1. The First Record I Bought
When I was a kid I was really into folk music. There was a duo called Kate Burke and Ruth Hazleton who I absolutely loved. I was really lucky to grow up going to folk festivals and seeing them play because they normalised the idea that women shred (albeit in a folkie way). Their album Swapping Seasons is the first album I remember buying on my own.
2. The Last Record I Bought
I bought the second Pink Tiles album! Mara, the bass player and one of the songwriters in the band, is the volunteer coordinator at PBS. She sees right through bullshit and writes ripper tunes. Paul, who plays guitar in The Pink Tiles, recorded and produced our album and is a genius hitmaker. The album is an absolute pop gem; I especially love the copious amounts of guitar feedback at the end of nearly every song. You’ll notice the same thing on our album – Paul does not do fade outs.
3. The First Thing I Recorded
I was in a Celtic folk band called Dram, as in a dram of whiskey. This was a rather ironic name seeing as four out of five band members were between 14 and 16 years of age. I played guitar and backed up all these Irish jigs and reels. I also wrote and sang some songs.
4. The Last Thing I Recorded
Our debut album, which we recorded with Paul Maybury of Pink Tiles and Rocket Science. He has a studio called A Secret Location in Fairfield. We’ve released a fair few singles off the album and we are constantly surprised by the good reception they’ve got. Our first single ‘Same For Me’ was recorded a year before everything else. RRR absolutely fanged that thing. We couldn’t have done any of the cool shows we’ve got to do in the last year and a bit without their support for that song.
5. The Record That Changed My Life
The Woods by Sleater-Kinney. I say this with a little trepidation because people often compare us to that band and it’s a totally inaccurate comparison. Lazy music journalists often compare any band with women in it to Sleater-Kinney because they think women playing music is a genre. The conversation between Carrie and Corin’s guitars blows me away. They weave in and out of each other and paint this writhing, jagged pattern around Janet’s steel-spined drumming. The first time I heard the record I didn’t like it. I had to grow into it and I love that.
Cable Ties is out Friday May 26 through Poison City. Cable Ties play The Factory Floor on Friday July 7. Photo by Danny Cohen
