Chan Marshall on the weirdest place she's heard a CATPOWER song, her history of covers, and what she’s learned from nearly three decades in the music business
“When I heard Billie Holiday sing, I could feel her. It was the first time I didn’t feel alone, because I heard somebody who also felt so desperately alone.” Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photo by Roger Sargent Something happens during a good Cat Power performance. “The dimension arrives,” explains Chan Marshall, who’s performed under that moniker since the 1990s. “A little tiny portal arrives, and it’s like, Oh, shit, did that just happen? Oh, that felt really good.
Song on Covers that feels like you wrote it I just go back to the first time I heard Billie Holiday, and the connection that I felt from hearing her sing was I didn’t feel as lonely. I think I was 13. I heard that someone else felt truly lonely. There are two pivotal songs for me. First was the live version of Aretha Franklin from 1964 on PBS singing “Amazing Grace”; I was 12 [in 1984] and that was the first time that I had music change me.
I jumped out of the booth and composed the music again, for “I Had a Dream Joe.” Did the same thing with my phone, had no intention of ever in my life covering “I Had a Dream Joe” ever in my life, never. I mean, “Against the Wind,” sure, maybe one day I might think of that. Then the third one was “In the Sea,” which is so sad and groovy. And then the last one was “You Got the Silver.”
Least favorite song to play live It would have to be “Hate.” I recorded this album with a band in L.A. for four days. I stayed in the studio for another week, so I was doing mixes, mastering and different things. I was having to hear certain things, and when I was listening to “Unhate,” I realized that — and it was a big deal for me to see this — I struggled with depression since I was young, and all these albums up to The Greatest, even The Greatest, I was always suicidal.
So when he was able to walk, he’s still falling down on his face and his diaper, and I was just practicing “The Greatest,” and he came from his bedroom, and just, his look on his face was terror. And I looked at him and I was like, “Are you okay, honey?” and he’s just [whining], and I didn’t understand. So I made him comfortable, and I started playing again, and he came back over, and he was like [crying]. It was the music. He couldn’t deal with me playing “The Greatest.