A couple of days ago, I was able to schedule a Zoom call with Brittany Luna (vocals) and Tim Hildebrand (guitar), of Philadelphia ska band Catbite, to discuss their newly announced EP, Doom Garden. In this interview, I asked the band members about where the EP title came from, the direction they took on Doom Garden, their recent performance doing the Operation Ivy cover set with Laura Jane Grace, and how they were able to get Patrick Stump to sing on one of the songs on the new record. Catbite will be supporting Doom Garden with a headlining tour, and the dates are below.
Thank you so much for your time today! Catbite just announced a new EP called Doom Garden, which I’m very excited to hear, that will be released on May 9th. Was this EP title a play on the deluxe version of Nice One that included a bonus track of “Doom Influence (Cat Fight)”? If not, where did the EP title originate from?
Brittany Luna: That’s funny…well, I mean, “Doom Influence” was a fun one to do. And also we have the drum fill of “Doom” that Chris dubbed the drum fill of doom, that Chris does in one of our songs. So, I guess kind of a little bit…but actually, we were over in Europe last year, at the end of the end of the year, and we ended up going to museum for we were in the Netherlands, and we went to the Hieronymus Bosch Museum, and he’s well known for this specific piece that is called a triptograph, where it folds in and there’s one painting on the outside, and then it opens up, and then there’s like, three other different paintings, and it’s called “The Garden of Earthly Delights.” And so, one panel is hell, one panel is paradise or the Garden of Eden, and then the middle is kind of a free for all for the human experience. Good and bad, and then just kind of chaos. And so that was that weighed in heavily with the Doom Garden title, plus the underlying, I think meanings of the songs are a little bit more, not darker, I would say, but like, they’re just not as cheery as our usual things that we write about.
Tim Hildebrand: And so, yeah, we had gone to this museum after we recorded the whole EP in July, and this was a couple months afterwards, and we had just kind of started to get the mixes back, and we were, at the time, kind of starting to really brainstorm what are we going to call the record? And that was when we were visiting this museum that day, when we were kind of having that conversation. And all of us kind of, I think, collectively and separately, had the same idea of, we really like this idea. And we started brainstorming, like “Garden of Terror,” or just something like a riff off of that. And also at the same time, we were working on the artwork with our artist that we use for every album cover, Nicole Salter, who’s a good friend of ours here in Philadelphia.
Brittany Luna: She sent us the very first draft of it, and when I saw it, I was like, “Oh my gosh, this really reminds me of this museum we just went to!” And I was describing it to her, and she was like, I’m actually reading a book about, not exactly Hiranus Bosch, but another artist from the Netherlands that’s inspired by Hiranus Bosch. And I was like, that’s crazy. I cannot believe that. We had not talked about it at all, and that’s what she had just been really into it at that point.
Tim Hildebrand: And also, she was inspired by our music, and it was just like this perfect little trifecta. All that happened simultaneously. So we knew it just had to work. And everyone was in their brains for the next couple months, coming up with ideas, and then, just spitballing ideas based on that. And just like one day, it was just like, about “Doom Garden” or “Garden of Doom”, and we landed on Doom Garden. It’s awesome. I think it’s a really cool title. It sounds fun!
As fun as doom can be, right? <Laughter>
<Laughter>
But it sounds like the stars aligned for you, within the artwork and the artists you’re been working with and stuff like that. But you have a great new lead single called “Die in Denver,” and it features a very natural transition from the ska/punk-driven sound that was on your first few records, but with more of a “beefed up” sound, I would say, that allows for more exposure for you guys in the future, hopefully. Also, the single features a great keyboard section, and it was fun to hear the extended solo towards the end of that track. So is this song a good indication of the direction you guys took on Doom Garden, and possibly beyond?
