after that but you seem to have just kept going. You’ve been in this show, performing. I’m presuming you’re feeing well.

I am. I’m feeling pretty good. I’m just getting my body back into healthy shape – it got battered around pretty good through it all. So I’m just starting to get everything back in order now, I guess, and starting to feel a little bit normal. It takes a good year to feel 100 per cent again, apparently, but I think every day I feel a little bit more like myself and I’m definitely on the right track as far as getting my health back in order. It’s a slow process but I’m feeling better all the time.

I saw you sing recently, and I have to say from my perspective of someone who has seen you perform a number of times, your voice is sounding better than ever and I wonder if you’ve noticed that shift.

I don’t know. I’ve had a few people say to me that I’m singing better now than I ever have and I don’t know what that is, but I’m definitely feeling better in my voice, like I feel I can do things that I couldn’t do before. I don’t know if it’s a mental shift – I'm just more relaxed now because life’s too short – or if something happened in the treatment that made my voice better. But I’m definitely feeling that way – I feel a lot more confident in it. I’m really enjoying singing at the moment. So, thank you.

You do seem very relaxed on stage and that might open up the channels.

I do think being relaxed is a huge thing, and my whole mental state – the way I look at everything – has really changed as well, and I’m sure that makes a difference. I’m sure those things definitely change everything, really.

So we’ll talk about the show – you are inhabiting June Carter Cash. Did you know much about her before taking this on?

Yes, I did. I’ve been a huge fan of the Carter Family and June herself and Johnny for as long as I can remember. Probably one of the first artists I really discovered was the Carter Family. So I love their story – I think everyone loves their story. It’s such a beautiful love story. She was a real saviour for him and those sorts of stories don’t come along very often. When you’re doing a show that has such a profound and amazing story to tell, and the music of Johnny Cash to go along with it, it’s going to be brilliant, right? The both of them are failsafes. I wouldn’t normally do something like this but I think when I was approached and I read the script and saw the song list, I realised how special it really was and it was one of those one-off things that I really wanted to do. And since we’ve been doing the show, it really is a great show. The songs are so well written, they never get old. They’re just so great to sing and so classic and I really love it. It’s not like we’re playing characters or anything – we’re Catherine Britt and Adam Harvey telling the story of Johnny Cash. It’s a little out of my comfort zone having to learn all that script. I basically tell the story as Adam sings, and I sing a lot of the harmonies, so my role’s quite different to what I'm used to, but it’s great. I really, really enjoy it. It’s nice to be in that offsider position on stage, where I’m not the one singing all the songs, I’m telling the story and doing something different – which really hurts my brain, to memorise that script. But it’s been really good for me to have to learn that and learn a new craft, in a way, which is great – I’ve always wanted to get into acting and things like that at some point. So I can see these as little baby steps towards those other, different things in the future. I’m really enjoying it.

Adam also mentioned the script. As he was talking about it, and also listening to you talking about memorising it, I wonder if it’s because when you’re remembering lyrics there’s a rhythm and a set way that those lyrics are constructed that’s just not there when you’re learning straight monologue and dialogue.

Well, that’s right – absolutely. With songs, melodies, they often tell you to make up a song if you want to remember something, right? A melody helps you remember. Some of it’s definitely easier. Learning a script was challenging for both me and Adam – we both really struggled with it. We’ve got it down now, but you’re always on edge, and that's what makes the show kind of exciting. You’re thinking, Oh my god, I’m going to remember everything, right? You’re always re-reading, pushing yourself to be the best each night, and I think that makes it a little bit different. Because you get on stage and you are so comfortable, you tend to start getting into those same rhythms and telling the same jokes, and I try not to do that, but you do that naturally. Especially if you feel like the crowd isn’t connecting, you pull your tricks out. Whereas with this, there are no tricks, there are no jokes, it’s straight dialogue and the songs and it’s serious. So it’s really different but we’ve both really enjoyed it. And Adam does such a great job as Johnny Cash. He just sings those songs so well. It’s really great to get to sing with him in that capacity.

I think what would be satisfying for the audience as well is not only knowing you two are established in your careers – so it’s not as if you’re outsiders coming into these roles – but both of you are very steeped in country music history and of course you on Saturday Night Country would bring your father in to talk about the history of country music, and Adam mentioned his childhood and teenage years singing along to Johnny Cash. The level of understanding that the two of you bring to this music must be infused in how you interpret the material.

Definitely. We’re both huge fans of this music. I think it really is just ingrained in us now, this history of country music. Especially in me. I grew up with a dad just educating all the town, and every week I got to do that with him on SNC, and now we’re about to relaunch it as a podcast. We’re putting our first one out on the 1^st of June. Which goes alongside – I’ve just bought Rhythms magazine so it’s Rhythms Radio podcast but it’s the same thing: the Kitchen Sessions with Dad, that’s what we’ve chosen to do. I’m excited to be doing that again and learning all over again from Dad. I always learn something new when I hear all that stuff and I’m fascinated by it. History in itself is fascinating but certainly if you’re interested in an area of it and music is everything to me, so learning more and more about it just makes me happy.

You just casually said, ‘I just bought Rhythms magazine’ and then kept going – I’d like to go back to that for a second. I love magazines and think they’ll stick around, but a lot of people might think, Why buy a magazine?

