By now you guys have probably read dmat’s review for the new Lack The Low album, God-Carrier (and if you haven’t you really ought to go do that…right now yeah?). And while Mathias’ review pushed my own precarious dib aside like an uncle’s least favourite, annoying nephew…his review really hits the nail on the head. Kind of like Lack The Low’s God-Carrier. Anyhow… I got to chatting to the mastermind behind the tunes, multi-instrumentalist and Melbourne-based pop mastermind, Kat Hunter.

How do you think your music should be described. Baroque? Avant Garde? Pop? Pop-adjacent? What is Kat Hunter’s go-to style?

I think it’s pretty hard to describe even for me! I normally say avant-pop, but honestly the music just makes itself, and the classification comes later.

In regards to the album imagery? Are you bending over backwards to please a select few, or is there a deeper meaning to the arched back-ism, dark palette and the pillar which carries the weight of one (or many)?

The picture on the cover was taken by photographer Jeff Andersen Jr. When we were getting together to discuss my music and figure out ways of conveying it in photography, he came up with the idea of making some photos in the style of a Caravaggio painting. It was totally all Jeff’s idea and his ability to pull it off, but that’s where a lot of the ideas around dark shading and posture came from.

God-Carrier is relatively short. Do you think about length when composing? Did you have a few hours of material to choose from? Is this a stronger pick of the bunch?

Actually there were originally more like eleven songs I was working on all at once, and hoping to put into this record. When I started writing for it, it was shortly after both my maternal grandparents had died, and I was writing a lot about them, inspired by their lives. The original working title of the record was actually Blue Streak, which was a missile my grandfather had worked on during his incredibly varied working life. In the end the project was too big and (ironically) heavy, and as I worked on it, the songs started splitting off in all directions – it was clear that the work did not want to be one big thing. Some of those original themes have survived in God-Carrier. For example, the sample in the middle of “Saturn” is a bootleg recording that my grandfather made in 1978 when he was working in Iran, shortly before the Iranian revolution. But for the most part it became clear that the God-Carrier tracks took on a life and theme of their own, and wanted to be placed together.

Is this music for you or for your fans? Or neither? I want to get in the head of one Kat Hunter (figuratively, of course).

I’d say it’s for me! That said, I do have an eye for how it might come across, and especially for how I want people to feel when they listen to it. When I’m making music I kind of feel like I’m at a pulpit – as though I’m there to really convince people of something or other; whatever seems most urgent and important at the time.

How much brain power does it take to make Lack The Low “lack the least”?

It takes a lot of brain power! More than I really have to give, but I muddle along anyway. The things that typically take a lot more care, hours and development is the singing side of things (I practice singing regularly and think of it as my primary instrument), but also the production and engineering. Given I was recording, producing and mixing this all myself I had to spend a lot of time and effort honing those skills so that I could try to get the music to where I wanted.

Of dealing with praise, metalheads and eventually converts from more extreme genres…

Yeah, I would say I think quite a number of the people who enjoy my music are metal fans. I think my music encompasses disparate enough influences that often people can find something they’re searching for in my songs, even if they normally listen to other genres. But I do get a lot of really lovely feedback from folks who like metal, prog and math rock, and I really love that, and I love those genres myself.

Have you received any criticism so far?

I’ve definitely received a bit of criticism. But honestly I love it. Normally the criticism has to do with something that I’m doing deliberately that might not be to everyone’s taste. I think usually once I get a song to the stage where I like it, then I’m willing to stand behind it, and I just enjoy finding out what other people think, good or bad. It’s all just really interesting.

When we attempted some simple word association…

Progressive: Hopefully also deep

Quoll: Spotted

Local music: More

Music Streaming: Inevitable

Bar Settings: Bukowski

Leaving Beers Unfinished: Wasteful

Do you have goals in mind for the next few years? They don’t have to be musically focused.

Yes! I’ve just gone back to uni to study wildlife and conservation biology. Beyond that, just hoping to ride out whatever strange apocalyptic waves and troughs the planet has in store.

Relevancy in lyricism, deeper track meanings and of course “Brigid”…

I started writing “Brigid” after having a challenging and physically painful experience in the medical system. I was at home, literally lying on the floor, in pain, listening to Jenny Hval’s album Blood Bitch, and this song came on, “The Plague”, and I was totally overcome and started writing this song immediately. At the time I’d been listening to a lot of Julie Doiron, so the initial parts of the song and guitar playing were inspired by her. I was trying to synthesize these ideas I was having about the kind of alienation that women face in the medical system, trying to have their symptoms taken seriously, trying to get diagnosis. I was going through my own health issues but was also hearing from friends about their experiences with things like endometriosis, which causes an unbelievable amount of pain, and usually takes women between 4 and 10 years to get a diagnosis. Originally the song was called “Elective Surgery”, and it went through many different versions, with the end section changing quite a bit. Eventually I settled on this thematic idea of care having originally been this community-based vernacular activity. I was interested in ancient forms of polytheism (Brigid is an ancient Celtic goddess) and the idea that people might have prayed to a goddess for the fertility and good health of people and of the land, of animals, of agriculture. That the ability for women to make life, to care, to create things in the world was held as vitally important on this cultural and spiritual level. To juxtapose that idea with an emotionally sterile, often inhospitable and bureaucratic industrialized medical culture felt like an interesting way of comparing the origins and results of the professionalization of what might be seen as “women’s work”, and to show on an ideological level how we have all lost out in that process. Really, this is just one example of the many systems in our industrialized society that have often failed to value warmth and compassion (for ourselves, for each other, for the land) as a central necessity. I think maybe we’re starting to come around now, but it’s a slow process.

How does God-Carrier compare with One Eye Closed, song-writing growth and all the years in between?

When I started One Eye Closed, I was really at the start of my production journey in many ways. I wasn’t even sure if I’d be able to make an album. It was the first time I had tried making anything so large scale; the first time I’d tried to do almost everything myself. Even though I was attached to the outcome, I was still in a more experimental mindset, and I was interested in letting that show through – interested in showing the process in the work itself. With God-Carrier I put a lot more pressure on myself to make something that would seem really full and complete. That each song would hold its own fully fledged little world, and that the album as a whole would make sense thematically. I was thinking about some of my favourite records I listened to as a teenager, and just trying to unpick what they were doing and asking “how can I make those sounds myself?” So in a lot of ways I’ve set the bar higher.

Thanks for taking the time to answer these questions. By making it this far you’re in dire need of applause or a stiff drink (probably both?). Do you have any parting words for would-be fans of Lack The Low and God-Carrier?

No parting words really! I just really hope everyone stays safe and well.

You can listen to Lack The Low via Bandcamp here.

 

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