Not Just Talking About Kate Bollinger’s Music

We publish a lot of interviews through Monster Children both in print and through our digital channels and god damn if a lot of them don’t blend together.

It’s nobody’s fault, it is this way with most publications, because it is that way with most humans. When asked questions under pressure, especially about something as subjective and abstract as art and music, people tend to crack into the same answers; the sort of watery expressions and equivocations that amount to some drab form of, ‘I don’t make the music, the music makes me, brother (hits weed pen).’

So to avoid that, I like to look outside of their music at all their other components and strange compulsions to find out what our favorite artists do apart from making art, because no one tells stories about Picasso mixing paint on a pallet; they tell stories about Picasso separating the food on his plate by age and texture. ‘What’s that say about how he organizes his art?’ one might say, and be fascinated. That’s the stuff we are really here for - the extensions of personality and interest beyond the thing that the person is known for. Kate Bollinger is known for her music, so I asked what she cooks for dinner on date night, what her parents do for a living, what she likes to watch, and all sorts of other things. And also, yeah, a little bit about music.

Before this interview began, we were discussing Kate’s life in LA and work outside of the music industry, which is where we begin.

Listen to Kate Bollinger’s new album, Songs From A Thousand Frames Of Mind, here.

Are you not into working in music?

I really love making music, but I don't think that it will ever be the only thing that I do. 

What else do you do?

I mean, I like working on film projects with friends. I like taking photos. I've really been liking working in my friend's store. I don't know. I like being busy and I like having many irons in the fire, but I studied cinematography in college and got a studio art degree with a focus in film. What about you? Where are you from?

Me? I'm from Honolulu.

Oh, that’s so cool! 

Yeah, this is a very two-directional interview. That’s fun. You’re going on a tour of Europe? How are you feeling about it? Are you excited?

I'm really excited. I'm a little sad to leave my life in LA, which is funny. I've just been loving working at the store and I love my friends here, so I'm sad to leave the routine that I have right now. Routine is really nice. I realized that's kind of what my life was missing for the last five years. 

But I'm really excited. I love Europe and the UK so much. I'm bringing my friend Jacob. He's one of my best friends from high school and my original drummer and played drums on the record. And then the rest of the guys I found through friends recommendations. I've never met them. They live in London. So, we're going to get to London, rehearse for three days, and then start the tour. A bit of a risk.

Just to backtrack a little bit, I'll ask you one more time on the record this time. Do you like music?

Yes, I do! I love music and I love being a musician, but I think of myself as a songwriter first. And it's funny how many different skills and… things being a musician involves that you kind of aren't aware of maybe before you're doing it. Like, business and practice. Performing is a whole different thing from songwriting. but yes, I love being a musician. Sorry that I've made it seem like I don't. I'm not really happy doing one thing ever. I feel like it's nice to have a balance. 

So, you studied cinematography and camera work and film. How do you apply that to your actual life? Do you work on sets? Do you make films? Do you have a secret YouTube channel?

I was initially in the poetry program, but I switched to film because I was starting to get more serious about making music and I felt like writing a lot of poetry sort of was exercising the same muscle and it was just taking too much time from my music. So I switched to cinematography with the intention of making music videos to go along with my music, and that's kind of what I've ended up doing in LA.

There are many reasons why I like being in LA, but it is something that I think has felt - I don’t know - I like the access to really talented people that have specific skills and locations and camera equipment. It has been a really cool part of living here. I made I think four music videos last year when I was releasing the album with a bunch of friends of mine who do all sorts of different things, and then I just shot two music videos for two friends, too. 

That's a lot of stuff. You're putting in a lot of work.

Thanks. It's fun. Yeah, I like to be busy.

When you're approaching shooting a video or even before that, concepting one, how do you make that connection between the visual and the musical? I'm always interested in how people are turning one medium into a whole another sensory medium.

That's a good question. I mean I guess my approach to conceptualizing a music video feels pretty similar to my songwriting approach which I often think of as being kind of like dreaming; all three of those things are really subconscious.

When I'm writing a song, I'll come up with a guitar part or chord progression, which is a little bit more intentional, but then once I kind of start singing a melody… I've talked to certain other musicians about songwriting and being kind of like this experience where you're like a vessel for some higher power that's actually writing the song. And that's kind of how it feels when I'm thinking of a video idea. I will listen to the song and then it feels like images just appear in my mind, which feels like a waking dream, does that make sense?

Yeah, I know what you mean. Flow state kind of. Do you script narrative also?

No, I don't think I could do that. Maybe I'll try at some point, but no, I don't. Sometimes there is a story arc, but most of the time it's purely visual to begin and then the narrative will sort of reveal itself later. That tends to happen with songwriting, too. I'll start writing something, it’ll just pour out of me, and then eventually I'll glean meaning from it, which, again, kind of feels like dreaming. You'll have this sort of absurd dream and then you'll tell a friend and you kind of figure out what it was symbolizing or something.