My husband and I were looking for something to start a little family business, and especially after I got sick it made even more sense to just do our own thing, and then we could live the lifestyle we really wanted. He was working a normal job and wasn’t really enjoying it or getting inspiration from it like I do my job, and he really wanted that in his life. I guess it was the right timing and I was writing for Rhythms. I had a column in Rhythms for a little while and my dad was writing for it as well. And then Marty, who I was writing for, who owned it for the last ten years or so – he’s the second owner – he just said, as I joke I think, ‘You wouldn’t want to buy it, would you? Because we’re going to sell. We've been offered something else and we want to move on from it. We’ve been doing it for ten years and it’s time to do something new and give it to fresh hands.’ And you just don't really say something like that to me because I do it. [laughs] So we figured out a way and we bought the business, and we’ve just released our second issue. So we’re four months into it and loving it. It’s insane and we’re busy as hell but we love it. It’s really great. My husband’s actually quit his real job and we’re going for it, we’re doing it full time. It’s really, really fun. [laughs]

That’s amazing – congratulations. That’s a wonderful thing to do both for the idea of dreaming big, or working big, but also because you’ve made that shift for your lifestyle.

It is really a lifestyle shift. We’ve bought a van and we travel around and go to festivals. It works like the ABC [Saturday Night Country] did. I was talking to my mates on the show and that’s why, to me, it felt like such a relaxed show and people really enjoyed it, because it’s a musician talking to a musician from a musician’s point of view. The magazine’s the same because a musician owns the magazine now. It really is a very different point of view and I have so much heart and soul in it, and I really want it to be about the artists and supporting the music scene in Australia and that’s what we’re doing. We’ve got rusted-on subscribers who just adore the magazine and writers – we’ve got the best writers in the country, I reckon, as far as music goes. They are just so passionate. They just work so hard and they’re just really all so invested in it. So we’re really lucky. It came with an amazing team of people. And the guy who started it, Brian Wise, still writes for us. And Marty, the guy I bought it off, still writes for us. It’s a real family. It’s a pretty special little business.

Now back to Johnny and June: is it less pressure to do a show when you’re entirely someone

else’s songs.

Well, no. Because your songs are really ingrained in you, especially if you’ve written them – you know exactly where they’ve come from – whereas interpreting somebody else’s feelings, basically you’re singing their diary for them. It’s tough, you know. You’ve really got to get your head around that and get into that character and feel the emotions they were feeling when they wrote those songs. And telling the story – like I said, that in itself is a struggle. So it really is challenging for us. Which I love. I love a challenge. I love making myself feel uncomfortable, putting myself outside of the box. So all of that is really exciting for me but it is challenging, for sure. A lot more than doing a gig.

I’m getting more of a sense now of why your career has gone on so long and grown bigger and bigger: it’s because you’re not content to say, ‘Well, I’ve done that and I’ll just sit here and count my bon-bons.’

[Laughs.] That's true. I really do love to challenge myself. And I don’t like to make the same record twice, I really like to experiment and try different things, and I’m always discovering new music and being inspired. I’ve been really lucky to still have a career after all this time.

Adam said something about luck as well. I said, ‘Maybe.’ Country music audiences are loyal but they’re also very discerning. The level of professionalism that both of you have delivering shows and delivering albums means that the audience keeps coming back. And you can have the stroke of luck, but if you don’t know what to do with it, it’s not much use.

That’s true, I guess. You’ve got to be there when the so-called stroke of luck comes along, don’t you. You’ve got to be the one who grabs the opportunity. You’ve got to be a go-getter and somebody who works really, really hard. Both Adam and I do that. We’ve both really earnt our careers, I think, and I know Adam certainly comes from a hard-working place too, and he is very professional about running his business, and he’s got a family to take care of, so he takes it very seriously. I guess they’re the ones who survive, when you really do run it like an actual business. It’s really about running a business and being professional and working your arse off, because no one’s going to believe in you as much as you do. It’s really up to you to have a career. I think we both have an understanding of that, which is why we’re very lucky to still be able to do this, and pay our bills doing it.

 I think it’s also having an understanding of audience and paying respect to your audience. Your albums are different each time but what’s recognisable is your strong storytelling ethos and really great structure of the songs. So your audience can go with you on that.

Yes – my voice is the same and it’s still my songs, and the style’s still there, but there’s slight changes: we do a new producer each time or we try something a little different, and that’s what keeps it interesting. All of my favourite artists do that, so I’m really modelling myself after my heroes.

And you’re probably someone else’s hero – you just don’t know it yet.

[Laughs] Yeah, maybe, I don’t know.

You mentioned that Adam takes things seriously but of course he can be quite a joker. He told me that he would probably go easy on you – but has he? Has he played any jokes on you yet?

No, not really. I’ve been on the road with Adam many, many times throughout the years and there’s all sorts of stories throughout our history. Adam’s like a big brother to me – we’re really, really old friends and we’ve just always gotten along really well, and taken care of each other. I think Adam’s really seen me at my worst recently and he was so supportive through all of that. Because Adam really is somebody who’s always making jokes and ready to grab a beer – he’s a real blokey bloke. But to me he’s a real friend and I’m very lucky to have people like that in the industry that I can rely on who aren’t just colleagues or people I see at work. I could call him right now and he’d do something for me if I need it. And that’s when I know that people are really my friends. We’ve all known each other for so many years and we’ve really bonded, so it’s good.

