Interview : Katie Noonan (2011)
February 15th 2011 10:00
The sweet and lovely Katie Noonan is packing her bags one more time to hit the road with The Captains for their fifth national tour supporting their debut album last year “Emperor’s Box”. With a busy year ahead where her other project Elixir comes back to life, Katie had a chat to me about the new Elixir album and concept, why the ARIA’s were a “Fucking train wreck, but fun” and the possibility of the next Captains record sounding like a Bollywood soundtrack.
Hi Katie, how are you?
I’m good, how are you?
Yeah not too bad. What are you up to today?
Oh God let me think......doing interviews, doing some work and I’ll pick up my son in the afternoon.
You guys are back out on road touring again. The album “Emperor’s Box” has been out for a little while, now that you’ve been playing them live are you still happy with the album or do you wish you could’ve changed some things here and there?
No, I was really proud of how the recording process went, but I know what you mean. Of course I would probably do things slightly differently now because we’ve played the songs so much more, but no not really. We did play some of the songs before we made the record we did a lot of underground warehouse shows to really flesh out the tunes live. There’s a pretty vibrant warehouse scene in Sydney, so we did quite a lot of gigs actually just jamming out the songs, which is what I’ve just done with Elixir for my next record with them. I’m really proud of the record and funnily enough I listened to it again the other day. You don’t listen to it once you’ve recorded it and I listened to it on vinyl which is my favourite way to listen to music and it sound good, so I’m proud of the record.
You popped up in the Sydney festival as apart of the tribute to Ruby Hunter, how did you get involved in that one?
I was so thrilled to be involved in that. Majority of the singers, in fact all of the singers other than myself and Renee Geyer were indigenous singers so I was just so honored to be involved. I met Aunty Ruby through a concert series called “Broad” which I did with Claire Bowditch, Deb Conway, Myself, Ruby and Sara Storer. I did that in late ’05, I remember because my first born was still a baby and I was breast feeding backstage! It was a beautiful tour put together by Deb Conway, basically all female singer/songwriters talking about their songs and the processes and singing together on each others songs and I sang on Aunty Ruby’s song ‘Woman’s Business’, which was so much fun and thats the song I sang at the tribute too. It was very special.
Obviously Ruby’s music had a great influence on you?
Well I first discovered Ruby through Archie (Roach) because i had heard Archie’s amazing album with “Down City Streets” and “They Took The Children Away” and those tunes probably fifteen years ago now or something like that. it was pretty much in high school, I guess I was learning more about Australia’s indigenous history, obviously came across Archie and came across Ruby. Ruby was the first indigenous female artist signed to a major record label so she was a real pioneer in many ways and certainly Archie and Ruby influenced my music.
I remember meeting them at an ARIA awards because we were both signed to the same label at the time. And they were pretty much the only real people in the room I wanted to talk to. (laughs) It was nice to finding actually real people at a gig that is usually so superficial. I remember that and felt an instant connection to them.
I’m not sure if everyone realised this but January 8 was Archie’s birthday, so it was a beautiful way for him to celebrate his soul mates life on his birthday.
I didn’t realise that. You brought up the ARIA’s and one thing I’ve always wanted to ask to people who’ve been to the ARIA’s, is it really a chore?
No look the last few have been and the last one was terrible.
It was pretty ordinary.
It was fun to be at because it was more of a party. But it was like no one was really listening to the music or anything. It was so bizarre to be at an event celebrating excellence in music and the way it is set up is just for a big piss up.
So it’s a very odd event, but it’s still fun but basically I remember seeing my friends and we kind of have a little chat but we’re always being pulled in different directions by publicists and all that kind of stuff. But certainly it’s an excellent night to award the industry but I think it could be done with a bit more respect towards the music.
True, cause the one last year was a train wreck to watch.
It was a fucking train wreck! it was fun to be there and I don’t have a television, so I have not seen any of the televised but from all accounts it was pretty bad. It was fun to be there and a lot of people were excited to be at the Opera House, it was people talking and drinking and they’d go “oh what award was that?” no one was really knew what was happening.
Well I think Powderfinger won an award and went “what’s this for?”
Yeah exactly. No one knew. It was very odd, very weird. And the performances seemed to be all about pomp and circumstance. It was weird.
What are going to be the next plans for The Captains after this tour?
Well basically this is the fifth national tour for this album, so this will be the closing of the chapter for this project as we’ve toured this a lot and now we’re basically looking forward to writing the next record. I’m not sure if I mentioned this earlier but our guitarist, Cameron, moved to India for a couple of years.
Oh wow.
Yeah. But it’s exciting because his coming back to Australia to do this tour and thats awesome. It’s still my main project but it’s slightly on the back burner on the creative front because it’s going to be a little hard to rehearsals when he’s in India (chuckles).
