FEATURE:
Modern Heroines
PHOTO CREDIT: Philippe Lebruman
Part Thirty-Two: Kate Stables of This Is the Kit
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FOR this part of…
Modern Heroines, I had to clarify in the title. This Is the Kit is the project of Kate Stables but, as she has other musicians in the band, I didn’t want there to be ambiguity. This feature is dedicated to women in music who are going to go on to inspire a lot of other musicians and enjoy great success. I will come to focus on This Is the Kit’s fifth studio album, Off Off On – it was released in October of last year. This Is the Kit perform regularly in various configurations from duo to quintet, with the core band consisting of Kate Stables (vocals/guitar/banjo), Rozi Plain (bass/vocals), Neil Smith (guitar), and Jamie Whitby-Coles (drums). I was a big fan of This Is the Kit’s fourth studio album, Moonshine Freeze, of 2017. I am going to concentrate on Off Off On, as it is the new album. That said, as I do with every Modern Heroines subject, there will be a playlist at the end that collates the best songs from all of their albums. In terms of sound, This Is the Kit are a mix of Folk and Alternative. The band have won praise from BBC Radio 6 Music heavily. Various broadcasters have featured the brilliant music of Kate Stables but, going forward, I think This Is the Kit’s albums will get wider exposure. The reason I have included This Is the Kit in Modern Heroines is because Stables is one of the most exciting and engaging songwriters in music.
She has a great voice, but I think her songwriting digs deeper than most. She has this ability to conjure music that sounds simple of the surface but, the more you listen, the more comes to the fore. Before bringing in a couple of reviews for Off Off On, it is worth getting some interview context. Stables spoke with CLASH last year and was asked about getting the record finished with lockdown looming:
“The new album was recorded at Real World studios near Bath in March. You must have been cutting it fine ahead of the national lockdown?
We just skidded our way in under the garage door, but I didn’t really even see it coming. I think everyone else in the band - they’re a bit better at reading newspapers than me - every morning would be like ‘this is looking a bit weird guys’ and I’d be all ‘ah it’s alright, it’s just another flu, let’s get on with it.’ And then I was really proved wrong and it was a real shock. We were just kind of in studio bubble world and not thinking about the outside world very much and then look what happened.
Given the way it took you by surprise, did you manage to actually complete the record before the world just stopped?
We finished the recording session. We did the full number of days we’d planned to do and got 97% of it done. All that remained was mixing and editing, and a few overdubs which I could do at home. We also sent it to a few friends [Aaron Dessner of The National and Thomas Bartlett, better known as Doveman] to add some touches, so the bulk of it was all done. It was just the mixing, the final phase, that had to happen long distance. It feels like some unlikely car chase scenario where you just miss the tree falling onto you. We’ve been quite lucky.
You have a different producer this time around, Josh Kaufman, and would it be fair to say that the vocal sound is pretty different for you?
I’m someone that always makes a fuss about reverb but Josh, god bless him, put his foot down. There are less effects than there were - we sort of came to a compromise - but I’m really pleased that he insisted because it makes it different. I think my main problem with reverb is that at a gig, when the sound engineer doesn’t know your music, they just decide to put loads on because you’re a female. That’s where my reflex against reverb comes from, but when it’s used carefully and thoughtfully it’s obviously a really great tool.
As ‘Off Off On’ nudges 2018’s ‘Moonshine Freeze’ into the distance, I wonder how you feel about past records? Do you listen back to them at all or consign them to the past?
Well, they’re all like time capsules or family photo albums; there’s these nice documents of what you did with these people at that time, but I don’t listen much to my past albums.
Obviously there’s the fact that I’ve just been working on this new album and so I’ve been listening to it because of that, but I also feel like I’ve been listening to it a bit more than I usually do because I miss the band and it’s just nice to hear them”.
As much as I love the music and vocals of This Is the Kit, I think it is the lyrics that leave the biggest impression. There is this obliqueness that some could see as evasive – Stables does write from a personal space but a lot of the lines are not as direct as one might expect. When she spoke with NME, Stables discussed her lyrical approach:
“Your lyrics are quite abstract. Is that a protective layer – because you don’t want to divulge specifics – or just how you naturally express yourself?
“I think it’s how I naturally express myself. Anyone who’s ever asked me to write something that isn’t a song – anyone who’s ever received a letter or an email from me – knows that I’m not a tidy writer, it’s lists of words and gobbledegook. But there is an element of privacy. I think a songwriter shouldn’t have to explain themselves or explain their songs. I just like being left to interpret a song, and I like leaving people to interpret my songs.”
‘This Is What You Did’ mirrors the circularity of an anxiety attack. What can you tell us about that track?
“‘Why am I putting everyone through the stressful experience of listening to this song?’ For a lot of people – me included – writing songs is a kind of exorcism. You say things out loud to get them said and out of the way, and then they almost don’t exist anymore. It breaks whatever power they had over you. So that song is about looking at the voices you hear and trying to work out how much of it is other people’s judgements, and how much is our own negativity. Anxiety is a circular thing – there is that vortex we can get trapped in sometimes – and the song has these loops that mirror the mind-loops in the words.”