Boneshaker was a terrific album. You’ve got the magazine, you’re doing this show. Adam mentioned that there might be some talk of the show going on. But: what’s next for you as a solo artist?

I’m heading towards the next album now. My husband and I are looking at building a little studio at home, so I’m going to make a record at home next time. I’m actually going to meet with the label next week and start discussing it, so I guess I’ll start getting into songwriting mode and next-album mode. This year is really about getting those songs together then starting to plan the next record. There’ll be something out next year, for sure. And then we’ll go out on tour. I’ve stepped into a little bit of producing other artists, and I’ve just done a girl who I really believe in, a debut artist whose album I hope we’ll be releasing soon. So I’ll take her out on the road. There’s lots of stuff like that going on. I’m always doing a million things.

And it might be wise to start the Rhythms record label …

Yeah. We’ve actually talked about it before, so that would be pretty cool. I don’t know if we want to run a label too, though [laughs].

How did the FU Cancer tour go?

It was amazing. We raised just over $10 000 for the McGrath Foundation just in donations alone. The shows were incredible, the guests were just unreal. We’re going to do it annually, a Newcastle one, and raise money for different things each year – raise a large amount for a local hospital or something like that. It’s pretty cool. It’s been a big part of my life for the last few months and I’m so glad it was so successful. We recorded a single to go along with it that’s coming out really soon through the label, and all those proceeds go to McGrath Foundation, which is pretty awesome as well.

www.catherinebritt.com

Album review: Boneshaker by Catherine Britt

Catherine Britt is one of the most compelling, and interesting, artists at work in Australian music, let alone within country music. Her 2012 album Always Never Enough was an extraordinary collection of songs that were both musically and lyrically satisfying as well as being memorable enough to still demand listening three years on (and when you listen to as many albums as I do, that's a big recommendation). Britt then released a 'best of' collection - The Hillbilly Pickin' Ramblin' Girl So Far - which could have seemed premature, given her youth, but she's released enough albums for it to make sense. It also seems now to have been a way of demonstrating her progress as preparation for the release of Boneshaker.

Boneshaker does not at all resemble Always Never Enough in terms of the subject matter of the songs or, really, the composition of the songs, although it's unmistakably a country music album: the bedrock of country music tradition is there, and Britt's storytelling nature also marks it as country. But the fact that it's such a different album, and also that it is, actually, a progression is exciting. Always Never Enough contained stories about others yet it also felt quite personal; Boneshaker tells stories but seems to explore themes more than focus on individual stories. It is a contemplative album that also has its upbeat moments in a major key. The dichotomies of the album appear within the first two songs: the rollicking title track and then the solemn tale 'Good to Bad'. 

Mostly - for me, at least - Boneshaker demonstrates that Britt is prepared to take risks with her music, and that means she's reached a level of confidence in her musical, singing and songwriting abilities that enables her to explore. When an artist finds herself at a point where talent and courage match, anything may happen - and it's usually great when it does. If she can hold her nerve - and regardless of the level of confidence, nerve-holding can be required - then the future looks amazing. In the meantime, this album full of individually great and collectively wonderful songs is the evidence we have that she's an artist who deserves a very prominent position on the national stage. 

Boneshaker is out now through Lost Highway Australia/Universal.
catherinebritt.com

Tamworth: the picks of the gigs

Make that my picks of the gigs ... These are the artists I'm most looking forward to seeing at this year's Tamworth Country Music Festival. [All dates given are January 2014.]


Jess Holland

21  - Tudor Hotel Front Bar,  5.30 p.m.

23  - Qurindi RSL, 6 p m.

24  - Tudor Hotel Back Bar, 12 p.m. 

Ashleigh Dallas
21 - West Tamworth Leagues Club, 5 p.m.

Tori Darke
21 - West Tamworth Leagues Club, 8 p.m.

The Hillbilly Killers

21 - Tamworth Services Club, 9.30 p.m.

Brad Butcher
22 - Tamworth Services Club, 9 a.m.
23 - Tudor Hotel, upstairs, 10 p.m.

Katie Brianna

22 - Tamworth Services Club, 9 a.m.

23 - Tudor Hotel, upstairs, 10 p.m.

The McClymonts
22 - TRECC, 2 p.m.

Kristy Cox
22 - The Pub, 8 p.m.

Shane Nicholson
23 - The Family Hotel, 7 p.m.

Catherine Britt
23 - The Pub, 8.30 p.m.

Lachlan Bryan and the Wildes
24 - The Family Hotel, 12 p.m.

Audrey Auld
24 - North Tamworth Bowling Club, 2 p.m.

Karl Broadie and Katie Brianna

24 - Tamworth Tennis Club, 4.30 p.m.

Interview: Catherine Britt

Catherine Britt is one of the brightest sparks of Australian country music - an accomplished songwriter and performer, with Golden Guitars, multiple albums and tours behind her, and she's still only 28 years old. That may seem a young age to have a retrospective album released, but that's what The Hillbilly Pickin' Ramblin' Girl So Far is. It's a great introduction to Catherine's work for those who are not yet familiar, and it's a very fine collection of songs - not just a collection of singles - for those fans who want their favourites all in one place. I recently spoke to Catherine about the release of this new album, and about what's ahead.