That's like the reverse of how other musicians I speak to operate. Usually they'll start with a theme or something. It's interesting that you start kind of in the reverse of that.

Yeah, it's funny. I have always done it the way that you're saying that's kind of backwards, I guess. But recently, I've been writing songs with my friend Matt, who I wrote a lot of the songs for my last album with, and we have been writing in the way that you're talking about with a theme in mind - a certain intention of writing a specific kind of thing. I've been playing around with that for the first time ever, but that's not my natural inclination at all.

Which came first for you? The visuals or the music?

The music for sure.

 How did you begin?

My mom is a music therapist and was a children's musician when I was little. She recorded something like nine or ten children's music albums, and for each album she had a children's chorus sing with her. I was in the children's chorus for each of the albums. I just grew up singing a lot with my mom. Both of my brothers played music, my dad loves music and played a lot of music around the house. I took violin lessons as a kid, but I hated it and I stopped doing that pretty quickly. Took a few piano lessons - I think it's interesting that my mom never had me take guitar lessons. I sort of rebelled against every other instrument and then she taught me a few chords on guitar because I had asked her to, and then I went off on my own and wrote a bunch of songs in my room and that was sort of it.

You just rebelled against your parents by learning guitar.

No, I rebelled against their attempts to have me learn violin or piano and I wouldn't say I was rebelling but just their attempts to create musical structure didn't work. What worked was just giving me a guitar and letting me go in my room and come up with chords on my own, and I think having my brothers around playing music and writing songs, it was natural - it was never pushed on me.

Interesting. Do you feel that that's a similar approach for other artistic aspects of your life where you need to come upon it organically on your own terms?

I think so. Definitely. Yeah.

Here’s a good annoying question for you: you’re a film person, what’s your favorite movie? Or guilty pleasure movie? Or both? 

It's really hard. I don't know if I have a favorite movie, but I definitely have a bunch of Guilty Pleasure favorite movies. I love Rom-Com’s. My mom and I watched a ton of Rom-Coms and 90’s and early 2000s movies. My oldest brother is an animator and he came home a lot with different movies for us to watch. He turned me on to a lot of stuff like Miyazaki when I was really little. He showed me The Tune by Bill Plimpmpton when I was really little. He showed me Triplets of Belleville and Ren and Stimpy and a lot of animated stuff that I like. I don't know, maybe my guilty pleasure movie is 13 Going on 30, or Bend It Like Beckham or something. You’ve Got Mail with Tom Hanks.

That’s some specific taste.

I love Audrey Hepburn movies. I love Funny Face. You can put that as my favorite one. Maybe I'll follow up with an email about my favorite movie

If you were not a musician, what would your primary occupation be? Would it be in cinema or would you be owning a bookstore?

I don't know. I wish I had five lives. I would like to maybe do what my mom does, be a social worker or something. She's a music therapist, so she works with adults with developmental disabilities or brain trauma. She works with kids with autism and other disabilities. The reason I say social work is I would want to do something that helps people, but I think I would always want to do something creative.

You keep talking about how you lean more visual as a person, you're kind of split between music and the visual aspect. Do you find that they are scratching the same itch for you? You know what I mean? do you find that they're both equally fulfilling?

That's a good question. I think they're definitely separate. It's more common for me to have a visual idea and want to execute it in a specific way. With songwriting, it feels more like a chance encounter that I'll write a song. Does that make sense? That's a good question. You've kind of stumped me. I'll have to think more about it. 

That was a hardball question, would you like a softball question? 

Sure.

 Okay, I love this question. So it's like your five year anniversary with your significant other. What do you cook for dinner? What's your specialty?

I like having lots of things, which I guess is the theme of my life. For my birthday when I was growing up, my mom would get all kinds of different appetizers. It was just like a little bit of tons of different things. Maybe that, so it would be fun snack food. 

Okay like several bowls of Doritos and hummus? Rider food?

No, no, no, no. Not like that. I don't know. That's just what I liked as a kid. But maybe Thai food. We would make chicken and vegetables or something. Maybe this should be off the record. I feel that tells you nothing about me.

Okay now that I'm thinking more about your question, there is one thing that I always make, and I feel like friends of mine will make fun of me because I make it a lot, which is chicken with the skin on, bone in, in a Dutch oven with a bunch of chopped up vegetables and balsamic and oil and a bunch of spices. It's really good.

That's a normal person food, right? That's like a normal person meal.

So I'd probably make that. It's really good though. It's good. It feels really like a really primitive meal, It's perfect.

That's a good word to use.