What's Up! Magazine

When one thinks of local music it’s hard not to think about the people who actually make up the soul of the scene. One of these folks who come to mind is Kat Bula, who has a broad portfolio of works and musical connections, and has been involved through the organization of B’DAMN, seeking sensible noise and venue policies. I was fortunate enough to catch Kat for an interview as we rang in the New Year.

Boris Budd: Tell us what inspired you to make Thimble vs. Needle. Were the songs from the record a collection of stuff you had accumulated as a songwriter over the years, or was the material a sudden burst of energy based upon prevailing events from that period in your life?

Kat Bula: You mean the album Thimble vs. Needle, which is mostly me multi-tracked, and not the five-piece band Thimble vs. Needle as it exists now, right?

For a long time I wanted to start a new band–an indie/pop/folk project that would get progressively noisier and mathier as it developed. But I had a hard time getting people to understand what kind of music I had in mind when I invited them to work with me. I had been playing in bluegrass bands (Feed & Seed, The Caved In) and Pirates R Us for so long that people assumed that was all I listened to or wanted to play. I watched David Ney go through a similar process after Pirates R Us broke up. He was writing all these songs that were not silly, not oom-pah-pah, but that was all people expected him to do. So he made this great serious album (Bright Blue) and then he was able to easily show people what kind of music he wanted to be making. After that, putting together the David Stray Ney Band was a snap. I wanted to do the same thing.

Some of the songs on my album (like “Pogo Stick”) I’d had for years, but the majority of them I wrote in the months leading up to recording. It all came out poppier and less “weird” than I had really expected, but I like it, and it did the trick as far as helping other musicians understand what I was asking them to be part of. In its current form, Thimble vs. Needle only plays about half of the songs on the album, and the newer songs are increasingly experimental.

BB: Discuss the recording process for the record. Did you work with a set line-up and what lessons and previous experiences from recording were you able to employ and or attempt in the production of the album?

KB: Most of the album is me. I did all the guitar, accordion, and vocal parts, and a lot of the violin and viola parts, before I brought in anyone else. Anna Arvan and I recorded some cello and violin parts simultaneously, and I’m convinced now that this is the way to go for an organic string sound. We did the same thing on Biagio Biondolillo’s record. Anna’s harmony vocals, Chris Stainback’s bass and percussion, and Dave Maguire’s mandolin and resonator guitar are all overdubbed.

I worked with Ryan Richardson at Golden Coin Studios, and that was a great experience. He found a balance of offering input while ceding control, that is hard for a lot of engineers I think. He also let me in the control room during the final mixing, and implemented a lot of my weird ideas without complaint. I don’t think that’s incredibly common.

Whenever I hear people complain about some aspect of my album’s mixing, it’s usually something I did to make it a little less polished-sounding. I like the way it sounds. If I ever want to make something super-polished, I know Ryan can do it.

BB: Please give the readers some background as to the number of projects/bands you have contributed to since you started playing.

KB: Do you really want a number? How about 15? I don’t really know. It’s like when young actors count the number of people they’ve made out with–do they count stage kisses?

I have been in bands since I was an 11-year-old in Spokane. Back then it was nursing homes, county fairs. The first band in which I had creative input was “Blue Moon,” a mishmash of traditional Irish and Scottish tunes and ’60s folk songs. I was 13 and Marcie, my bandmate, was 15. I played fiddle and flute, and maybe mandolin or something. Once we played a show on a stage in a grocery store parking lot for some charity. The audience was literally zero.

BB: Why did you decide to make music your life and why is it a good/bad decision?

KB: I never did decide. When I was little I had no friends so I sang, and then learned fiddle. Now I teach fiddle lessons instead of continuing to work at a video store because I get paid more to teach fiddle and it doesn’t make me want to die.

If music as life were a decision, it would be a bad one. I learned as a college music major that it’s incredibly dangerous to form your whole identity around being a musician. What happens when you work so hard that you don’t even like music anymore? Then who are you? What happens when you surround yourself with people who are better musicians than you are? Does it make you an inferior person in general?

Pirates R Us may have hampered my GPA in my last quarter of college, but I owe them for reminding me that music can be ridiculous and fun. But only as long as I keep my escape route clear.