You're still so young that a retrospective may seem premature but looking at your output, it's not.  So I was wondering how you've managed to be so productive in such a short space of time, really.

Well, yeah, I guess it is and it isn't.  Fourteen years, five albums in 14 years would seem a little lazy to some people. [Laughter] I don't know.  I've just tried to consistently release albums every two or so years, and take my time in doing it so that I release albums I'm proud of.  I guess I didn't realise I was at this point until the label suggested this ‘Best of’ and I had to look back and go, ‘Oh my God, yeah, I have been doing this for a while, eh?’  It's been a long time, so it feels really good to be able to this.

It's a fantastic collection of songs but, then again, you did have a lot of great material to choose from.  Was it a pleasure to choose these songs or did you find it difficult to pick which ones would go on it?

A bit of both, to be honest. There's only so much you can fit on a CD and there's only so much video you can fit on a DVD, so we had to be a little bit selective, which was quite hard at times.  But I think that, at the end of the day, we got it down to the best possible reflection of my career.  So I feel pretty good about what we've put on there.

The first songs are from your very first EP, which was released when you were 14, and you sound very assured on those songs – and you should assured for someone who is 34 or 44, let alone someone who was 14.  But do you look back at yourself then and think that you weren't that assured or confident or do you still look back and think, yeah, I knew what I was doing?

[Laughs] Funnily enough, I felt like I did.  I felt like I was really confident on who I was as an artist and I never denied myself that.  I never held back from that.  I always knew exactly what I was going to be and exactly the artist I wanted to be and I never got confused or strayed away from it, especially early on.  I was very set in what I was going to do and no one was going to change that.  It was nice to have that at such a young age.  I felt pretty lucky, looking around at my friends who didn't even know what they wanted to be when they grew up.  And I'm, like, ‘Well, I'm going to be this and this is the sort of music I want to make’ [laughs].  I knew, so it was weird.

Do you remember how you started to formulate those ideas when you were young?  Because that's quite a degree of clarity, I think, at an age when your brain is still literally a brain storm, they say teenagers have.  It’s a very singular thing to focus on at that age.

It is, which makes me wonder if I - I don't know - I may have a little bit autistic ways in me, I think.  In the fact that I focus on something and then that's it.  It's definitely a slight sign there. But I just - I knew and I focused on it and it became a bit of an obsession and that all, I guess, stems from the artists that I loved. 

In the song ‘I'm Your Biggest Fan’, you write about your brother getting married and becoming a father very young and having a very focused life, really, setting himself up - him and his wife through education and homes and more kids.  So I'm wondering, actually, whether it's a family trait to be very organised and focused.

[Laughs] Oh boy, I mean, we have a pretty special parents.  They're super smart and very - I don't know - they're very much like that.  I guess they ingrained it in us to be organised and to be proud of who we are and to follow that path 100 per cent and never hold back.  They supported us no matter what we did, even if they may have felt like it wasn't the right idea.  I mean, I'm sure my parents didn't really want me to be a country singer [laughs].  But they supported it anyway, so that's was nice.

Well, and it's paid off, it sounds like for you and your brother and, possibly, your other brothers as well. 

Yeah, absolutely.

But listening to these songs, there are a lot of songs on the album so, I think, for fans, it's definitely - it's a lot of quality output on one album. The songwriting is really consistent in that it's consistently very good.  So it's not like we could look at your early songs and say, oh well, Catherine didn't know what she was doing and now she really does.  So I was wondering if you look back on all of these songs and all of the albums and think that you have developed a lot as a songwriter at all or whether it's just you've had that consistency of vision and storytelling throughout?

Well, first off, thank you. Look, I think I've, hopefully, gotten better and, hopefully, grown as a songwriter.  I still think my best songs are to come.  I think every album I get slightly better at it. I'm still proud of my early songs and stuff.  But I sing some of them at my gigs and it is from a 14 year old’s point of view or a 15 year old’s point of view, some of the songs.  And it's not really something I can totally relate to at 28 but I can because it was me.  So I’m confused but, yeah, I knew what I was talking about back then, I'm sure [laughs].

Well, I think it sounds like it.  And also as a singer because on that first EP, you had more of a, shall we say, hillbilly twang to the way you sang but it disappeared pretty quickly.  So I was wondering whether that was something you were into at the time or whether there's still a lurking hillbilly twang somewhere.

I reckon it comes out pretty often.  But I don't know, I think I sang a little differently when I was younger, definitely.  I was still learning to sing.  God, I never really did any lessons or anything like that, which I should have done. I had no idea what I was doing and I just did it anyway [laughs].  So it's a bit of a worry but I think I was still just learning.  And every album as I went on, I learnt a little bit better how to sing in the studios and I got better because I was performing a lot.  And my voice just developed and kept changing and growing so, hopefully, that will continue to happen.

And I forgot to ask, when you were talking about the song selection, what the criteria were.  Was it you looking at songs thinking, I'm going to put on the singles or the ones that people respond to when I'm performing live, mainly, or is it the ones that in my heart, I really want to put on there?