The title track deals with the death of a friend…
“Yes, in part it’s about this experience in a hospital and the idea of someone leaving and how we come to terms with that – putting ourselves in that position: what it would be like to know you’re on your way out. And the rhythms and the routines that happen in and out of a hospital room, and the light that changes, and the daily cycles of being in this one place. Places or images are often my inspiration for songs. For me, I just see this particular hospital, and the kind of light in it, and the bulbs that blink on the machinery”.
I think that Off Off On was one of last year’s best albums. It is definitely worth buying if you do not have it already. I am not sure what the future holds for This Is the Kit, but I think we will see many more albums and huge international recognition. Just before moving on to some reviews, there was an interesting interview from NBHAP that delved deeper into themes explored on the record – including modern day living, imagery and spirituality:
“The ‘identity disease’ has been a prominent feature of our society since forever and the need for people to define themselves has hit its peak when branding personalities became the new goal of advertising. Humans like to categorise and build systems to put other people into. It is a necessary action to stay healthy since otherwise we would constantly be overwhelmed by the amount of uncategorised information we receive on a daily basis through our interactions with strangers, colleagues or friends and the amount of digital information but right now, and times before, it is also one of the most problematic issues we have.
“I think probably everyone carries experiences and knowledge and know-how within but sometimes it needs to be unlocked or woken up by a certain situation and sometimes we have to re-learn stuff. Quite often as human beings we forget the lessons we learn and we forget the skills we’ve acquired through our lives but also throughout the history of mankind. I feel like there are so many things that we could be doing and be aware of but we choose not to.
It’s really easy to feel like it’s futile and we’re just going around in circles but I actually think that it’s a spiral: we sort of come back to the same point as before but we’re a little bit further along. We go round and we’re kind of in the same place but we have made some progress. It does feel quite repetitive, though and we’re like ‘Oh god, really?! We’re in this political situation again, hasn’t anyone learned how to do this yet”.
I should really move on and introduce some reviews for the remarkable Off Off On. It is an album that deserves a lot of love and listening.
In their review, this is what The Independent noted:
“The fifth album from Kate Stables’ This is the Kit was crafted with the band at an isolated cottage in the Brecon Beacons, before being recorded in Wiltshire. So far, so 2020. Except this was before Covid took hold.
It’s uncanny, then, just how appropriate the title of the album, Off Off On, feels given the stop-start nature of lockdowns in this Covid year. The themes too, of resilience and starting again (“Started Again”), homesickness, needing space, and the perennial question of the work/life balance (“Slider”), love and solitude (“Shinbone Soap”), and anxiety (“This is What You Did”) could not be more pertinent.
“This is What You Did” is, to me, the single of the year, and not just for its conception as a “panic attack kind of song”, but for its brilliantly infectious melody and distinct folk-flavoured groove. While the hypnotically circling banjo and relentlessly propulsive beat create a feeling of unease, Stables’ overlapping vocals cleverly conjure the negative voices that can be hard to shake. Flourishes of saxophone and off-beat electric guitar add to the suffocation, which she evocatively describes, “Is it holding you down, this great weight? And it’s flattening/ And it’s breaking you up, all your frequency shattering”.
Fascinatingly, Stables tends to gauge what her songs need from playing them at gigs, and you can hear how much those rehearsal sessions in Wales gained the album: an energy harnessed straight from the live setting”.
Just before bringing things to a close and giving you a playlist featuring the best This Is the Kit cuts, I will quote from a review from The Line of Best Fit:
“This Is The Kit have always been connoisseurs of creating slow building tension. In a song that feels reminiscent of 2017’s Moonshine Freeze, the band crescendo into a chant of “rocks and water” - again a nod to the location the album was created in, but also an example of finding the beauty in simplicity. This is the way the album has been produced - simply but magnificently. Producer Josh Kaufman - New York-based musician, Hold Steady collaborator and member of Bonny Light Horseman and Muzz - has elevated the album, finding the perfect mix of chaotic and smooth.
An exciting cacophony of instruments pop up throughout the record - on “Slider” there’s subtle saxophone from Lorenzo Prati, on “No Such Thing” brass creates a jazzy and elegant tone, and woodwind springs up in “Coming To Get You Nowhere” as Stables repeats the line “energy, energy, please”.
The themes are as diverse as the instruments, ranging from sadness to power. “Slider” is a tribute to a friend who passed away after being ill in hospital. Delicate vocals overlay a melancholic saxophone, as lyrics explore both sides of every phrase, revealing the new perspective that arrives after trauma: “Making time / losing time”, “To be held / and to hold”. In antithesis, “Was Magician” is a story of a young woman reaching her full powers. Based on the books of author Ursula K. Le Guin, Stables has delivered a quietly compelling call to action for her generation.
The album ends on a nearly seven minute reminder to “Keep Going”, a sentimental and heartening song that encourages hope and the promise of a better future. It is at its core, the message everyone needs to hear this year”.
Make sure you familiarise yourself with the work of Kate Stables and This Is the Kit. Her music is amazing; I do feel that she has a very long and interesting career ahead of her. Her sound is very much her own but, at the same time, it can be appreciated by everyone – as you will hear…
IN the playlist.