Chicago has been a hotbed of musical activity lately. With acts like Veruca Salt, Liz Phair, Urge Overkill and Smashing Pumpkins coming to the forefront, there has been a recent signing frenzy of other Chicago bands, including Catherine. Signed to New York based TVT Records,Catherine has been receiving attention in alternative circles. Described by some as mirroring the Smashing Pumpkins' sound, Catherine are more akin to the noisy, distorted guitar of both My Bloody Valentine and Sonic Youth. Even so, being close friends with the Pumpkins has not dulled comparisons. Drummer Kerry Brown co-produced tracks on the Pumpkins' Pisces Iscariot, and is married to Pumpkins' bassist D'Arcey Wretsky. As well, Billy Corgan produced their first EP, Sleepy, and plays in a side-project band, Star Children with guitarist Neil Jendon. Regardless, Catherine and their swirling triple guitar attack are striving to create their own niche in the world of loud arena rock. The quintet is comprised of founding members Neil Jendon (vocals/guitar) and Jerome Brown (guitar), brothers Kerry Brown (drums) and Keith Brown (bass), and Mark Rew (vocals/guitar). Currently touring to promote their new album, Sorry, Imprint caught up with Catherine at a Toronto gig.

Could you talk a little about the Sorry motto 'Better Living Through Noise'?

N.J. It's just a spoof on the G.E. corporate logo or the G.E. corporate slogan of Better Living Through... I forget what it is. Just the idea that you could buy anything to make your life better.

K.B. Better Living Through Lightbulbs!

N.J. Yes. Somehow the quality of your life would go up. It just seems ludicrous. I though it was funny, that, but it would be a lie.

Where have you been having the biggest responses?

K.B. The big cities are cool because the turn out is consistently good. We're playing twenty-one and over clubs so everyone has seen it all a million times.

N.J. Entirely too cool. Too cool for their own good.

K.B. Then there's like Springfield, Missouri, where there will be six hundred kids that are dying for music that are just going crazy. Tulsa, Oklahoma, we're huge there.

Have you been playing a lot of all-ages gigs then?

K.B. It seems that the all-ages shows are in like Tulsa, Oklahoma. When we go to New York and L.A. it is really hard to get an all-ages show. The night clubs don't want to deal with it because they don't sell alcohol. We're not big enough to play a three thousand seater where they make money off ticket sales. We get all-ages now when we open for Suede and Hole in Florida. That will be great. That will be all-ages and that's where a lot of our audience is. Kids that are finding music for the first time. For me there is nothing worse than going to New York, and playing to people who are thirty that have seen every band in the world.

N.J. Nine times out of ten they are from the industry so it is in a way kind of redundant.

What is Chicago like for all-ages gigs?

K.B. Tough. There are a lot of eighteen and over, but still it is the same thing. If we're not going to sell out a big hall, the night clubs can't risk having the place packed with kids that aren't going to drink their beer. All-ages clubs are failing all over the place. People try to do it but it's just...bands come in and they pretty much take all of the door, so then the promoter is stuck selling Cokes...

N.J. ...and coat check. It's rough. All these cities, the minute there is any all-ages thing going on, the police are all over it like a bad suit. City hall is all over it. They can potentially rub something like that into the ground just by saying that you need a special business license or whatever, or you need special insurance. That's the way it is. It just doesn't happen.K.B. There is nothing worse than a sixteen year old kid who is a total music lover [who can't get into a show]...we got into it a lot, especially when we played in Chicago. The last time we played Chicago it was an eighteen dollar show and there was like fifty kids outside that didn't have I.D. because they were under age, and they couldn't get into the show, which sucked. Just because they are not a legal adult, they can't see a band it's kind of silly.N.J. Those are the kids that are going to go out and buy the record, and they are into it. It made us feel like big jerks.

Who's idea was it to do the Bee Gees cover of "Every Christian Lionhearted Man"?

M.R. It was my idea. I thought it would be kind of funny to do it and I thought it was a really good song. When I was a kid I used to like the band a lot. I used to listen to their forty-fives and this was in the late sixties before disco, before they did disco stuff.

N.J. It's funny even their disco stuff is...good compared to other disco stuff.

J.B. Just watch Saturday Night Fever.

N.J. I guess yesterday's trash is always today's nostalgia - it's always better than what is around now. I was just surprised because our soundman has the soundtrack and he played it one night and...it sounded cool. I hate to say it but it sounded cool. I remember just hating it when it came out.

M.R. The Bee Gees were one of those bands who started out to be just as unique or obscure as any other band of that time. Then they succeeded and ran into the seventies, and took advantage of the seventies trends which sort of hurt them after the seventies.

N.J. There was a band that had a good long run at it. They were able to reinvent themselves three or four times.

K.B. They were one of the few bands that came out of the sixties that actually tried the seventies disco thing and it worked for them. Roxy Music sort of discoed but the Bee Gees full-out discoed. At least they went into it hardcore.