Tim Hildebrand: Yeah, I think Catbite has kind of always been progressing in a new direction. We kind of figured out our sound and like what we want to be as a band, kind of on the last record (Nice One), and just became very comfortable with the stuff we can do. But also at the same time, right before we released Nice One when we did the the “Cat Fight” and the “Cat Light,” which Catbite has always been…we love all these different styles of music, and we always come together over the different styles of Jamaican music, but it was really fun to explore with hardcore and country and like a little bit of outside of that. And I think people reacted to it really well, and which gave us the confidence to explore a little bit more with the actual Catbite songs. So, I would say that this EP is kind of all over the place, but it stays pretty true to that Catbite sound. As far as “Die in Denver” goes, I feel like it was probably the first song that we wrote for this EP, and I feel like it is the most natural transition from Nice One to Doom Garden. And it’s that’s why we kind of chose it to be the first single, because I feel like it is a matured extension of Nice One in that it’s very similar, but also it is introducing us to this new era of Catbite. Because it’s been about four years since we recorded Nice One…
Yeah, I think I saw that on the liner notes over here, so that was a pretty good while ago…
Tim Hildebrand: Yeah, we recorded it in 2020, November 2020, so it was four and a half years ago. We’ve actually become a touring band, where before, Nice One, when we only played maybe like 20 shows, because then we recorded it and it came out at the tail end of the COVID lockdowns. So since then, we’ve just kind of matured so much. But yeah, and then the rest of the songs I feel like go a little bit further away, and the way that we’re releasing them is kind of that natural progression, in sequence of how we want them to be heard.
Brittany Luna: Yeah, like Tim was saying, we haven’t put out new music in about four years. So I think that it’s only natural that our sound might change slightly. If we were to put out something the next year after Nice One, it would probably have sounded very similar to what Nice One sounds like. But I just think we’ve had time to…things are different, and you just evolve as a person. So I feel like our music definitely has grown but I think it still very much sounds like Catbite.
Yeah, it does. And I think it’s a natural progression for you guys, kinda how I mentioned before. I caught one of your live performances in DC about two years ago. That was my introduction to you guys and I have been a fan ever since. In fact, I always thought that Catbite could be as big as No Doubt, with the right type of push. Why do you feel it’s important to treat each concert as an opportunity for others to discover their next favorite band?
Brittany Luna: I feel like going to a show is such a freeing experience. Especially if you’ve never been to one before, and I’m talking about more like a local show, or something like that, where you’ve seen smaller bands that just kind of open your eyes to what’s going on in your community. I think that’s like such a beautiful thing. And bringing someone who maybe has never been. We’ve played so many shows where young kids come to our shows and they’re like, “This is my first concert!” And I just think that is like the craziest thing ever, and just amazing. And sometimes they come by themselves, sometimes a friend brings them, and it’s their first time. And I just feel like it’s such an eye opening experience in life.
Tim Hildebrand: And, you’ve seen us. We have a lot of fun on stage and we’re really lucky because all five of us in the band…this is all we’ve ever wanted to do was be in a band that pays our bills, we get to travel for, and perform in front of really fun crowds. And it’s just become such a common thing that every night after the show, we always go to our merch area and hang out and talk to people, which is almost as cool as performing. You just get to meet these people from all over the world. And either they just discovered us, or they’ve been listening to us for a long time, and they finally got to see us, or literally anything. It’s just so cool to get any sort of feedback face to face. And obviously we just have so much fun on stage, and then we get to hear that, and it just makes us really happy. And also, another thing is, we in every power that we have, we try to do every show as “all ages”. Because something that we kind of discovered over COVID when we were doing interviews, and especially we were talking to a bunch of younger people, and before that…I mean, I’ve been playing in bands forever, and it’s just like the go to is you play the club, you play a shitty bar, and it’s 21+, and that’s just the only way that you’re going to get a show and you’re going to get some money. And we kind of stepped back, and kind of looked at that like, oh, shoot. Some of the best and most memorable shows of my life were when I was first getting into punk rock and ska and I was a teenager. But if we’re playing 21+ shows, we are completely skipping all these people from discovering Catbite. So, it’s still very hard. There’s still a lot of cities where there just isn’t the infrastructure to play all ages. But I would say that 99% of the shows that we play are all ages. And I think that also does a lot, not just for the people coming that are underage, but also it just like, it kind of enhances the experience for everyone there. I don’t know if I’m just very observant of it now, but maybe you’ve noticed as well that when you go to a bar show or a 21+ show, the energy is kind of lacking. People over 21 have a lot of anxiety, and they’re not going to be as prone to as soon as the first song goes, they’re not going to be skanking, throwing arms and having the time of their life as kids do. And as soon as you see a bunch of kids going off, they’re having fun, and I’m over here standing in the corner, then they’ll start to join in. And once more people see people their age doing that, it just all around, enhances the environment. And then obviously we are feeding from the energy of the crowd. We bring as much as we can. But when the crowd is just…staring blankly at you…
Yeah, that’s also almost more intimidating than opening up for a huge band! You’re not getting that feedback…
Brittany Luna: For sure. Yeah, we’re trying to put on the best possible show that we can even if we’re tired, even if it’s been like the end of a three week, or four week tour…we’re trying to put on the best possible show, because it may be someone’s very first show that they’re going to and you’re trying to make this an experience.
