It’s a very real possibility that when a band spend as much time on the road as Australian jazz/ska/funkers The Cat Empire, they could lose track of where they are on any given night. That’s why we’re impressed when drummer Will Hull-Brown not only knows exactly where he is, he’s also well aware of the fact that he’ll be in Victoria on July 19 as part of the the Phillips Backyard Weekender, a two-day music event taking place at Phillips Brewery.
“Yeah, we’re just playing a cultural centre in Minneapolis tonight and then we’re on our way over to see you guys in Victoria in a couple of weeks,” says Hull-Brown when we reach him by phone. “It’s a six-week tour and it’s lots of travelling, but we’re pretty lucky that we have a good driver and we can just chill out in the back of the bus.”
The group is touring for their recently released album, Steal the Light, which is a return to the partying, dancey ways of their earlier material, and Hull-Brown says they are eager to bring those vibes to our fair city again.
“We’ve loved it there. We’ve come to Victoria a few times and in some ways it feels like home,” he says. “A beautiful city, nice people, good food, and everyone’s up for good music. We love that part of the world.”
Now that The Cat Empire has been together for over 12 years, they’ve had lots of time to reflect on what it is that’s made them such a popular touring band, as well as their creative strengths and weaknesses. The result of this reflection brought them to their latest and fifth album, which has brought their career full circle.
“The natural thing for us was to always make upbeat, feel-good, danceable music,” says Hull-Brown, “so we wanted to get back to our roots, have fun, and do a party album with bangin’ tunes that people can go nuts on the dance floor to.”
Another consideration the band made when writing Steal the Light was to make an album from which they could play every song in a live setting, rather than having to pick and choose which ones to include in their shows.
“On previous albums we had to pass up certain songs, but with this new one we’ve played most of the songs, and by the end of the tour we’ll have played them all,” says Hull-Brown. “We’ve got the luxury now of mixing up set lists depending on where we are or what we feel like doing.”
The Cat Empire is an eclectic band that gets pulled in a bunch of different musical directions on stage, but they always hold things together, and that almost-chaotic energy is what keeps them exciting. Hull-Brown credits some of this frenetic onstage energy to vocalist/trumpet player Harry James Angus.
“Harry leads a lot of that. You never know when you’re going to do a solo; he’ll just point to you and say, ‘Alright, drum solo! Bass solo!’ So sometimes we don’t have much choice,” he laughs. “But it really depends on how we feel, like what kind of music we’ve been listening to that day, and we might start a jam based on that during the set. We always want to have freedom to mess about during the songs. It’s an important part of our live set and it’s essential for us to do that, otherwise I’m not even sure we’d exist.”
Maybe some of that impromptu energy will translate nicely to their upcoming show here. And the best thing of all is the beer will be close and in much abundance.
“Yeah, I know,” chuckles Hull-Brown. “Great, man; I really look forward to the show and trying the beer there!”