Cayetana
Freedom
Augusta Koch, Allegra Anka and Kelly Olsen, aka Cayetana have been in Melbourne, Australia for little under a week. So far they’ve seen penguins at St Kilda Beach, met Courtney Barnett, acquired the taste of Vegemite and adopted the city’s colloquialisms. To say they’ve embraced the local culture would be an understatement.
Four days ago they embarked on the 24 hour flight from Philadelphia to Melbourne. It was symbolic for many reasons. Finding themselves some 10,000 miles from home, up until now, the furthest they had toured was across their northern borders into Canada. More importantly it marked five years to the very date that the trio formed. So much of their short career has been about fate and seizing opportunities and, this tour, like their fortuitous formation, is no exception.
“When we first met, it was at a party and we talked about starting a band. In my mind, it was one of those things where we’d meet up once or twice and then it would fizzle out. But we met up once, then again, and again and again and it just ended up clicking really well with the three of us,” says bass player Allegra Anka. “Our first songs were terrible,” laughs singer/guitarist Augusta Koch in reflection, as drummer Kelly Olsen chimes in with a wry smile, “it got bad before it got better.”
Though they may downplay it, their history is brief in time, but not in achievement. Early on they released a three track basement recorded demo online which drew the attention of many, including North Carolina based label Tiny Engines. Only three years after meeting for the first time, they released their self-assured debut album to acclaim in the punk scene and beyond. They toured extensively, including a 31 date summer tour of the United States with The Menzingers, appeared on festival line ups and were being played on taste-making radio stations such as WXPN. Their band bucket list was being crossed off at a rapid rate as they shared the stage with heroes The Thermals and Against Me! “I feel like opportunities were handed to us that we were never ready for, but we just had to force ourselves to be. Like our first show, or our first tour, everything. We had to jump from one thing to the next really quickly and I feel like it really pushed us forward in a really positive way,” says Olsen. “Things just happen and we let them happen, and that’s why we’re here,” says Koch insightfully.
We sit at the bar of the Fitzroy venue where they’ll later play their fourth and final show in Melbourne. Tomorrow they’ll drive to Wollongong for a sold out Tuesday night show. Anka later jokes onstage about burning her passport to become a permanent resident.
I first met Olsen in Brooklyn in April when she was selling merch for Hard Girls on their tour with The Smith Street Band. It was around the time they had just accepted a promoter’s offer to come to Australia. Standing outside of the venue she was clearly excited, but there was a modest sense of trepidation to it all. The band had months before released a two track 7 inch, but prior to that had been fairly quiet. There was an unease that Australian audiences would be unfamiliar with their music. “I think it’s definitely nerve racking coming to a country on the other side of the world and not knowing what it’s going to be like in terms of the shows. But we’ve been pleasantly surprised,” she says, alluding to their sold out Saturday night show at The Corner Hotel where the first few rows sung their words back to them. “I still can’t believe we’re here,” she grins.
Just like their first tour to a foreign continent, the band is forever breaking new ground. In an effort to challenge herself, “to be more vulnerable,” Koch has just released Issue One of her Safe Sins zine, a collection of thoughts, ramblings and poetry that previously hid in notebooks. A combination of single sentence observations and free verse writing, Koch lists Leonard Cohen and The Weakerthans’ John K. Sampson as key influences and proudly wears the lyrics to Joe Strummer And The Mescaleros’ Johnny Appleseed as a tattoo on her arm. She writes in a unique style that is equal parts contemplative as it is direct; always sincere and ever eloquent. When she sings her voice splinters with a fragility that imitates and emphasises the words that she sings.
Back in 2014 when performing for NPR in New York, Koch introduced Favorite Things as, “a love song; the only one I’ll ever write.” Four songs earlier she sung Serious Things Are Stupid. I ask her, where then her inspiration for songwriting comes from. “I guess mostly thoughts,” she says after a long pause. “With the lyrics, the one thing I always try and do is write very sincerely. That’s why they’re usually from experiences. I don’t want to be phony ever and that makes me more vulnerable.”