Tim Hildebrand: We’ve done a lot of support tours, and we’ve been really lucky with a lot of those tours where the people in the crowd are really into ska, or into our band, or know a little bit, or are open-minded. And then I think it really hit us once we started doing some tours that were a little bit outside of our comfort zone, specifically like when we went on tour with The Gaslight Anthem. Turns out their fans are not really open to dancing around and singing and being skanking and stuff. And that was a really humbling moment. And I think at the beginning of that tour, we’d actually just come off of the second leg of the Bad Time Records tour. So it was basically a co-headline, where it’s all our fans. And then right after that was the Supernova Ska Festival, which was just hundreds of Catbite fans screaming to our songs. And then we went straight from Supernova to the first show with Gaslight Anthem and a sold out show in Cleveland. 1,000 faces just looking at us like, what is going on? But every time at the merch table, even though they all looked at us like we were absolutely bat shit insane, and had no business being there, and there’d be a line of people saying, I haven’t thought about Ska in awhile. Or, I hate ska, but you made me a new fan. And just like hearing that, we were like, Okay, we gotta remember that. We can’t even just rely on the crowd’s energy. This is what we want to do, and we’re doing it for those 10 to 20 people that come at the end of the show to tell us we’ve changed them. And then that makes the shows where people are going bonkers at even more special.
Yeah, and that’s a very authentic approach to performing, in general. So my kudos to you both. But what inspired you and your bandmates to make music together in the first place?
Brittany Luna: Good question! I mean, Tim has been playing in bands, and Ben and Chris have been playing in bands for a bit. Tim and Ben were in a band together. We went to high school together, so me and him have been playing in ska bands since high school, and then Chris had also been playing in ska bands. He’s older than us, so he’s been playing ska bands forever, and the three of us kind of got linked together, because we all three ended up playing in a ska band as the backing band for this guy, Sammy Kay, great friend of ours. We basically were thrown into a van and went on a three month tour together and became best friends, and we really locked in. And we knew we had something special. But then, my old band that Ben and I were in, we kind of just fizzled out, and not really doing anything more. So I just kind of left the band. It was not going anywhere, and I’ve been performing since I was a young kid. My dad is from Peru, from Lima, and was a singer and in a band in Peru and when he came to the States and was trying to pursue music. And then so, as a kid, I was kind of thrown into it. He would have us write songs when we were six or seven, me and my brother and I would perform when I was around the same age. I would go, and he would perform at different places, and so I would go with him, and he would have me sing and stuff. So I’ve been doing it for a long time. And I ended up going to school for music in Orlando and studying jazz. And then I finished my degree here in Philly at a school called University of the Arts. And I always knew I wanted to be in a band. I wanted to be a singer in a band. And one of my favorite bands is Paramore. And so I’ve idolized Hayley Williams all my life. I was a little pop-punk kid and I just wanted to do something like that. That was always a goal of mine. I sang in a band in Orlando, and it was like a funk/soul band. I sang back up, and it was really fun, but I wanted it to be like my own thing, so Tim and I met very quickly when I came to Philly,…but fast forward, we had talked about starting something together for a while…
Tim Hildebrand: But you were still in school. We’ve been dating for like five years at this point. And then I quit that band, and then she was done with school, graduated, and it was like, All right, we’re starting a ska band. Let’s do this. And then, Chris, our drummer, he was our best friend at the time, and he’s one of the best ska drummers we know. And we started with our original bass player, Johnny, who was a longtime friend of mine, and he was in the band for the first year, but then once we started to kind of become a serious band, he said he couldn’t really do anything outside of Philly. And we’re still really good friends. We love him. But that’s when we were like, probably just see if Ben wants to do it. Because Ben is the best bass player in the world. It just worked out so great.
