Kate Crash

Rainy days are the best days for interviews.

Kate Crash is building “a conscious intermedia revolution.”
“All the rules are being broken”
She is all about interactive audience engagement. Kate Crash informed me that
“dinosaur day” is a newly declared 5th of the month holiday. . . every 5th . . . celebrate it!
Intermedia projects involve: collage, music, painting, fashion, lyrics, dance . . .
Poetry is a part of her background and she found nourishment in Neruda and Edna St. Vincent Millay, Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, and musically feels inspired by Karen O. of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs with whom she shares a producer, Nick Launay.
Eminem, Bowie, Missy Eliot, Brittney, Nirvana all inspire . . .
She is is the chameleon combiner
A collage.
She thinks everyone pulls their identity and art from somewhere . . .
People used to compare her to Peaches.
Which I think is more about Peaches’ strength and unsettling confidence and showmanship.
It used to bother her, but now she thinks that
people can compare her to whatever they want.
Now its MIA, all about the combining sound. And people get Kate’s music now, because of MIA.
But Kate thinks
there is room for more than one wild frontwoman.
Karen O.
Madonna
Peaches.
Blondie.
As women we are responsible for changing the standards of beauty and behavior.
She talked about looks as they help success. And her stage presence reflects inspiration from Mick Jagger and Iggy.
Women
Might have to work harder, but the key is to stick to the true self.

She is all about “Changing the zombie culture of the world.”
Her recitation of lyrics recalled another day, an era of an oral tradition. With the pop format, Kate can bring poetry into people’s homes and lives.
“Society is at war because people are at war.”
She advises to leave anger and
Operate out of love.

Wary of addiction-riddled eco-activists, who save the world between lines, she finds authenticity and clarity from her meditation practice which helps put her in touch with cause and effect. We all have the darkness within us, but we can rise out of it in creativity.
“Greed has failed the system”
She might be considered the savage love child of Iggy Pop and Timberlake.
She calls it
“Hip Pop Punk”
Ronson meets Cobain sums up the guitar style. She makes art within the mainstream to change it.
Pop music with a catchy chorus sucks people in and then she can get away with murder in the verses . . .
Darker songs from the past, involving impossible loves and her music now is more celebration . . kids love her . . .pop . . .rock . . .old punk rock people love her. As Bowie was respected by artists, music people, the mainstream, she crosses demographic separations in her appeal.
When I first met Kate Crash, she was wearing a yellow and black striped outfit reminiscent of a techno interpretation of a bumblebee. She was on her way to a shoot or a video filming. My brother Gabriel Eng of gabrielengphotography.com has shot her picture. She’s unforgettable.
I finally got to see her live act at Cinespace in January 2009. A master of reinvention, she never appears with the same look twice. I liked the blue hair and the silver lame suit, or the metallic blue suite with “Kate Crash” embroidered on the back.
I saw her this fall after she had just come back from Japan. Chanting helps her to focus.
She has more confidence than 100 of the rest of us put together. She can tear up the dance floor and her live act incorporates a vigorous dance component with costume changes, her gypsy electro band ensemble, supporting dancers, and her MC host. Early February she will perform for a fashion show as well as at Mister T’s. She performs with a headset mic that permits her to pirouette, kick, and dance into the crowd, all while singing.
She is a multi-instrumentalist, a dancer, a poet, a performer, a singer.
What is amazing is her flair for the visual component of her persona. She is always dressed to kill, with a riot of color and texture. She stays fit with a raw vegan diet.
I don’t like to draw comparisons but if I had to I’d say, think Pink meets early Madonna meets Gwen Stefani . . . .but you see Kate is Kate, and there is no one like her.
Check out her myspace URL: /katecrashmusic . . .
Recently she had
favorable press on KROQ with legendary Rodney Bingenheimer.
Her past involved humanitarian work in the Middle East, although her approach has changed.
It’s all about love. Taking critique.
And hard work. “Be willing to do the grunt work. . . I had to make the dream a reality, you can’t just dream and say it, you have to dream it and do it!”
And keeping people excited and working with the new tech-based short attention spans.
Kate Crash the persona is a movement.
“I’m just the face of something already going on.”

Two shows on Saturday February 7th!
A fashion rock show for designer Nathalia Gaviria at 6363 Hollywood Blvd. 8pm Saturday.
Then Mister T's in Highland Park where she will have the total artistic freedom to tear up the stage.
And beyond that Good Heart in Venice Tues 10th and Thursday an art event downtown on Alameda.
Stay tuned.