The vulnerability is real and is one of the many strengths of the band. Their 2014 debut album Nervous Like Me, alludes to anxiety in more than just title, as does the track Busy Brain. Intentional or not, comfort is an underlying theme to the record, with the word surfacing on three of the songs. It’s particularly poignant because they’re music provides so much of it, not just as catharsis for themselves as creators but so too their audience as listeners. Earlier this year, their song Favorite Things was used in a scene for Awkward, the American teen comedy series that screens on MTV. An inspired choice, their presence was subtle, but opened their music and indeed their message up to a broader audience. “I grew up listening to music and it saved my life,” says Koch, “so if people find anything in our music, then that’s the best thing in the world.” “I think that’s all we can ask for,” adds Anka. “That’s the ultimate reward.”
For me, the greatest meaning comes from their most recent song Freedom1313, where Koch sings, “I walk the line to the other side / This fear of bitterness that leaves me terrified / That doing what you love won’t make you money / And doing what you hate will make you full, / Then let me be forever hungry.” She tells me it’s about, “working and music, struggling and not always being able to do the things you want to do.” To me it’s about being paralised by the 9 to 5. It’s about fighting the apathy and anxieties of adulthood and growing up but not giving in. The song, a sharp mix of wit and wisdom, was penned around the time the band were being offered lengthy tours and had to contemplate quitting their day jobs or putting them on hold indefinitely to pursue music. It was with a satisfying sense of validation that they performed the song the past few nights in Australia.
When the song was released I was immediately drawn to it and wanted to find out more. Sure, the band have been happy to laugh at themselves in the past through tongue in cheek titles, but I was sure those digits had a greater significance. A Pennsylvanian postcode perhaps, if not the street number to a share house or their rehearsal space? I dug deeper and stumbled upon a numerology blog titled Angel Numbers. Written by a psychic based in rural Victoria, the site, “a guide to repeating number sequences and their messages and meanings,” went in to elaborate depth on the significance of the numbers 1313. Initially it, like most horoscope, was aloof, claiming it to be the “number of optimism, enthusiasm, communication, creativity and expansion on all levels,” but it soon began to startlingly mirror the lyrics of the song. “Use your natural interests, talents and personality to bring joy and upliftment to others,” it said. “Your angels are helping to empower you so that you can walk your chosen path with confidence.” I ask Koch if that’s just a happy coincidence to the song’s title and she laughs. “That’s a better answer than my mum’s Netflix password,” she says with a smirk. “My mum lost her job in 2013 on the 13th of June. It used to be her password for things. Once I asked her what her password was and she was like ‘Freedom1313.’ She’s not patriotic, so I asked her what it meant, and she was like, ‘freedom from this job that I hate.’ It’s funny because that’s what the song is about.”
Therein lies the beauty of Cayetana’s music. Their songs are steeped in their own personal meaning, yet still create scope for independent interpretation. Stereogum described the band as “unaffected,” and it’s an apt summary. As a three piece, there’s nothing excessive to their sound; no indulgent solos or overly verbose lyrics, in fact the longest song on their debut was 3 minutes and 39 seconds in duration. Coming to music later in their lives — Olsen was 27 before she played drums for the first time — the band almost have nothing to prove and are all the better for it.
With album number two now completed after recording it in June, the band are just awaiting formalities until an official release date. “Raw and unflinching, imperfect and beautiful,” was how their debut was described by their label in its press release, which makes sense for a first album, but going in to writing and recording a follow up, I ask them if that was something that was hard to achieve this time around without it being forced. “There’s an element to our music that’s raw,” starts Koch. “I don’t want to be a perfect band. Raw and sincerity go hand in hand. I would never want us to sound super produced because that’s not what our band is.” “The bottom line is that we want to make people happy and we want to share what we are,” says Anka, profoundly. “So being perfect is never a goal, we just want people to enjoy our music.”
Brendan Hitchens
