Futuremag catches up with Kate Moth to chat about their single, ‘Run Generation’, the creative process behind their forthcoming EP No Key Sharp Enough, and the importance of friendship, vulnerability and having fun as a band. Following their selection as one of BIGSOUND’s five Upstarters, the group reflects on their journey so far, finding confidence in their sound and what’s next as they take their new music on the road.
Futuremag: Congratulations on the release of your new single, ‘Run Generation.’ How are you feeling about finally having it out in the world?
Kate Moth: I can only speak for myself, not on behalf of the other four members, but I think ‘Run Generation’ definitely feels like a step in the direction of being a little bit more critical of the ways that we’re mixing and producing our music.
We were much more granular with the way we wanted this particular song to sound. It’s a really great opportunity for all of us to find a language that we can agree on and really dive into a particular sound and personality for the song.
It’s always interesting trialling different mixes and seeing how a raw recording can turn into so many different expressions. For me personally, it feels like a really great step towards honing in on a particular language and mood, and opening all of our eyes to just how much you can do with a song if it’s produced really well.
So, yeah, a step in the right direction. And, speaking on behalf of the band, we’re all super pumped and excited that it’s out.
Futuremag: The song started as a jam during your live sets and eventually became a staple of your shows. What is it about ‘Run Generation’ that makes it so much fun to play live?
Kate Moth: It definitely puts all of our different playing styles to the forefront. There’s a really driving bassline, but it’s also very melodic, which is quite signature of our bass player, Tawny.
There’s a straight four-four beat in the drums, but it also has a lot of texture and different elements that our drummer, Fergus, brings to the project. Live, you can really feel that energy. We go super nuts with this one!
Fun is always really important to us, especially when it comes to playing live. Whenever we get to this song in the setlist, it feels a bit like getting a power-up in Mario Kart. It’s like you’ve just eaten a huge mushroom. There’s so much more energy, and you feel completely consumed by the song because there are so many different moments.
In the middle, there’s a section that becomes a little more a cappella, where I’m singing by myself. That’s a really intimate moment to lean into before it explodes into this beautiful, intricate play of textures.
Futuremag: ‘Run Generation’ also received its first play on triple j Unearthed Live, with the release brought forward. What was it like finding out the song was going to be played on triple j?
Kate Moth: It’s always an honour. I actually listened to it in a sauna with my girlfriend. We had one headphone each, and it was at the sauna where our bass player, Tawny, works. She was listening to it on the computer, and we were just dancing in the sauna.
There’s something particularly nice about radio when a song is first put into the world. If it comes out on radio first, there’s almost a feeling of relief. It’s like, “Now it feels like it’s out there,” because you know there are other people listening to it.
It feels more official. It’s been externally validated by a bigger audience, and it makes it feel a little more real. We’re not just playing it for our best friends; there are other people with their own stories listening to it for the first time, who might never have heard of Kate Moth before. It’s a pretty cool feeling.
Futuremag: I found that ‘Run Generation’ made even more sense to me after hearing ‘(You’re not a) Genius’. Do you see those two songs as connected?
Kate Moth: That’s a really interesting question. All of our songs are connected in some way, especially because they have the sound of all of us playing in our different ways.
They’re both very guitar-focused tracks, and I’m curious about whether there’s a link between some of the lyrics or an emotional through-line. Maybe a moment of insight, but also a moment of restlessness.
They’re both restless songs. They search a lot and never stick in one place for too long, but they also really enjoy each section and indulge in it. I appreciate that connection. I think they could be linked, although I hadn’t actually thought about it before.
I think that’s also the nature of releasing singles. You want someone to take a song in at first listen and appreciate it on its own, but with this EP, all the songs are meant to be listened to together. They work hand in hand and give each other a bit of context, so it’s nice to hear that.
Futuremag: Your EP is called No Key Sharp Enough, which is a lyric from ‘Run Generation’. Did you ever consider writing a song specifically called ‘No Key Sharp Enough’, or was the title more inspired by that lyric?
