Kaito’s
new CD, You’ve Seen Us... You Must Have Seen Us..., is
just one of those rare releases that begs for repeated listening.
Kaito’s sound is a fresh, raw and vital combination of
catchy, hook-filled pop and playful, inventive guitar noise—falling
somewhere between Sleater-Kinney, The Pixies, and Sonic Youth.
Just two boys (Dieta Quantrill-drums, and Dave Lake-guitar)
and two girls (Nikki Colk-vocals/guitar, Gemma Cullingford-bass)
from Norwich, UK, who happen to be making some outrageously
cool, creative music. Here’s a little bit of my intercontinental
phone call with future pop superstars Kaito.
How’d you guys get hooked up with Mike from Devil In
the Woods Records?
Nikki: We did a gig in London with Seafood, and we played first,
and we played a really good gig, and then we met Mike backstage
and played him a demo of the album (we weren’t signed then)
and gave him the demo. And Mike sorta emailed me a week later
and said he really loved it and asked when we could finish it.
We were like “Omigod!,” and we finished it really
quick. We had about three weeks to finish it off, and it all
just started happening from there, really. That’s amazing. Wow, I just realized I have really dumb
questions.
Nikki: That’s alright. We have dumb answers [laughing]. I have a question for Dave. I wanted to talk about your guitar
playing—it’s sooo crazy! I’m trying to get my
head around what you’re doing to get all those weird sounds.
Dave: Well, it all happens when we’re together in a room
really. I had different effects for a number of years, and then
we just start playing, and the next thing you know it’s
happening. Nothing’s planned. It’s just like a total
response to what someone else is doing in the band. I’ve
got about five or six pedals that I use, just gear I’ve
accumulated over the years. You buy stuff, and you haven’t
got a use for it for ages, and then the next thing you know
you’ve got this amazing sound. I’m influenced by noise.
I like going to raves and parties and just hearing lots of different
noises and just trying to re-create different noises. I’ve seen some pictures of you using different objects
to play your guitar.
Dave: There’s this toy raygun I use that works really well. So, the noise of the toy gets amplified by your guitar pickup?
Dave: That’s correct. The raygun was just something that
was lying around while we were playing, and we wound up using
it in the song. It’s crazy what you can use. It’s amazing how well your noises actually enhance the
song. It’s so noisy, but it really fits with what’s
going on.
Dave: We’ve always tried to work out why. We really don’t
know, and that’s what’s really quite nice about it
I think. If it had been planned, then it probably wouldn’t
have been such good fun.
Gemma: We wanna hear some of your dumb questions! Alright. What’s the deal with your little gang of cats
on your webpage? Is KaitO training a secret army of cats?
Gemma: My cat’s not on there. I haven’t got any decent
photos of my cat. Her name is Muffin. The Siamese used to be
Nikki’s, and one of Dave’s cats is on there. Dave’s
got nine cats. He’s big on cats. Dieta’s is Little’n.
We like cats. I’m handing you to Dieta now.
How do you say your name again?
Dieta: Dee-ter. It’s like the German way of saying it. As in “Would you like to touch my monkey?”
Dieta: Uhh, you can touch my monkey if you want!?! [laughing]
We’ve only just met. Sometimes it’s best that way, y’know?
Dieta: I guess so, yeah. When are you coming over to the U.S? Well, not you specifically,
but the whole band?
Dieta: [laughing] Yeah, I’ll bring my monkey around the
end of September I think. It’s supposed to be nice then.
This magazine you’re writing for, is it mainly a skate
magazine with just a little music section? No it’s divided up pretty evenly between skateboarding,
snowboarding, and music.
Dieta: Because it’d be nice if we could get on a skate
video. Y’know that bit where they fall over and hit their
bollocks on the handrails. Yeah, we’ll get the band in a slow motion shot—all
falling onto a handrail. What kind of day jobs do you guys have?
Dieta: I’m a structural engineer. I build big things. It’s
like playing with big Legos. Do you know Legos? Do you have
that? Oh, yeah.
Dieta: It’s not a bad job. Except they don’t let you
get pissed [drunk] and play in front of people, so it’s
not as good as drumming, y’know?
Gemma: I’m a paper girl, and when I’m not doing that
I’m cleaning out birdcages in pet shops. Wow.
Gemma: [laughing] No, just kidding! I’m just an unemployed
student. What’re you studying?
Gemma: Media.
Nikki: I’ve got a really bad job. I work at a chemist’s—printing
up photos, but you can see really cool photos, like very private
stuff.
It pains. But y’know, it’s quite fun really. You ever take any home?
Nikki: Ohhhh, I’ve got boxes and boxes. I plan on an exhibition,
y’know? It’s a bit horrific. That’s why I like
it. It’s quite good, but it’s hard work.
Dave: I work in a factory making things out of metal, with a
lot of psychopathic people. They’re all nuts. They’re
mad. It’s not a bad job. Not as good as being a pop star. Maybe that’s why you’re so into noise.
Dave: Yeah, that’s definitely it! It’s the machines
wailing and screaming—it gives me inspiration. I catch myself listening to noisy things all the time and
appreciating how musical some everyday noises can be.
Dave: You can put it to anything, y’know? It’s really,
really cool what you can do with noise. Some of the sounds we
used on the album are of Dieta playing on milk bottles, and
on the song Shoot Shoot, if you listen to it hard, Dieta is
actually sawing a log of wood all the way through it. It’s
incredible because we start the song and he makes the sawing
last until the end, and then at the end you hear the wood break
and fall to the floor. It’s a stroke of genius. So next
time you listen to Shoot Shoot just imagine Dieta sawing away
outside the studio, and perfectly in time! [laughing] With his
monkey out.
Kaito’s
new CD, You’ve Seen Us... You Must Have Seen Us..., is
just one of those rare releases that begs for repeated listening.
Kaito’s sound is a fresh, raw and vital combination of
catchy, hook-filled pop and playful, inventive guitar noise—falling
somewhere between Sleater-Kinney, The Pixies, and Sonic Youth.
Just two boys (Dieta Quantrill-drums, and Dave Lake-guitar)
and two girls (Nikki Colk-vocals/guitar, Gemma Cullingford-bass)
from Norwich, UK, who happen to be making some outrageously
cool, creative music. Here’s a little bit of my intercontinental
phone call with future pop superstars Kaito.