What made him go to India.
His wife is a diplomat.
Oh okay!
So she got a amazing posting and they saw it as a great opportunity to hang out in a pretty crazy culture for three years. I’m sure it’ll be awesome for his music and it’ll probably deeply influence the next Captains record as well. We might make the record.....Rajistan or something (laughing)
A bollywood soundtrack?
Yeah, that’ll be fun. As long as we did a bollywood film clip. That would be hilarious!
So it’s still the main project but it’s essentially the end of touring for this project. And we will be starting writing next.
You mentioned earlier that you’ve been working with Elixir again, can you tell us a bit more on whats happening on that front?
Well Elixir has always been the side project kind of fit in other projects but now I’ve decided to make it one of my main priorities, mainly because my creative muse has lead me to that point and we’ve essentially written a record. We’ve got eleven new tunes ready to go. We’re recording in April. We’re working on a world première collaboration for the Brisbane festival in September which is going to be awesome.
Whats that collaboration involving?
I don’t know if I can let that cat out of the bag, they haven’t announced the program yet. Basically it’s going to be these new Elixir tunes being choreographed by this choreographer from America with a dance company of five premièring a new collaborative piece in September.
That sound really cool. When it comes to writing for the different bands, do you have a different way for writing for the different projects? The way you’ve written for Elixir is it different to writing for The Captains or for George?
Yeah, every song is different like every friend is different. There is a space I go to with each project that I can’t really describe but I know when I’m there. But it’s also dependent on the collaborators. I do a lot of co-writing. The Elixir record is completely co-written between myself and my husband Zac and Steven and Tom Shatcock so it’s a real collaborative process. So everythings different.
I read once where you said you preferred to write alone, but obviously in recent years you’ve done a lot more collaborating, has it become more easier?
I used to prefer writing on my own but I’ve enjoyed being inspired and challenged by co-writing. I think co-writing is really awesome to do but I would only recommend doing it after you’ve spent a good solid five or ten years writing on your own. I guess you don’t want to be overtly influenced by your co-writer, you’ve got to have a sense of what you are and what you’re bringing to a song. But initially I didn’t like co-writing out of fear because i was kind of scared of it. But after a few initial co-writes, I loved it and really enjoy co-writing.
Do you have a wish list of people you’d like to write with?
Tim Finn. And that ones been ticked off. That was amazing to write with Tim. I’d love to write with Joni Mitchell or Elvis Costello.
I reckon Elvis Costello would be amazing.
Yeah, he’s coming in April so I’ll have to hit him up. (chuckles)
You should! How does a song start for you? Is a lyric, a melody, a piece of music?
Every song is different, sometimes its just a chord progression, sometimes it’s a melody, sometimes it’s a lyric. It’s generally easier for me to start with a melody. Its generally where they come from. Sometimes it’s a chordal progression, so yeah, everyone’s different.
What else do you aim to do in music? You’ve achieved a lot over the years, is there something that makes you go “Geez I really want to do that!”
I just want to keep on building up mad, exciting ideas and try to make them happen. I do like the idea of working more and more in a theatre sense. Collaborating with dancers or with the circus or with actors, whatever it is, just kind of building up more multi arts, where music is apart of it but not all of it.
But those things cost a lot of money so I guess I’ll be dreaming up ideas and finding funding and stuff like that.
Fair enough, Do your boys Dexter and Jonah realise they have musical parents?
They do, they grow up in a house with no TV so there’s only instruments and books. I guess they know thats different to other people’s houses. But, children only know what they’re grow up and they know we’re their parents and what we do. Dexter has been around the world three times and he’s five, so that’s pretty awesome. And Jonah know I made my first solo album with him inside my tummy. I think my last vocal was at about 32 weeks or something! But for them thats just normal, it’s all they know.
Are they themselves musically inclined?
They’re very musical, deeply creative people. Which I think it is because they don’t spend time in front of computer games and television, also they are instinctively creative.
So is there a possibility down the track we’re going to see The Katie Noonan Family Band?
ooooh, that would be amazing.......who knows, I made an album with my mum, I’ve obviously made albums with my brother, but...that would be so surreal!
Dexter is an amazing drummer.
Oh really?

Yeah he’s incredible. He hasn’t had that intuition bashed out of him from television. But no, I don’t think that will happen (laughs).
One last question for you Katie, what’s your biggest guilty pleasure at the moment?
Well usually I would say a big bold Barossi Valley Shiraz but I’m doing dry February. Which is very boring. Its day two.
Hows that going for you?
Day two of twenty eight, not that I’m counting! That’s usually my weakness.
You’ll have to find something else this month to substitute.
Yeah, well it’s meant to be yoga so we’ll see!