Kate Moth: I think it was a coincidental discovery that it’s a really great lyric in ‘Run Generation’. But the concept of No Key Sharp Enough almost feels like something that explains all the songs on the EP.
In some sense, the lyric encapsulates each of the songs and explores this feeling of not having a good enough answer for the themes they touch on. But there’s also a sense of becoming comfortable, or finding consolation, in the fact that there might not be an answer to those big, overarching questions.
For example, ‘Heartattack’ could be interpreted as a love song, and who knows the answers to love? Or who knows the answers to those complex things? ‘(You’re not a) Genius’ could be interpreted as a self-introspective journey of realising that you don’t know the answers to everything.
The title captures this idea of trying to break open a lock, but never having a key sharp enough to fit. There’s a sense of searching and taking action, but perhaps also an insight that there is no key sharp enough, and maybe there’s nothing to unlock.
The title actually came quite late. We already had the songs and were trying to work out what to call the EP. We were driving home from Melbourne along the Hume Highway, going through the lyrics in the car, and it just stuck out to us.
It’s also a music pun, which is kind of funny. The songs all make sense harmonically together, so it fits that musical element as well.
Futuremag: What do you think those tracks from the EP add to the record that we haven’t experienced through the singles?
Kate Moth: I think some songs naturally present themselves as singles when they’re being written or played, and others don’t. It’s hard to know exactly why that is.
Some of the songs we hadn’t released as singles are actually among our favourites. By not putting the pressure on them to be flagship songs, we could be a little more indulgent. They could be longer, and we could give ourselves more freedom to experiment, try things and go a bit nuts.
I think people will find that we’ve turned our imagination up another octave with some of those tracks.
One of them, ‘Holly Go Lightly’, is quite a pop song and probably could have been a single. But the fact that it wasn’t gave us the freedom to make it a little more out there and play around with it.
This is also our first EP and our first music releases, so we haven’t really tried to edit ourselves too much. There’s a lot of freedom and fun in what we’re doing, and we wanted to turn that up even further with some of the other songs.
Futuremag: How does songwriting usually work between all of you? Does someone bring an idea to the table, or do the songs tend to develop collaboratively?
Kate Moth: A lot of the songwriting is quite collaborative, and there’s not really a one-size-fits-all approach.
Sometimes a song comes from something quite personal to someone. Other times, we’ll be jamming for hours, with Seth and Finbar developing an intricate melody on their guitars. Tawny comes in with her own bassline, Fergus brings his drumbeat, and I’ll add my own melody. Sometimes I’ve been sitting with a lyric on my mind for a while that I want to sing about.
Our main rehearsal space is at Finbar’s house. There’s a little studio in a one-by-one room that we call the sauna. Once that room reaches a particular temperature, something really great comes out of it!
It could be a particular riff or a full song, and then everyone takes it apart and brings their own individual perspective to the different parts. There’s no real formula, which I think is a good thing.
We’re also getting closer as a group, to the point where any of us can branch off and write something together before bringing it into that space. It’s a really loose process, and we’re comfortable experimenting.
I think getting five people comfortable with sharing something personal is a process in itself. The world doesn’t have a lack of love songs or songs about youth, but some of the greatest songs I’ve ever listened to explore really intimate details of people’s lives.
When five people come together and create something beautiful that’s a little deeper beneath the surface, it makes it really special. It’s a skill we’re cultivating at the moment: being vulnerable around each other.
We’re all really great friends, and we weren’t brought together as session musicians. There’s a genuine friendship there. I feel comfortable talking to everyone about things I’m dealing with in my life and then converting those experiences into a song.
It’s quite a vulnerable experience, but one we’re slowly becoming more comfortable with.
Futuremag: It sounds like you’ve built a really supportive environment where everyone feels safe enough to be open and have difficult conversations. Sometimes those conversations can be the most productive. Is that something you’ve experienced as a band?
Kate Moth: Definitely. It’s actually quite funny because we’re very used to having difficult conversations in the rehearsal room. Sometimes the only way out of it is for everyone to just start playing their instruments!