The first disc was all about singles and fan favourites, so I based my show in Tamworth this year, I put out a thing on Facebook and asked my fans that were coming to the gig what their favourite songs were.  I did a voting system and it's funny, songs like ‘Drive-in Movie’, which is an album track I never released as a single, came up as the most-voted song.  So I put that on there as well as ‘In The Pines’, which is one of the first songs I ever sang as a kid starting out at gigs.  Then it became a bit of a signature track for me and, of course, the pilot track of my first EP for that reason.  So I left off a couple of songs that were soft releases.  Single number five of albums that just would tide me over but never really did anything huge and replaced them with some fan favourites.  So it was a hard decision but, I think, it was the right one.

And there's enough variety on there for people who might already have all of the albums to want to have that particular arrangement of songs. I guess that's part of the challenge for you as an artist, just thinking, if people already have all of my albums, how do I put these songs together so that it's something - there's something a bit new about it?

Yeah, exactly.  And I guess that's also why we did the new single as well, so that there was a new track element to it as well.  Not just all old stuff.  And, of course, the B side on the CD has quite a bit on there that people wouldn't have played before either.  So there's a fair bit of new stuff on there as well that will make it a little bit more of a special thing for people who already have my records.

About the new song - there was a track you had on Always Never Enough about people in the music industry talking about other people behind their backs or whatnot.  And it sounds like ‘Who Cares’ is a bit of a companion piece to that?

Yeah, definitely.  I think you're talking about ‘Mind Your Own Business’?

Yes, that's it.

Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.  I think ‘Who Cares’ was a song I've been wanting to write recently for the reasons of the song, really.  I've struggled a lot with people talking and saying things.  I don't know what it is about me that [laughs] makes people want to - I don't know - talk when I'm in a room.  But it's been something I've always had to deal with and I felt like this song was something I really wanted to say because it's not important.  Those things are so insignificant in the grand scheme of things and if you know you're a really good person and you're just doing the best you can do.  There's human error with everybody, then you can sleep well at night knowing that so, I guess, I really wanted to express that in a different way this time with ‘Who Cares’ and make it a bit more like I can't let this affect me.  You've got to just get on with life and be happy with who you are and be settled in that, so that's a little bit of a progression from ‘Mind Your Own Business’.

And in a short space of time, I've got to say because ‘Mind Your Own Business’ was only released a year and a bit ago so I think - - -

A bit ago, yeah [laughs].

But also just on that point of why people react the way they do.  I sometimes think if you do have a clear vision about your life and if you've pursued it, that actually stands almost as a living example to people who like to believe that other people should do things for them.  So people who would say ‘things keep happening to me and I don't know why, it's God's fault, it's the universe's fault, it's everyone else fault but mine’.  If there's someone like you who actually says, ‘I want to do this and I am doing it’, and then you've continued to do it, it shows up that other type of person that they have no excuse.  And that could be very annoying to them.

[Laughs] Okay, well, that's - thank you.  That makes me feel a bit better, I guess, understanding how they think.

So … even though this interview is about the CD, you must have some new material in the works, I would imagine, because it seems like you always have new material.

Yeah, I do.  I'm working on another album now so I'm looking towards, maybe, releasing something mid next year.  So this is perfect actually, it's going to tide me over nicely.

And you're playing 23 January at the pub in Tamworth and will that be a band show or is that a solo show?

Full band and it'll be the Hillbilly Pickin’ Ramblin’ Girl So Far tour show so it'll be, basically, our focus on this record and all the hits or whatever you want to call them, all the singles.  It should be really good and a little different to what we've been doing, obviously, the last five or six years at The Pub with the Hillbilly sessions.  I just wanted to bring it back to basics and just make it all about the career so far.  So I'm looking forward to that actually.  It should be really cool.  I've got a great band together so I'm pumped.

And will you do some more shows off the back of that or this is the main one with the band and then you might do some solo shows?

This is it.  I just do that one big show in Tamworth and then I, usually, go around and get up at Bill Chambers’s jam and things like that.  But they're all really small appearances and I do lots of interviews and things where I might play a song.  But I usually focus on just the one performance.  Other than my band, The Hillbilly Killers, have a show as well on the Tuesday night but that's totally different [laughs].  So, yeah, that's all I'll be doing in Tamworth.

That actually was going to be my last question - what's happening with the Hillbilly Killers - but I think you've just answered it.

Yeah, yeah.  Well, that's the next step.  We’ve just been over in America.  We played Americana Festival for all the Americans, which was pretty special, and now we're doing another show in Tamworth.  So it's going to be our second consecutive year and then we'll working towards an album release, by the sounds of it.  So it's all still moving forward and still happening slowly, because we've all got our own lives and busy schedules, especially Tim Rogers.  So it makes it a bit hard to make things move fast [laughs].

Very true.  Actually, I'll ask you one final question - and this is, probably, a cruel question - if you had to pick one song on this album from your heart that you think, This is the song I just love more than the others, which one would it be?  I said it was cruel.

Yeah [laughs].  I think the most significant - which I think is different - the most significant song for me would, probably, have to be ‘Sweet Emmylou’.  As far as the accolades that I received for it and the, I guess, attention it got, you'd never imagine that a single song would do so much and I'm so glad it's the song that I love and still, to this day, love to sing and I'm really proud of.  So I was lucky in that way, that it's a good song.  That's one that I do at every gig so, yeah, I really love that song.

www.catherinebritt.com
The Hillbilly Pickin' Ramblin' Girl So Far is out now.