Brittany Luna: I think originally, we had the idea that he was just gonna help us out for a couple shows, and then we’d just find someone else. But then he just stayed, and it just clicked.
Tim Hildebrand: We’re just one big family, and we can all play ska well together.
Hell yeah, you guys definitely can! I mean, you are one of my favorite ska bands for this new generation of ska bands coming through. So I grew up on bands like Less Than Jake and stuff like that…But, I absolutely love hearing the live performance of Operation Ivy Live at the Empty Bottle that featured Laura Jane Grace. That was awesome. What are your favorite memories from that performance, and why did you feel it was important to donate the proceeds from the digital sale on Bandcamp to those affected by the LA wildfires?
Tim Hildebrand: Okay, well, the whole thing was just so surreal. It was something that we had been loosely talking about with Laura Jane for a long time about doing this. It started off because she started a petition on Twitter to get Op Ivy to reunite for Riot Fest, and got 1000s and 1000s of signatures. Obviously, nothing ever happened, but we had at that time, kind of just become friends with her, online. And I was just like, “hey, if you ever want to do an Operation Ivy cover band, let’s do it!” And she was all about it for a second, and then it just kind of fizzled out. That must have been about two years ago. And then with the Supernova Ska Festival, which I’ve been at every single year there, it’s like a family to me and Britt. We got engaged at that festival. But the guy who runs it, Tim Receiver, texted me one day and was like, “What do you think it’ll take to get an Op Ivy cover set from you guys and Laura Jane?” I’m like, dude, I’ll do it for free. I don’t care. We just got to convince Laura Jane. And he’s like, “Would you mind just asking?” And I’m like, sure, why not? I don’t think she’s gonna be down. I don’t know if she’s busy. And I text her, and like two seconds later, she’s like, “Yeah, let’s do it.” And then we locked it in and started rehearsing. And then once we announced that, that’s when we got the offer from Riot Fest, which we really didn’t want to do more than once. We wanted to be one time, just a special thing, especially like at the Supernova Ska Festival. But I just felt right to do it at Riot Fest, because that’s where it all started, the whole idea of doing this. So we’re like, Okay, we’ll do it at supernova Ska Fest. We’ll do a Riot Fest. They’re one week apart, also to give us an opportunity to do tours together and practice. So she invited us to go on tour with her band. And then the Empty Bottle one was the special secret show at a small, tiny, little club in Chicago. The night before our Riot Fest performance, which is what we really, really wanted to do. Because as much fun as playing in front of 1000’s of people on a festival stage, playing these songs in a small, shitty, very hot club at midnight, was a dream. And I knew it was gonna be special, so I set up a bunch of cameras, and Lord James, audio engineer at the time we had him, Jacob. He’s Greek, the nicest guy ever. We had him record from the mixing board. And the goal was, at the time, I just thought it’ll be cool to get a good multi-cam video with good audio that our bass player, Ben, who is an audio engineer, we’d have him mix it, and we’d just hold on to it for a rainy day. so we can just put it out so people can actually watch it like on YouTube. And so many people wanted us to do a full tour of it…
Brittany Luna: But it would have taken away what was so special about it, if we would have done it as a tour. It was so special to play that record top to bottom with Laura on vocals. She’s just so electric, and she’s such a powerhouse. She’s just like a powerful person in general. But then when you hear her fucking scream….it’s like the most amazing thing ever! So it was such an honor to get to perform with her, especially those songs. And I think Tim definitely wanted to do a multi-cam kind of thing. I mean, just on phones, but put them up in the venue, and we kind of had the idea that eventually we’ll put this out. We don’t know when or how, or why or for what. But then when the <LA> fires happened, we were like, fuck….This is the time. And so that’s what happened. And I’m so grateful that, like, people were so responsive we were able to donate over $25,000.
