CAT HOPE - FETISH CD limited to 75 copies, full color artwork, in red jewelcase. Click HERE to order
"CAT HOPE as a solo bass show using an incredible line up of pedals and a lap top to construct enormous walls of sound. She is in the precess of making her first solo recording this way, and in March 2000 Cat did a short tour of the US and London as part of the Extreme Music From Women tour, promoting the realease of a CD of the same name on UK label Susan Lawly"
Background:
Cat Hope is a solo noise artist with a difference she uses
bass guitar.
Based in Perth, where she performs regularly in her noise outfit LUX MAMMOTHand band GATA
NEGRA, as well as composing on commission for contemporarydance, theatre and film. Cat has
had a varied and bizarre musical career;starting as a classical flautist, playing in
Eygiptian orchestras overseas
and ending up in her current situation as a noise, rock and soundtrack composer performing
on electric bass. The inclusion of one of her
compositions on the Susan Lawly "EXTREME MUSIC FROM WOMEN" compilation early in
2000 led her to develop her solo bass noise performances and subsequently tour the USA, UK
and Australia. Cat has also performed with IKUE MORI,STELLARC, HUGO RACE, JON ROSE, TONY
BUCK, QUARTERED SHADOWS and ONCE UPON A TIME and has completed albums with her band GATA
NEGRA, LUX MAMMOTH,
as well as MICEVICE and HUGO RACE AND THE TRUE SPIRIT. Her music is languid and distorted,
personal and disquieting, featuring
endless bass loops, feedback, static noise and generally a bass guitar used in ways you
never imagined possible
Reviews:
I have a smug hope that those people who, like me, where hugely
impressed with Cat Hopes band Gata Negra's wonderful album "Cage of Stars", and
her
earlier cassette, would, unlike me., be somewhat shocked and frightened by this particular
effort. Away from the soft crooning and subtle bass-driven
songs of her band, this is Power Electronics the hard way. Bass guitar, what must be a
veritable arsenal of effects pedals, and what the sleeve notes
tell me is "'cat controller' sampling software", whatever that is. That last one
is on the live tracks, which I understand were recorded on the "Extreme
Music From Women", tour put on by William Bennet in America. The rest (apart form one
track done in Perth, Cats home city) is wrought on the ever present
Tascam Porta One slavemachine. And what a sound she gets. Deep, dark, disgusting, hideous
even, this is burning black Noise which summons
Leviathan (eternal Hebrew symbol of Chaos). Its loud and angry but also gets low and
sinister. Twenty one tracks divided into equal Fetishes; which one
is yours, pervert? Mine might be "Fetish One", but then it might be ( ). I'm not
telling. All I'm telling you is that this is classic grating sub-fi
Noise just the way God in Its wisdom intended (although which God, again I'm not telling).
Nice homemade paper cover too.
THE TAPED CRUSADERS #10
"the dress cut to obscenity that she was wearing didnšt take your mind off the
noise. Being slowly dismembered wouldn't have taken your mind off the
noise. Last, and worth the wait, she used a bass ,a number of effects pedals and a laptop
..the crowd registered, gaping at the unbridled ferocity of one
woman and her bass guitar. Subsonic rumbles, feedback, minimal beats all combined to form
a kind of soup that merged beauty and ugliness in a quite
original way. I like what Cat Hope does, I like it a bunch, and hopefully we'll be hearing
more from her as time goes onS." Robert Beveridge,
Cleveland Times, March 2000, USA
"Cat was great I liked how there were quiet moments then superfast strumming of the
guitar - her hands were a blur. for me it was like watching
a talented turntablist cut up the decks, hands whirring, sounds not quite matching the
speed of the hand movements because they are blended together.
and I've never seen anyone control the feedback like her before! boldly going where no
other artists like to venture.. "Kath - Radio Pulse, Feb
2001, Brisbane , QLD
"Cat Hope was like nothing I've ever heard/seen. Walls of feedback and raw noise
generated by a bass and some effect boxes. This was most "extreme", in
damn good terms of sheer abrasiveness and sensory overloadS" Keith, RadioStatic,
March 2000, Rochester NY USA.
" Cat Hope has developed a unique set of chops, a powerful stage presence,great
control of feedback, she also knows where number 11 is on the volume
control of her amp, making her probably the noisiest woman that I've everheard on a stage
anywhere ."
Jon Rose, Australia Ad Lib, 2001.
"The music here is some very trancy and hauntingly beautiful droning noise work. The
overlying drone and feedback of the bass guitar become almost the
backdrop to the back drop of very sublime melodies. Kind of like standing back to admire
the architecture of a skyscraper, but only being able to
focus on the beautiful woman just beyond the glass doors. Over all, a very nice noise
album that has a touch of beauty hidden behind the monotony and
harshness of the drone" LAST SIGH on line magazine, May 2001
"Cat Hope knows her way around the bass to produce big time noise. "Fetish"
is void of melodies or rhythms, and is more a real, pure, noise CD with
highly treated and distorted sounds colliding together in a rather ample space. It's not
really aggressive or grinding, but experimental, and goodS"
Vital Weekly, January 2001
"Fetish" is original and intimate, and is more
for noise fans only exploring interesting directions and quite enthusiastic, this is a
hard
album that won't please the masses, but will find its way to serious noise
freaksS" Nicolas, Recycle Your Ears, January 2000
Contact Info:
http://cathope.cjb.net