Catherine Britt is appearing at the Tamworth Country Music Festival on the evening of 23 January 2014 at The Pub. 

Interview: Catherine Britt

I've raved elsewhere about Catherine Britt's brilliant new album, Always Never Enough. I'm still listening to it, over and over, and finding so much to love about it each time. It is a collection of great stories and an important contribution to the tapestry of Australian storytelling in song.

Recently I spoke to Catherine, before she headed out on tour with Tim Rogers. She was vibrant, interesting and engaged, and had lots of interesting things to say about music, family and life. 

Well, I’ve been listening to your album a lot because I have to say, it is fantastic.

 Oh, my god, thank you so much.

It’s really, really, really good. As soon as I'd heard it I emailed your publicist at Universal and said, 'This is the best thing Catherine has ever done.'

Oh, my goodness.  Thank you so much.  I’m so nervous and so excited and I’m like just mixed, 'What are people going to think?' and I guess that’s natural. You do that before every album, but I’m so proud of this record and I do think it’s the best thing I’ve ever done and I’m so glad you say that. People are hopefully going to react to it the way that I want them to which is great.  Thank you.

My first question was actually going to be to say that it’s a collective album that sounds cohesive and I was wondering if there was an overarching intention because there are so many different song styles and stories on it, but there’s really this sense of it pulling together as a whole. 

Well, absolutely, and I think that’s the key to a good album is trying to make it all make sense and all flow together, but also show all the different sides of yourself and be dynamic and be non-limiting, I guess, musically. And I’ve always tried to achieve that and try to be the best artist I can be and open myself up to all sorts of genres.  And because I listen to all sorts of genres, good music’s good music, so I think that it’s important to just write what comes straight out from your heart and your soul and not sit there and try to write a country song, just try and write a song.  And I think that’s what this album is a result of and the fact that I’ve been so many different things on this album that I haven’t been before, there are a few political things on there that I never would have really spoken about before.  And, I guess, it’s because I’m getting older.

[Laughs].

 And starting to realise that the world around me a little more and be more aware and some other peoples stories that have affected me and of course that have my own things I’ve been reminiscing or if they’re enough ... Just another good old heartbreak. Probably the most powerful heartbreaks I’ve ever written, because it was the most powerful heartbreak, I’ve ever been through so it’s very dynamic and I love that.

I think with 'Always Never Enough', I actually didn’t see it as a heartbreak song, although I did read your notes about it. I actually saw it more as a statement of what it’s like to be an intelligent, strong-minded young woman in a society that perhaps doesn’t endorse that as much as it could.

Yeah.  And look that’s – I’m so glad you caught that cause that’s exactly what it is.  It’s a double entendre – it’s supposed to be both and, look, that is exactly why I released it as the first single, because it really sums up this album and me as a person. It’s like I’m always that overachiever who tries way too hard every day to be better than she was yesterday and I’m very competitive and very much trying to push myself and try and be better. And I think that it is never enough for me and it is ‑ it’s always pushing to the next level and pushing for the next step and what’s next in my career and what am I going to do now, okay. And I think that’s that definitely the title itself sums up the album, sums up me, sums up everything. So, yes, it is a heartbreak song that is very honest and very real and I’m sure my ex-boyfriend hates my guts because of it.

[Laughs].  Too bad!

[Laughs] But, no, it also definitely sums up me as a person and as an artist.

You’ve spent quite a bit of time in the US and it’s always struck me that the United States, it is more supported or people are more supported if they are ambitious, if they want to strive to, as you said, do better today than you did yesterday. So I was wondering if you found that you actually you were more comfortable or have been more comfortable in American society in that respect.

Oh, yeah.  I guess. I mean, not really. I never felt quite like I fitted in American. Living there for six years was one of the best experiences and the worst experiences of my life. But it’s like I worked so much on it, it was like going off and getting my music degree or something, my college, my version of college but it – I fitted in in a lot of ways but I didn’t in a lot of ways. Their culture is so different from us and it’s such a different world over there that I never quite felt comfortable, I never quite felt at home quite like I do having a conversation with my parents in Newcastle, hanging out in my own town.  So I don’t think you ever really capture that anywhere else, your family, and the people that you surround yourself with that you love and adore you no matter what, and I think that’s what I wanted to come home to at the end of the day.  I still go to America all the time, I’ve been there four times in the last seven months touring, but I didn’t want to live there. At the end of the day when I come off the road, I want to come home to my best friends who adore me and who I adore, and my family who love me no matter what, and my hometown that I’m just so proud to be from. And I think that that’s what I realised as I got older, is what’s important here that I’m off taking this dream, that does it really matter, is it making any difference that I am here full time or do I balance my life out and try and find happiness in my personal life as well as my career? And that’s the decision I made.

Well, I think it’s a good one and it’s good for Australians that you’re here.

[Laughs].

But having said that about the US, I was in Tamworth earlier this year - as one should be every year - and looking at Harmony James at a gig and looking at the make-up of her band and just reflecting.  I’d seen Felicity Urguhart the night before and I thought, 'Australian country music is really supportive of woman out the front of bands.'

Yeah.