Tim Hildebrand: I just remember saying we should do this. I felt so helpless. And just like scrolling on Instagram and facing everything. I’m just like, oh, this person’s house is gone. I just get so anxious. I need to help. We all do, and we’ve been lucky that with our platform, we’re able to do stuff and raise money and attention and stuff. And that’s all we can kind of do.
Brittany Luna: If we have this platform and we’re able to use it, and people will listen, we have to do everything we can to help, in any way we can. And if this is the way we have to do it, this is the way that we have accessible to us, then that’s what we’ll do.
Yeah, it’s great that you all did that, and I’m glad that people jumped at the idea of grabbing that live performance…
Tim Hildebrand: And Ben did such a good job at editing, mixing and doing all that time that he spent. We wanted to spend as little amount of money on this because we’re obviously donating all the proceeds, right? I didn’t want to spend, or hire someone for $1,000 just because we were thinking, all right, you’ll probably raise like, $1,000 or $2,000 with this. This will be sick. So, I’ll set it <for sale> at midnight, I’ll hit it <publish> on Bandcamp, and I remember hitting “public” on my computer at midnight the day it was being released, and then my phone just started blowing up… I’m like, What the fuck is this? Because every time you get a sale, someone that buys it, you get an email, and I already had by the time that the page was refreshed, we had already had ten people donate money. We were literally about to go to sleep. We were waiting up until midnight. We were both so tired, and then, and then we ended up staying up an hour in bed, just looking at it like…Oh, my god…$600 had been raised!
Brittany Luna: It was a really, really cool thing. Yeah, I’m really glad. And one thing I’ll say that I thought was really cool, just about the whole experience of doing Ivy, and doing it with Laura was when we when we performed at Riot Fest, and we turned around, I there was on the stage and behind us on the stage was like all the other bands that were not playing on stage. And just watching us do this set. It was like, the craziest thing ever. Yeah, you look back and there’s so many people behind us watching the show!
Tim Hildebrand: It was basically like every band that was playing Riot Fest that day came, and members of each band because they all had all access. That’s pretty common for festivals. You have people from the other bands watching on the side stage…
Brittany Luna: I was way more nervous about that, because every time I see another person, I’ve been inspired by my whole life and turning around and I don’t care about all the 1000’s of people that are watching…
Yeah, but when you make eye contact with someone who you know exactly who that person is…<Laughter>
Brittany: It was so crazy! But I feel like it was probably one of the coolest things, too.
Awesome. So now the big question…how’d you manage to get Patrick Stump on your record to play trumpet and sing on the song, “Tired of Talking”?!?
Brittany Luna: Okay, we’ll preface with that he is such a nice person. Like a really, really nice person.
Tim Hildebrand: Genuinely sweet, artistic, obviously authentic. So he had been on this podcast called In Defense of Ska, which our friend Aaron and Adam run, and he was on it, and just kind of professed his love for ska, which he has before then. The first time he was on, it was in 2020, and he was on a second time, listening again to this podcast, and we knew that he was aware of us, just through Aaron, saying you should listen to these bands. So we basically just reached out and sent the track and did not expect, because for this song, we wanted a vocal feature on it 100%. We wrote it with intention of having someone, and we were between a couple people…far fetched people that were like, no fucking way. Aka, Patrick Stump, and some other people. But we were just like, let’s just shoot our shot…whatever. And we sent the song, and then couple weeks later, it was almost a month later…
Brittany Luna: And at that point, I was like, well, it seems like we’re not going to hear anything from him. That’s fine. That’s what I expected. And we get this email and it’s like, “Hi, this is Patrick Stump. And we’re like <shocked faces>…my brain has never shut off, but it did then.
Tim Hildebrand: Our brains just broke. We couldn’t…we could not compute. We literally, we had just left. We were at the Asian supermarket, and we were about in the car, and we were in the car I was driving, and Ben first texted the group chat and said “Stump is in.” So, I’m driving and thinking what does that mean? And I’m like, luckily, we’re only going to Target, a couple blocks away. We pull in the Target parking lot, and we’re just freaking the fuck out. Screaming, crying.