[we get the wind up- one minute to go]
Well thats timed nicely then. Thanks so much for having a chat today. Can’t wait to see out on tour in the next couple of months.
Yeah awesome. Ok thanks. [kids are yelling in the background] Gotta go take care.
Katie Noonan and The Captains are out on tour in March. For details head to her website.
I’m good, how are you?
Yeah not too bad. What are you up to today?
Oh God let me think......doing interviews, doing some work and I’ll pick up my son in the afternoon.
You guys are back out on road touring again. The album “Emperor’s Box” has been out for a little while, now that you’ve been playing them live are you still happy with the album or do you wish you could’ve changed some things here and there?
No, I was really proud of how the recording process went, but I know what you mean. Of course I would probably do things slightly differently now because we’ve played the songs so much more, but no not really. We did play some of the songs before we made the record we did a lot of underground warehouse shows to really flesh out the tunes live. There’s a pretty vibrant warehouse scene in Sydney, so we did quite a lot of gigs actually just jamming out the songs, which is what I’ve just done with Elixir for my next record with them. I’m really proud of the record and funnily enough I listened to it again the other day. You don’t listen to it once you’ve recorded it and I listened to it on vinyl which is my favourite way to listen to music and it sound good, so I’m proud of the record.
You popped up in the Sydney festival as apart of the tribute to Ruby Hunter, how did you get involved in that one?
I was so thrilled to be involved in that. Majority of the singers, in fact all of the singers other than myself and Renee Geyer were indigenous singers so I was just so honored to be involved. I met Aunty Ruby through a concert series called “Broad” which I did with Claire Bowditch, Deb Conway, Myself, Ruby and Sara Storer. I did that in late ’05, I remember because my first born was still a baby and I was breast feeding backstage! It was a beautiful tour put together by Deb Conway, basically all female singer/songwriters talking about their songs and the processes and singing together on each others songs and I sang on Aunty Ruby’s song ‘Woman’s Business’, which was so much fun and thats the song I sang at the tribute too. It was very special.
Obviously Ruby’s music had a great influence on you?
Well I first discovered Ruby through Archie (Roach) because i had heard Archie’s amazing album with “Down City Streets” and “They Took The Children Away” and those tunes probably fifteen years ago now or something like that. it was pretty much in high school, I guess I was learning more about Australia’s indigenous history, obviously came across Archie and came across Ruby. Ruby was the first indigenous female artist signed to a major record label so she was a real pioneer in many ways and certainly Archie and Ruby influenced my music.
I remember meeting them at an ARIA awards because we were both signed to the same label at the time. And they were pretty much the only real people in the room I wanted to talk to. (laughs) It was nice to finding actually real people at a gig that is usually so superficial. I remember that and felt an instant connection to them.
I’m not sure if everyone realised this but January 8 was Archie’s birthday, so it was a beautiful way for him to celebrate his soul mates life on his birthday.
I didn’t realise that. You brought up the ARIA’s and one thing I’ve always wanted to ask to people who’ve been to the ARIA’s, is it really a chore?
No look the last few have been and the last one was terrible.
It was pretty ordinary.
It was fun to be at because it was more of a party. But it was like no one was really listening to the music or anything. It was so bizarre to be at an event celebrating excellence in music and the way it is set up is just for a big piss up.
So it’s a very odd event, but it’s still fun but basically I remember seeing my friends and we kind of have a little chat but we’re always being pulled in different directions by publicists and all that kind of stuff. But certainly it’s an excellent night to award the industry but I think it could be done with a bit more respect towards the music.
True, cause the one last year was a train wreck to watch.
It was a fucking train wreck! it was fun to be there and I don’t have a television, so I have not seen any of the televised but from all accounts it was pretty bad. It was fun to be there and a lot of people were excited to be at the Opera House, it was people talking and drinking and they’d go “oh what award was that?” no one was really knew what was happening.
Well I think Powderfinger won an award and went “what’s this for?”
Yeah exactly. No one knew. It was very odd, very weird. And the performances seemed to be all about pomp and circumstance. It was weird.
What are going to be the next plans for The Captains after this tour?
Well basically this is the fifth national tour for this album, so this will be the closing of the chapter for this project as we’ve toured this a lot and now we’re basically looking forward to writing the next record. I’m not sure if I mentioned this earlier but our guitarist, Cameron, moved to India for a couple of years.
Oh wow.
Yeah. But it’s exciting because his coming back to Australia to do this tour and thats awesome. It’s still my main project but it’s slightly on the back burner on the creative front because it’s going to be a little hard to rehearsals when he’s in India (chuckles).
What made him go to India.
His wife is a diplomat.
Oh okay!
So she got a amazing posting and they saw it as a great opportunity to hang out in a pretty crazy culture for three years. I’m sure it’ll be awesome for his music and it’ll probably deeply influence the next Captains record as well. We might make the record.....Rajistan or something (laughing)
A bollywood soundtrack?