And intelligent singer-songwriter women. In the US, the Dixie Chicks are really good singer-songwriters in that vein.  But a lot of what you see of women in country music in the US is perhaps a bit more of the showmanship type than, say, you or Felicity or Harmony or Beccy or Kasey, people who write really great songs and still get to perform them. 

Yeah. I think there is a really great support system here for the singer-songwriter and I think that’s very much a part of our music industry in a lot of ways.  I mean, look at our mainstream radio in Australia - the music that sells the most is indie pop rock singer-songwriters. You’ve got people like Nick Cave and Tim Rogers and things like that are our legends in Australia.  Jimmy Barnes. And in America they probably wouldn’t even be like as appreciated, I guess, as they are here. I think that it’s great that we appreciate a real singer-songwriter and real music in Australia.  And we’re just so taken with that and I think that that’s a lot of the reason why I wanted to come back here and make music here. Because I feel like Australians do get what I’m trying to do and I have a big audience here of intelligent music fans who completely support me as an artist and I love that.

And you mentioned Tim Rogers, who you’re obviously going to be touring with soon. In terms of his song writing - I was a You Am I fan pretty much from the start and I remember reading an article about him years ago where someone was asking him about his songwriting and he said something like, 'Well, I don’t like those songs that are just like, "oh, that girl left me, I’m so miserable".' Those songs aren’t interesting when you do them over and over again. He liked to tell stories and he is one of our great storytelling songwriters. 

Oh, god.  Absolutely. 

So you’re a good match.

I’m the biggest Tim Rogers fan in the world. I think he’s just awesome and brilliant and I’m so freaking excited to go out on tour with him. And also very scared, knowing Tim personally, and I have no idea what the next three months have in store for me.

[Laughs].

But I’m very excited to be out on the road with such a brilliant musician and a brilliant man and a pure gentlemen and one of the best singers that we have here in Australia.  I mean, he really is just when it comes to songwriting and artistry, you don’t really get much better than Tim Rogers.  So I’m very, very proud and excited to be working with him.

And do those sort of tours – and I don’t know how many you’ve done where it’s kind of you and  just another artist as opposed to another band – but do these sorts of tours give you the opportunity for further collaboration?

Absolutely and I’ve done many tours like this, I mean pretty much in this day and age, it’s what you do.  You go out with another artist, it’s the only way to sort of make money and get people out to shows these days.  So I think that it’s definitely the majority of what I do when I go out on the road and it’s great because you create this friendship with other artists that last forever. And that never goes away because you create this bond on the road and this musical bond that you never would have seen before and it’s really cool.  Tim and I have been working together for, gosh, three or four years now creating this band with Bill Chambers and we call ourselves the Hillbilly Killers, and we’re actually working on an album and things like that that will come out hopefully down the track.

Oh!

But that’s how we kind of became friends and then of course he asked me to come out on this tour with him, this Rogers does Rogerstein tour. So it’s just all a part of the music industry, I guess, you meet people and it takes you to different places and that’s what I love about it.

You mentioning the Hillbilly Killers is the first I’ve heard of it so now I’m very excited [laughs] to hear that.

[Laughs] Yeah, it’s very much underground and in development at the moment, but we’ve been hanging out for a few years now and writing and developing this band. We’ve all got ridiculous schedules so it’s like trying to actually all get the studio and try and get together and actually make it work is another thing.  But we’ve got plans to go out and record this year, so hopefully they don’t fall through and we do end up releasing something pretty soon. It's great to work with Tim and, of course, I’ve worked with Bill since I was a little girl so it totally makes sense to have us all in, I guess, in a band together.  And we’re all from the same music, we all love the same stuff so it’s very exciting.

That is exciting, but I’ll go back to your album and what I really picked up on this is more so than on the previous albums was a feeling of confidence from you, that you were confident in yourself as a songwriter and as a singer.  So I was wondering if that was true or maybe I’m reading something into it [laughs].

Yeah.  Well, I’m like any artist, one minute I’m confident, the next minute I’m the most insecure person in the world [laughs]. That’s just what we do – we’re all the same really, I guess, at the end of the day.  But, look, I am very confident in myself musically and I always have been.  I’ve always believed in myself and, I guess, if you don’t believe in yourself, you wouldn’t do it.  You got to have confidence to go get out in front of a crowd and sing your song, but that’s what it’s all about.  We’re all show-offs at the end of the day, I’m the youngest of four and I used to get up in front of my whole family and 'Look at me, look at me'.

[Laughs].

That’s the kid I was.  That’s what all artists are at the end of the day, we want people to pay attention to us and love us and appreciate us and give us attention. And I think that when it comes to this album, I’m more confident than I ever have been with any other album, that is absolutely true and I’m glad that it shows in the music.  That’s really cool that it comes through.

I think it’s the case that – and you would probably find this as well as a listener – that you can put on some records and you feel as a listener you relax.  Because you think okay, well, the artist was clearly quite happy about what was going on here and I can just relax and let go into this.  And sometimes – it’s the same with live music – and sometimes you put on an album, you just think, 'Oh, I’m on edge, something’s not working'.  But with this one I just put it on and immediately thought, 'Okay, I can just sit back here, I’m in Catherine’s capable hands'.

