Interview: Neko Case
Alt.country. Neko Case does not like that as a description of alternatives to commercial Country music. “It sounds like a web site,” she says. Her record label, Bloodshot, calls the music insurgent Country. No matter what you call it, on May 15, the night before Bethlehem’s River Fusion, you can hear music you are not likely to hear either on the Valley’s Country radio stations or at the Allentown Fair.
The thirty-three year old Case prefers just to be classified as Country. But her music is both more intellectual and emotional than the “top 40” radio fare that she says she does not listen to. For example, her latest CD, “Blacklisted” (Bloodshot Records 2002) begins with the lines “Fluorescent lights engage black birds/Fry ‘em on a wire.” She wrote all but two of the thirteen songs.
Her lyrics create a mood instead of telling straightforward stories. Rather than giving literal meanings, she says, she likes to “paint pictures.” In a phone interview from Toronto, where she is mixing a live CD, Case says that “Blacklisted” deals with “fear and homesickness, being caught in the middle of change.” She calls it “a little more reflective” than her previous work.
Case left her family’s home in Tacoma, Washington, when she was fifteen. At eighteen, she began playing as a drummer in various punk bands. It was not until 1998 that she recorded her first Country CD, “The Virginian” (Bloodshot), named after the state where she was born. She says that did not find much of a change between the two musical styles. “Both punk and Country have the same intent. They are both about dissatisfaction and passion.”
She broke through with her second release, “Furnace Room Lullaby” (Bloodshot 2000). All the songs were written or co-written by her, many of them about love and breakups. Case was noticed both for her talent and her sultry good looks. She even won last year’s Playboy poll of “The Sexiest Babe of Indie Rock,” an event which she says she prefers not to talk about.
For someone with such an exceptional voice, it is surprising that Case did not begin singing in public until her early twenties. She says, “I just wanted it so bad,” overcoming her shyness. She also says that the other members of Maow, an all-girl punk trio, forced her to sing her own compositions. The trio was based in Vancouver, where Case studied art and photography. It is the hometown of many of the musicians that she has worked with from the time they were first billed as Neko Case and Her Boyfriends.
The musicians use a number of different instruments on “Blacklisted,” ranging from traditional banjo and pedal steel to pump organ and cello. But throughout, Case’s powerful, clear voice is in the foreground. “In the classic recordings the vocals are pushed out front. It creates tension,” she says. As an example, she mentions the Platters, the fifties vocal group with hits that included “The Great Pretender.”
Case will be playing at RiversEve, an event the night before the all-day RiverFusion festival on May 16. Both are benefits for the Illick’s Mill Partnership for Environmental Education. Replacing her regular band (her guitarist is having heart surgery), Case will be backed by the Sadies, another band that she has recorded with and who are also on the Bloodshot Records label.
Case has two side projects. She is a member of the indie pop group the New Pornographers, and is one of the Corn Sisters along with her friend Carolyn Mark.
Neko Case, RiversEve, shows 7 and 9 pm, the IceHouse, Bethlehem, $42.50 and $35.00, pre-concert event for $60 features reception with dessert buffet, premium seats to Neko Case and admission to RiverFusion, 610-653-0908, RiversEve web site at http://www.illicksmill.org/riverfusion/id43.htm.
- Dave Howell is a free-lance writer.
(This article first appeared in The Morning Call newspaper.)
The thirty-three year old Case prefers just to be classified as Country. But her music is both more intellectual and emotional than the “top 40” radio fare that she says she does not listen to. For example, her latest CD, “Blacklisted” (Bloodshot Records 2002) begins with the lines “Fluorescent lights engage black birds/Fry ‘em on a wire.” She wrote all but two of the thirteen songs.
Her lyrics create a mood instead of telling straightforward stories. Rather than giving literal meanings, she says, she likes to “paint pictures.” In a phone interview from Toronto, where she is mixing a live CD, Case says that “Blacklisted” deals with “fear and homesickness, being caught in the middle of change.” She calls it “a little more reflective” than her previous work.
Case left her family’s home in Tacoma, Washington, when she was fifteen. At eighteen, she began playing as a drummer in various punk bands. It was not until 1998 that she recorded her first Country CD, “The Virginian” (Bloodshot), named after the state where she was born. She says that did not find much of a change between the two musical styles. “Both punk and Country have the same intent. They are both about dissatisfaction and passion.”
She broke through with her second release, “Furnace Room Lullaby” (Bloodshot 2000). All the songs were written or co-written by her, many of them about love and breakups. Case was noticed both for her talent and her sultry good looks. She even won last year’s Playboy poll of “The Sexiest Babe of Indie Rock,” an event which she says she prefers not to talk about.
For someone with such an exceptional voice, it is surprising that Case did not begin singing in public until her early twenties. She says, “I just wanted it so bad,” overcoming her shyness. She also says that the other members of Maow, an all-girl punk trio, forced her to sing her own compositions. The trio was based in Vancouver, where Case studied art and photography. It is the hometown of many of the musicians that she has worked with from the time they were first billed as Neko Case and Her Boyfriends.
The musicians use a number of different instruments on “Blacklisted,” ranging from traditional banjo and pedal steel to pump organ and cello. But throughout, Case’s powerful, clear voice is in the foreground. “In the classic recordings the vocals are pushed out front. It creates tension,” she says. As an example, she mentions the Platters, the fifties vocal group with hits that included “The Great Pretender.”
Case will be playing at RiversEve, an event the night before the all-day RiverFusion festival on May 16. Both are benefits for the Illick’s Mill Partnership for Environmental Education. Replacing her regular band (her guitarist is having heart surgery), Case will be backed by the Sadies, another band that she has recorded with and who are also on the Bloodshot Records label.
Case has two side projects. She is a member of the indie pop group the New Pornographers, and is one of the Corn Sisters along with her friend Carolyn Mark.
Neko Case, RiversEve, shows 7 and 9 pm, the IceHouse, Bethlehem, $42.50 and $35.00, pre-concert event for $60 features reception with dessert buffet, premium seats to Neko Case and admission to RiverFusion, 610-653-0908, RiversEve web site at http://www.illicksmill.org/riverfusion/id43.htm.
- Dave Howell is a free-lance writer.
(This article first appeared in The Morning Call newspaper.)