BB: Give us some insights as to what it was like to be in a group like Pirates R Us. What kind of memorable adventures took place on the road and in the studio?

KB: One of the things I miss most about that band is that we played a lot of house shows, lots of them for people who normally didn’t pay attention to non-mainstream bands. People like to throw pirate parties. Since that band was so high-energy (another thing I miss), it was amazing to play for people five feet from our faces who reflected back that energy so intensely.

…Of course, the whole message of the band was subverting the Man, so “high energy” sometimes meant messing around rockstarishly (in pirate hats). Sometimes the audiences met us there (like the garage full of people in Moscow, Idaho that took the 110 degree weather as an excuse to get naked), and sometimes they did not. I still hear stories sometimes about what a jerk that band was. It’s funny to me; as individuals we are all so lovely. We’d have to be, would we not, to so thoroughly embrace acting like dorks?

BB: What is your take on the condition of the local music scene? What is your prescription for the preservation of the art community?

KB: It’s tempting to oversimplify this. Selective enforcement of the noise ordinance doesn’t seem to be as much of a problem as it once was, but it could resurface any time and we need to get that law changed. (Readers interested in working on this, please get in touch with me; my former B’DAMN (Bellingham’s Downtown Alliance for Music & Nightlife) co-conspirators have all moved away. You can reach me through myspace.com/thimblevsneedle.

On the more pressing problem of disappearing venues: let’s develop non-traditional venues. Please tell me one reason why the restaurant or widget shop where you work couldn’t or shouldn’t host shows during or after business hours. A lot of places really can’t, and I get that, but I think a lot more have just never considered the idea. Come up with a way to monetize it–or at least not lose money–and why not give it a go? Businesses, remember that when bands advertise for their shows, that is free advertising for you, even if you’re not actively making money from the show.

And, duh: musicgoers please actually spend money in the businesses that host music. We live in a capitalist society; make it a worthwhile business endeavor to host music and more places will host music. Especially please support the places that pay bands as the businesspeople they are. (Bands, even if you’re “not in it for the money”, if you have a draw, don’t let businesses trick you into doing their advertising for them without compensating you accordingly.)

BB: Who do you draw influence from musically? In life?

KB: I love when bands like Deerhoof and CocoRosie–even sometimes Radiohead–combine sweet melodies with unexpectedly dissonant or noisy instrumental arrangements. That’s where I want to go with Thimble vs. Needle. Andrew Bird is a buttkicker for me because he has such a similar skill set to mine (violin, just-okay guitar skills, singing) and he makes amazing music instead of complaining that you can’t lead a band with a violin. Peter Woiwod (Go Slowpoke), Anna Arvan (I Love You Avalanche) and Jake Hemming (Big Sur) constantly write songs that challenge my perception of what’s “good enough” lyrically and melodically. Complex instrumental bands like Rooftops, Cicadas, Pan Pan and Piano Mover inspire me to write stuff that requires my whole concentration to play. I miss that about playing classical music, or even the super-fast bluegrass improvisation I had to do to keep up with Feed & Seed.

BB: Where does you see yourself on 5, 10 years? What are your goals and dreams?

KB: Isn’t the world supposed to end before I’m 31 anyway? …I want to have or be working on a PhD. My second major (besides music) at WWU was Culture, Gender & Sexuality Studies. It probably should have just been English with a Critical Theory focus, and that’s probably where I’ll end up doing graduate work. I’d also like to do more academically with electronic music and critical musicology.

BB: What was the wildest experience you have ever had on the road with a band?

KB: I work with kids now, Boris. Isn’t it enough that there are swear words in my songs? …Pirates R Us recently received a request to go to St. John (or was it St. Croix?) and play a party for people who like to fire cannons into the air and make people walk the plank off of a nearby cliff. That sounds like it could take the cake of anything I’ve actually experienced. Even wilder than the mini-golf place in Abilene, Texas. Or the elementary school classroom in Davis, California.

BB: Tell us about your cat you love so much?

KB: As I type this, Audrey is curled up half-asleep on a Mono CD, purring. Oh–oh, now she’s licking her paw. Every little thing she does is magic.

Contact Kat Bula at myspace.com/thimblevsneedle