Oh, cool.  That’s such a cool way of putting it. I think that music has to have confidence behind it, you’re so right. That’s what sells the Bruce Springsteens and the Elton Johns and the Bob Dylans; people who have been around forever. That’s what sells about them is that they are 100 per cent confident in what they do with themselves as an artist. And you do, you listen to their albums and are like, 'Oh, okay, this is somebody who really knows what they’re talking about here', and you pay attention.  Like you would in a conversation, if somebody starts speaking intelligently or whatever and they’re really passionate, they know what they’re talking about, you pay attention.  You don’t brush it off as that guy doesn’t know what they’re talking about and, I guess, it’s the same with everything, music included.

Yeah.  Yeah.  Often with albums there’s the odd song you want to brush over, or maybe two or three songs for some people. I think each of these songs is really, really great which is an unusual thing for any album.  

[Laughs] Thank you.

Well, thank you for making them.  But they all sound loved, if that makes sense and they also they sound like they’ve had the sort of attention that they would get because they’re loved.  But I was wondering if you actually have any favourites out of them?

 I don’t know, being such a new album I’m so in love with all of it. [Laughs] I haven’t really kind of gone down that road yet, but I’ve been playing the new single 'Always Never Enough' and I love that, I love the song and it’s so great to play live.  But 'Sally Bones' is another song that goes over so well live, people come up to me and go, 'Play that crazy song' [laughs]. So people really love it, but I think that it affects people and same with 'Our Town', that always goes over really well live. But  they all do, I don’t know. The song about my brother, 'I’m Your Biggest Fan', is always really great at festivals and people seem to really love it even though it’s the first time they’ve heard it. It’s always really fascinating to see what happens when you sing these songs live, it’s a totally different thing. But I don’t really have a favourite as yet. We’re about to release 'Charlestown Road' as the second single and I love that song too, it’s about my childhood and where I grew up and I guess it’s essentially every Australian’s childhood, really.  But it’s cool that I was able to write that song, I haven’t been able to write that song prior to now, so I’m glad I did get the chance for that come to out.

I guess it is every Australian’s childhood but that’s part of the role of being a storyteller, to reflect that back to people so that they can find something in themselves that connects to it. 

Exactly.  Exactly.  And that’s the beauty of songwriting, songwriting is all about is writing songs that obviously come from a place that has affected you but also people can relate to it and put it in their own life and make it their own story.

And on 'Sally Bones', I didn’t find it a creepy song so much as it’s a really powerful song, but I noticed that it’s the only point on the album – and probably in any of your songs – where you actually go out of a singing voice and into a speaking tone when you say her second name.  You kind of flatten it and it’s just a little detail but I thought that’s really interesting, it’s almost like a character coming through you, like you just flatten your voice for that second.

Yeah.  Yeah.  I’ve never really sung like that before on any album and I think that it’s cool to, kind of, to try these things and that’s how I wrote it.  I didn’t intentionally think of that or anything, but that's sort of how it came out but I love that, it is telling Sally Bones’s story and that shit happens all the time.  And it’s, like, even though it’s not a great thing to happen in this world, it’s something that I like to, I guess, make people pay attention to again. And focus on even if it’s for three minutes and maybe it’ll make a difference and it’ll change some things, maybe it won’t. But at the end of the day, it’s her story and it’s a great song to sing and a great story to tell.

You mentioned you’re from Newcastle, which is fairly close to the country music community on the Central Coast [laughs].  So I was wondering if you have any plans to move to Copacabana.

Oh, yeah.  Yeah.  Just like everyone else.

[Laughs].

No, I am so close and that’s the thing, I still hang out with all those folks but I’m also sort of outside of the industry enough to not be a part of it all as well. But I’ve always kind of been a bit of an outsider – spending a lot of my time overseas and whatever, but all those folks are very much very good friends of mine. I’ve just been on tour with Bec actually, Beccy Cole, for the last, I don’t know, I think we were out for about five months actually. In the [United] States and it was brilliant. Australian Story came out with us on the road and did a lot of recording while we were out on the road.  And it was great to watch her journey and come out as a woman and a very proud gay person, I love all of that. She’s already brilliant as an artist and I love her as a personm and it was just great to see her come into her own and be the person that she absolutely should be a hundred per cent, I love that. But, yeah, I spend a lot of time down there [on the coast] but definitely no.

[Laughs].

I love Newcastle, I’ve got all my family and my friends here, I’m definitely going to be here for as long as I can.

For springing off on tour, Newcastle is quite pretty much as good as Sydney, you have access to main roads and an airport and all those things.

[Laughs]. Exactly. It’s like a little mini city. But it’s not too much of a city that it’s – I can’t be in Sydney for more than a day without going insane so it’s like it’s still got a sanity about it, which is good.

You are heading out on the road again, so you’ve been out with Beccy for a few months and you’ll be out for a while with Tim – do you enjoy that rhythm of being on the road?  Or is there a rhythm to it?

I love it, I’d much prefer to be on the road than anything else.  I’ve really, really enjoyed touring and I’ve enjoyed playing gigs live and yeah, that’s a big, huge part of what I do that I love. So I’m looking forward to going out with Tim and seeing what that’s going to be like and then we’ve got lots of plans for the rest of the year, which obviously we’ll bring out at an appropriate time as well.  So yes, I’m very excited about getting out on the road again.

Catherine Britt's new album is out now through ABC/Universal. Check Catherine's website for tour dates:

 www.catherinebritt.com