GRENADES OUT OCTOBER 26 VIA FOLKWAYS / ACRONYM RECORDS
LISTEN AND SHARE “NEW COLOSSUS”
TOUR DATES CONTINUE AUGUST 9
LISTEN TO KAIA KATER ON SPOTIFY / APPLE MUSIC
“...One of the most remarkable Canadian folk records in some time...Kater's music is somehow ancient and brand new at the same time.” -Tom Power, CBC Radio
"...plaintive, mesmerizing...writes and performs with the skill of a folk-circuit veteran..."
-Rolling Stone
"Where bluegrass meets Nina Simone" - The Guardian
"You want some authenticity in your folk music or bluegrass – I give you Kaia Kater."
- No Depression
PHOTO CREDIT : Raez Argulla // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES
Known for her prowess as a songwriter and tradition bearer who performs with “the skill of a folk-circuit veteran” (Rolling Stone), Grenadian-Canadian artist Kaia Kater took a decidedly different direction for her new album, Grenades, out October 26 in partnership with acronym Records in Canada and Smithsonian Folkways Recordings world wide. What started out as a search to discover the roots of her identity became a physical and emotional exploration of history, in particular her paternal ancestry, and has led to bold new heights of imagination and creative expression.
Kaia grew up between two worlds: one her family’s deep ties to the Canadian folk music scene; the other the years she spent soaking up Appalachian music in West Virginia. Her father grew up in Grenada, fleeing to Canada in 1986 as part of a student exchange program young speakers program, after the U.S. invasion. His voice can be heard recounting those events during the album's interludes — a way for Kaia to tie her present with his past, in order to understand our current global climate of war, unease, immigration, and displacement.
Grenades is the lore of lives recounted. As Kaia describes it in the album’s line notes: “It is my grandmother Myra’s glory, it is my father Deno’s struggle, it is my march from the past into the present. Concentric circles of song spin around, lurching the listener backward into the cargo bed of a pick-up truck in the mountainous rainforests of Grenada on 13th March 1979. They pull you by the ear and plant you in the middle of helicopter gunfire during two months of terror in 1983. You are swept by the easterly wind and settled gently in the back row of a Boeing 737 at the exact moment when a young man decides to walk off a plane into the frozen Canadian winter. You sit cross-legged on the floor and listen to the words he speaks to me, his daughter, a quarter of a century later.”
On Grenades, Kaia revisits the past in songs like “La Miseère” and “Grenades”, looks to the future in “Poets Be Buried”, and touches on the present in “Canyonland” and the first single “New Colossus” which is available to stream today.
LISTEN AND SHARE “NEW COLOSSUS”
Born in Montreal, raised in Quebec and Manitoba, and now based in Toronto, Kaia studied Appalachian music in West Virginia and dove deep into old-time banjo music on her previous releases, including 2016's award-winning Nine Pin. For Grenades, she took a decidedly different direction, choosing to lean into a wider array of sounds and styles, in order to convey a wider array of emotions and topics, most notably her paternal ancestry.
To explore the varying facets of her sound, she partnered with producer Erin Costelo in Toronto to create a musical aesthetic that pulled from more than just the Appalachian influences of her past past musical efforts. Artists like Aoife O'Donovan and Daniel Lanois figured prominently in the artistic vision.
“I play acoustic guitar on the record, and the title track doesn’t even have banjo in it, so we knew it would be different right off the bat,” Kater says. “We anchored a lot of the sound with guitar player Christine Bougie (Bahamas, Good Lovelies). I knew I wanted Christine on the record, and we built the sound from there.”
It’s a sound that starts in Grenada, moves through America, West Virginia, and travels into Quebec. It’s the sound of an artist forging a new path into the future, while holding her history close. Grenades tells stories of courage and uncertainty; it is an odyssey reflecting on the nature of personal identity, memory, family –— and how sometimes a person must travel across the world to find out where their home is.
Kaia started her career early, crafting her first EP Old Soul (2013) when she was just out of high school. Since then, she’s gone on to release two more albums, Sorrow Bound (2015) and Nine Pin (2016). Her most recent album weaves between hard-hitting songs that touch on social issues like the Black Lives Matter movement and more personal narratives speaking to life and love in the digital age. Nine Pin won a Canadian Folk Music Award, a Stingray Rising Star Award, and sent Kaia on an 18-month touring journey from Ireland to Iowa, including stops at The Kennedy Center, Hillside Festival and London's O2 Shepherd's Bush.
Hot off the heels of a string of summer festival performances, including Edmonton Folk Festival, Kaia will be on the road in North America this fall to support the new album. Watch for more Canadian tour dates to be announced shortly.
GRENADES TRACKLIST
New Colossus
Heavenly Track
Canyonland
(Power! Power! Power!)|
La Misere
Meridian Ground
Starry Day
(Death of a Dream)
Grenades
Hydrants
Everly
The Right One
(Off The Plane)
Poets Be Buried
UPCOMING TOUR DATES
Aug 24 - Fayetteville, AR - Fayetteville Roots Festival
Aug 31 - Portland, OR - The Old Church Concert Hall
Sep 7 - Sisters, OK - Sisters Folk Festival
Sep 11 - Nashville, TN - AmericanaFest 2018
Sep 20 - Berryville, VA - Watermelon Park Festival
Oct 19 - Black Mountain, NC - LEAF Festival
Nov 1 - Frederick, MD - Weinberg Center For The Arts
Nov 2 - Baltimore, MD - Creative Alliance
Nov 3 - Arden, DE - Arden Gild Hall
Nov 14 - Lewisburg, PA - Weis Center For The Performing Arts
Nov 17 - Wakefield, QC - The Black Sheep Inn
Nov 20 - Toronto, ON - Rivoli
Nov 25 - Halifax, NS - The Carleton
Nov 30 - Albany, NY - Massry Center For The Arts
Dec 1 - Philadelphia, PA - Philadelphia Folksong Society
KAIA KATER ONLINE
WEBSITE
TWITTER
FACEBOOK
ABOUT ACRONYM RECORDS
Re-launched in 2017, acronym records is a Toronto-based full service Independent Record Label and is part of the MDM Recordings Inc. family of companies, founded by Mike Denney. It is run day to day by Head of Creative/Managing Partner Tony Tarleton and supported by the amazing team of MDM. Other artists on the acronym roster include Megan Nash, Christina Martin and Mikhail Laxton with more artists to be announced soon. Canadian distribution for acronym/MDM is via Universal Music Canada, ABC Music in Australia and rest of the world via FUGA.