Words are so important when it comes to songs and concepts, but we’re also learning how to call it and just play through whatever we’re feeling.
I’m quite a “talk it out” kind of person. I like rationalising things and working through them with words. But what I’m learning through music is that you can express something through your playing, whether it’s an expression pedal, reverb or delay. The emotion can still be there without needing the specific, literal words.
It’s something I’m becoming much more comfortable with.
We’ve only been together for about a year and a half, coming up to two years, and I was saying to Seth recently that if we’re already tapping into something this special, I can’t imagine what it might look like in another year, two years or three years.
We’re building something really beautiful, and we feel very privileged. We definitely don’t take it for granted.
Futuremag: You’ve also put in a lot of hours together, both in the rehearsal room and playing live. How important has that experience been in building the band?
Kate Moth: I think such an important part of being in a band is simply playing and putting in the hours. It’s like practising for a game or a sporting event.
We’ve definitely put in the hours and paid our dues. That doesn’t just mean spending time in the rehearsal room; it also means playing so many gigs where sometimes there are very few people in the audience, not feeling embarrassed and making some of the worst mistakes you can imagine on stage.
We’ve all done that many, many times!
I’m sure we’ll make plenty more mistakes in the future, but we’ve built a really nice foundation together where everything feels natural. It feels like we’ve been doing it for a long time, even though we haven’t.
Futuremag: You were recently selected as one of the five Upstarters for BIGSOUND. What was it like finding out you’d been chosen?
Kate Moth: We were pretty over the moon because we found out about a week beforehand, and we’d almost given up hope of getting up there.
It was such a great feeling. We’d never played Brisbane before, and we love Monster Children. I’ve been reading the magazine since I was a kid because my dad used to give it to me for Christmas. So it was a little surreal, and we had so much fun up there.
It was also really nice to be selected among so many incredible artists. It felt like our hard work was being recognised, and that was really validating.
You have to emotionally prepare yourself for rejection when you’re working in a creative industry, so we’d already started preparing ourselves for that. To then be selected was an incredible confidence boost. It made us feel like we were being seen.
Futuremag: BIGSOUND can be such a whirlwind, especially when there’s a big opportunity on the line. Did you feel any pressure going into the performances?
Kate Moth: Absolutely. I did a lot of reflecting after BIGSOUND about how having a big incentive in front of you can affect your emotions and your performance.
Initially, I was really excited. I was thinking about how much fun we’d all have, how some of us were flying up, and how we’d make a great trip out of it.
But as it got closer, it started to feel a little more daunting. I was rehearsing lines in my head about what to say, whether to thank BIGSOUND or Up Bank, whether to talk at all or keep things mysterious. I was thinking about all these little details and even whether I should eat before the performance because I didn’t want to get reflux!
I was so in my head.
The funniest thing is that the best performance I’ve ever done, personally, was probably when there were hardly any people in the audience. I remember playing in Geelong and there were only four or five people watching us, but they were loving it. There were also people watching from the balcony.
Reflecting on those moments reminded me that music is about having fun. It’s not necessarily about playing to an audience; it’s about playing for yourself and not losing sight of that.
The point isn’t to be competitive or to have a plan for every performance. It’s just to have fun.
I ended up getting nice and drunk for our next BIGSOUND performance and had a ball! It was a good reminder that if there’s ever another big opportunity in front of us, we can fall back on that experience and remember what really matters.
Futuremag: With No Key Sharp Enough out, what are you most excited about for the EP?
Kate Moth: I’m really excited to take it on tour. We’re doing a headline tour through Melbourne, Canberra and Wollongong, followed by our first Sydney headline show.
It’ll be so much fun to have all these songs out in the world and hear people singing them back to us. You really notice the difference once a song has been released and people start singing along at shows.
It’s also just a relief to finally put the music out there. It’s like having a stone in your shoe. You’ve got all these songs you’ve been working on and writing for ages, and then you finally get to empty the shoe. It feels really good.
Although, of course, we already have other stones in our shoes!
It’s a never-ending uncomfortable feeling of walking around, but I guess that’s part of being a musician.