Brittany Luna: And then we go into Target, and we literally have a list of like two things to buy. And we were there for like, 45 minutes because…
Yeah, you couldn’t get your brain right…<Laughter>
Brittany Luna: We were pacing around!
Tim Hildebrand: We were looking for a new trash can, and we were in the produce section. <Laughter> We’re like, what are we doing right now? But I mean, it’s so cool to me, because all we did was ask. I feel like sometimes people get like…you think in your mind, oh this person is so unattainable or out of reach, or I’m just a small band, why would they listen to me? And maybe that person will completely ignore you. And it could have very well happened to us, that we will have been ignored by some other artists that we’ve liked, or wanted to work with before, and that just happens sometimes. But if you never ask, if you never try, you’ll never know. And we were just like, What the fuck, let’s shoot our shot. And Patrick said yes!
Tim Hildebrand: I mean, spoiler, it’s really good. It’s really good. The song was, it was really a great song like that. We’re really stoked on it, it’s very different, but not really different at the same time. It’s definitely the most unique song on the record already. And I think we were just all really stoked on how it came out before he was even involved. And then we were just doing a little back and forth with him. We had talked about it, and what we wanted him to do once we locked him in, and because we kind of left a bridge open, and we’re like, okay, maybe he’ll just come up with something right here. And we’re like, just let me know if you want to talk it over. And then it was like a little bit of radio silence here and there. I’m just super anxious, thinking he’s gonna ignore us. And then all of a sudden, one day, he says, “sorry I took so long. Here you go.” And he sent us about 30 vocal tracks, and a trumpet track! And he’s like, “sorry, I kind of went nuts. Use whatever you want.” And then we just start listening to these just isolated tracks…
Brittany Luna: My god, it’s his voice, and I’m singing our song, and my mind is just like exploding, Hearing his voice, and I’m like, wow, that’s actually him!
That’s gotta be such a surreal moment for your band!
Tim Hildebrand: Oh, yeah! And then we immediately sent them to Sarah Tutson, our producer. We love her so much. And we kind of gave her notes, but also at the same time was like, this is all of them, we trust you. This is our guidance. And then she came back with her first mix. And just the way that she blended Patrick and Brit’s vocals together is just…it’s absolutely insane! And also, every time I’ve sent it to anyone, when we sent it to our management and our booking agent, and Bad Time Records and stuff, the first thing that everyone has said is, “I cannot believe how well Brit and Patrick’s voices go together.” It was just so perfect. The blend where…sometimes you hear songs where there’s a collaboration and it’s a good juxtaposition of sounds like, but sometimes it just seems a little little off or whatever, or a little too different. But this, it sounds like they wrote the song together and are singing in a vocal booth together, like a Disney Channel original movie type of thing. <Laughter> When you hear it, I think you’ll understand what I’m trying to say. But it’s really cool, and we’re so proud of it. And, I just can’t wait till it’s out. It’s been a nightmare trying to keep this a secret!
Yeah! You just kind of casually put it on the track list, and I was like, holy shit! Patrick is on guest vocals!!
Tim Hildebrand: We kind of wanted to, you know, keep it a secret until the song actually came out. But then, we really wanted “Die in Denver” to be the first single, because it’s the one we just felt was right. And Mike from Bad Time Records is, like people are gonna know about it when they see <the tracklisting> but we’re like, whatever. It’ll be cool. We’ll slip it in, and nothing’s happening until we release this.
That’s so awesome, and I’m so happy for you both. Any quick last words for your fans? It also looks like the vinyl is selling really well. I was one of the ones that bought it on day one.
Brittany Luna: Thank you so much!
Tim Hildebrand: I mean, we just announced a bunch of tour dates, and we’re gonna be announcing more. We have so much to share, so come to a show, buy a record, stream our stuff, add us to a playlist, tell your friends about us. Let’s go! This the year of Catbite.
Hell yeah! I can’t wait to see you guys on tour again. And best of luck to you both.
Catbite: Thank you so much, Adam.
Take care!