M.R. Since everyone identifies the Bee Gees with the seventies it was easy to say 'let's do it, people will think it's funny.' In reality it wasn't a seventies disco song. We didn't really change it - we just added a lot of distortion. It's on the Best Of The Bee Gees Volume One.

K.B. I like the people in the audience that don't believe that it's a Bee Gees song and they think we are lying. We used to play it and then say 'that was a Bee Gees song' and then hear thirty people laugh. I'd love it if someone from the Bee Gees would come on stage and jam it with us.

So what is your ideal gig?

M.R. For me it would be eighty percent men and twenty percent women.

J.B. And all the men topless.

N.J. That was Jerome Brown. That doesn't mean that the rest of the band necessarily agrees with him.

K.B. A medium-sized room with a good P.A. and a friendly crowd.

N.J. I kind of understand why you need a big rock light show and all that nonsense. In the bigger venues you need to do something to get people's attention. In a three thousand seat hall, a five piece band looks about yay big from all the way in the back.

K.B. At Lollapalooza you see bands that totally kick your ass in a nightclub, and they are in front of a place that holds thirty thousand and the band looks like this and sounds like this and it's during the day.

N.J. It doesn't matter how much you drink, when you're out in the daylight you don't really feel drunk.

K.B. There is this huge distance. Some bands can do it. The Stones can do it.

J.B. They have that giant dragon.

N.J. If it's a good band, it can only make it better.

K.B. We did a Chicago show where we couldn't afford to have a giant floating pig, so we had this guy who was about six foot six dress up in a pig outfit and come on stage and smoke cigarettes the whole show. We got a review in the Sun Times. The whole review was about the pig - nothing about the band.

Do you think that the hype surrounding Chicago has helped you?

K.B. It's weird. When we were there all the time...it affected us a lot more. Since we are never home, the connection is different. Of course we go into some clubs and they'll say 'From Chicago, Billy Corgan's favorite band.'

M.R. I think that it's really good. As it gets bigger and bigger it is just going to translate into better and better things, not only for the musicians, but for people who want to see music. I'm hoping... ideally I would like that more music stores would open.

N.J. Yeah, we need another guitar store in Chicago. Since all this has happened...for a decade there was only two places to play in Chicago that were considered legitimate, and that has doubled. There's two more really good venues in Chicago. That's outstanding. That translates into people being more willing to make the effort to play in a band, and more people going to see bands that they have never heard of before just because they are generally interested in seeing something new. That's exciting.

K.B. I don't think that record companies are coming to Chicago and signing shit bands. I think they are signing bands that have been doing it for a long time, and are worthy of getting signed. If bands like Urge Overkill or Smashing Pumpkins didn't spark this, bands would still be playing, out every night. It's not like record companies are coming in and giving bands a million dollars. The bands are signing to small to medium sized record deals.

N.J. Chicago has a natural cynicism to it, so people don't swoon over record companies. They are more like 'what do ya got?' They are very straight forward.

How sick are you of the Smashing Pumpkins comparisons?

K.B. I'd like to see that go away more than the Chicago hype and that only happens to us because we are friends with the band. It used to bum me out, but now it doesn't phase me. The only thing that bums me out is when kids arrive at a show and want us to play all of Gish.

N.J. The only connection between us and the Pumpkins is that I get all my Amway products from James Iha. I get all my Amway products from James.

What about Billy Corgan producing the Sleepy EP?

K.B. He co-produced the EP. Of course you'll read that he produced, masterminded and told us what to play.

N.J. He was our Sven Gali and he shaped us.

K.B. Basically he had some time off after the Red Hot Chili Peppers' tours...one of their tours. I can't remember which one...before they recorded Siamese Dream. He came into the studio, we're buddies. He came in and said 'I'd like to produce a couple of songs' and we said 'cool.' And the whole thing got blown out of proportion, way out of proportion. We are sort of the same age, we've got the same influences, we like rock music, which can be said about any other band from Chicago.

N.J. I'm just surprised that no one has noticed our C.C.R. influences. Styx, Survivor...you want to talk about the Chicago scene, let's talk abut REO Speedwagon, man.

K.B. I forget how many bands are from Chicago, like Tar and Jesus Lizard. These bands I don't even remember - they are from Chicago. They for some reason are from a different part of Chicago that doesn't get thrown into that Chicago scene. We tend to get thrown into that Liz Phair, Smashing Pumpkins, and Veruca Salt category. Seam, Tar...all those Touch and Go bands. Those bands rarely get any kind of Chicago press. Red Red Meat is a Chicago band that is signed to Sub Pop. The only time they get thrown in is when Billboard does a story. There is going to be a third and fourth and fifth wave of bands, there are going to be so many. Triple Fast Action just signed a deal and you'll be hearing from them.

J.B. Figdish has got something going on.

N.J. Also keep in mind Drag City Records, who put out the first Pavement records, that's a Chicago label.

Are you familiar with Canadian music?

J.B. I've heard The Tragically Hip. They play in Chicago all the time. They play at least once a month. I actually thought they were a Chicago band.

-Chris Aldworth

Article From - University of Waterloo: Imprint

Date - May 19, 1995

Article By - Chris Aldworth