Yeah, that’ll be fun. As long as we did a bollywood film clip. That would be hilarious!
So it’s still the main project but it’s essentially the end of touring for this project. And we will be starting writing next.
You mentioned earlier that you’ve been working with Elixir again, can you tell us a bit more on whats happening on that front?
Well Elixir has always been the side project kind of fit in other projects but now I’ve decided to make it one of my main priorities, mainly because my creative muse has lead me to that point and we’ve essentially written a record. We’ve got eleven new tunes ready to go. We’re recording in April. We’re working on a world première collaboration for the Brisbane festival in September which is going to be awesome.
Whats that collaboration involving?
I don’t know if I can let that cat out of the bag, they haven’t announced the program yet. Basically it’s going to be these new Elixir tunes being choreographed by this choreographer from America with a dance company of five premièring a new collaborative piece in September.
That sound really cool. When it comes to writing for the different bands, do you have a different way for writing for the different projects? The way you’ve written for Elixir is it different to writing for The Captains or for George?
Yeah, every song is different like every friend is different. There is a space I go to with each project that I can’t really describe but I know when I’m there. But it’s also dependent on the collaborators. I do a lot of co-writing. The Elixir record is completely co-written between myself and my husband Zac and Steven and Tom Shatcock so it’s a real collaborative process. So everythings different.
I read once where you said you preferred to write alone, but obviously in recent years you’ve done a lot more collaborating, has it become more easier?
I used to prefer writing on my own but I’ve enjoyed being inspired and challenged by co-writing. I think co-writing is really awesome to do but I would only recommend doing it after you’ve spent a good solid five or ten years writing on your own. I guess you don’t want to be overtly influenced by your co-writer, you’ve got to have a sense of what you are and what you’re bringing to a song. But initially I didn’t like co-writing out of fear because i was kind of scared of it. But after a few initial co-writes, I loved it and really enjoy co-writing.
Do you have a wish list of people you’d like to write with?
Tim Finn. And that ones been ticked off. That was amazing to write with Tim. I’d love to write with Joni Mitchell or Elvis Costello.
I reckon Elvis Costello would be amazing.
Yeah, he’s coming in April so I’ll have to hit him up. (chuckles)
You should! How does a song start for you? Is a lyric, a melody, a piece of music?
Every song is different, sometimes its just a chord progression, sometimes it’s a melody, sometimes it’s a lyric. It’s generally easier for me to start with a melody. Its generally where they come from. Sometimes it’s a chordal progression, so yeah, everyone’s different.
What else do you aim to do in music? You’ve achieved a lot over the years, is there something that makes you go “Geez I really want to do that!”
I just want to keep on building up mad, exciting ideas and try to make them happen. I do like the idea of working more and more in a theatre sense. Collaborating with dancers or with the circus or with actors, whatever it is, just kind of building up more multi arts, where music is apart of it but not all of it.
But those things cost a lot of money so I guess I’ll be dreaming up ideas and finding funding and stuff like that.
Fair enough, Do your boys Dexter and Jonah realise they have musical parents?
They do, they grow up in a house with no TV so there’s only instruments and books. I guess they know thats different to other people’s houses. But, children only know what they’re grow up and they know we’re their parents and what we do. Dexter has been around the world three times and he’s five, so that’s pretty awesome. And Jonah know I made my first solo album with him inside my tummy. I think my last vocal was at about 32 weeks or something! But for them thats just normal, it’s all they know.
Are they themselves musically inclined?
They’re very musical, deeply creative people. Which I think it is because they don’t spend time in front of computer games and television, also they are instinctively creative.
So is there a possibility down the track we’re going to see The Katie Noonan Family Band?
ooooh, that would be amazing.......who knows, I made an album with my mum, I’ve obviously made albums with my brother, but...that would be so surreal!
Dexter is an amazing drummer.
Oh really?

Yeah he’s incredible. He hasn’t had that intuition bashed out of him from television. But no, I don’t think that will happen (laughs).
One last question for you Katie, what’s your biggest guilty pleasure at the moment?
Well usually I would say a big bold Barossi Valley Shiraz but I’m doing dry February. Which is very boring. Its day two.
Hows that going for you?
Day two of twenty eight, not that I’m counting! That’s usually my weakness.
You’ll have to find something else this month to substitute.
Yeah, well it’s meant to be yoga so we’ll see!
[we get the wind up- one minute to go]
Well thats timed nicely then. Thanks so much for having a chat today. Can’t wait to see out on tour in the next couple of months.
Yeah awesome. Ok thanks. [kids are yelling in the background] Gotta go take care.
Katie Noonan and The Captains are out on tour in March. For details head to her website.
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