{"title":"The Cat's Miaow","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"songs-94-98","title":"Songs '94-'98","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eSongs ’94-’98\u003c\/em\u003e is a smart selection of material from \u003cstrong\u003eThe Cat’s Miaow\u003c\/strong\u003e, an Australian indie-pop group that gifted their decade with some of its finest songs. Released on World Of Echo, the album draws from the group’s string of excellent seven-inch singles, a small clutch of compilation contributions, and features one previously unreleased song, \"\u003cem\u003eI Take It That We’re Through\u003c\/em\u003e\", recorded in 1998.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003ePart of the burgeoning international pop underground of the nineties, \u003cstrong\u003eThe Cat’s Miaow\u003c\/strong\u003e’s legend has only built over subsequent decades, as more people discover this most quixotic and curious of groups: a recent appearance on A Colourful Storm’s compilation of Australian indie-pop, \u003cem\u003eI Won’t Have To Think About You\u003c\/em\u003e, is testament to their enduring influence. In part emulating the selection of tracks on the 1997 CD-only compilation, \u003cem\u003eSongs For Girls To Sing\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eSongs ’94-’98\u003c\/em\u003e is also the group’s first ever full-length 12” vinyl collection.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe Cat’s Miaow\u003c\/strong\u003e started out in 1992 as a home-recording duo, Bart Cummings (guitar, bass, vocals) and Andrew Withycombe (bass, guitar) taking time out from duties with Girl Of The World and The Ampersands (respectively), knocking out songs on Withycombe’s four-track. Soon joined by Kerrie Bolton (vocals) and Cam Smith (drums), the quartet spent the next five years quietly, slowly working away in the suburbs of Melbourne, recording gem after gem of independent pop.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe Cat’s Miaow\u003c\/strong\u003e were always worldly and stylish, each seven-inch single a refined artifact, each song a peaceable jewel. You could hear some relationships with other music – someone (if not everyone) in \u003cstrong\u003eThe Cat’s Miaow\u003c\/strong\u003e was a Galaxie 500 fan; there’s a minimalism to the playing and melodies that recalls Young Marble Giants, Marine Girls, Beat Happening – but the spirit in these songs is endearingly individualized, the result of a hermetic vision, an ideal of what a simple, unadorned pop song could be.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIt’s not much of a surprise that \u003cstrong\u003eThe Cat’s Miaow\u003c\/strong\u003e found a receptive audience, and no small amount of support, from the networked communities of indie-pop labels and fanatics that developed in the nineties. But they also understood the importance of the local: their first few cassettes reached the world’s mail routes via Wayne Davidson’s legendary Melbourne tape label, Toytown; they turned up on a split single with Davidson’s group, Stinky Fire Engine; they appeared on a tribute cassette for one of Australia’s finest, The Sugargliders, and indeed that’s Josh Meadows of said group playing wah guitar on \"\u003cem\u003eStay\u003c\/em\u003e\".\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eCosmopolitan yet homely, dedicated to their craft, \u003cstrong\u003eThe Cat’s Miaow\u003c\/strong\u003e always felt a little like a group moving in slow motion, using that pace and focus fully to embrace the art of the perfectly stated pop song – every element in place, no flash and no fuss, no excess, just the core of the thing. Few managed to tease such fierce poetry from such understated, elegant means. From Australia or anywhere.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"World of Echo","offers":[{"title":"LP - Black","offer_id":50455037804875,"sku":"1154712","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"LP - Blue","offer_id":51948954943819,"sku":"R0180-4597","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/2255faa2-4ed2-428d-a456-dd8264bed554_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727187723"},{"product_id":"skipping-stones-the-cassette-years-92-93","title":"Skipping Stones: The Cassette Years 92-93","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe Cat’s Miaow return to World Of Echo with \u003ci\u003eSkipping Stones: The Cassette Years ’92-’93\u003c\/i\u003e, their second compilation for the imprint, and the fourth in a loosely defined series of reissues associated with the group (also including The Shapiros’ \u003ci\u003eGone By Fall: The Collected Works of Th\u003c\/i\u003ee \u003ci\u003eShapiros\u003c\/i\u003e and Hydroplane’s \u003ci\u003eSelected Songs 1997-2003\u003c\/i\u003e). It’s a smart selection of songs by one of Australia’s finest independent pop music groups, whose initial run, across the nineties, was as mysterious as it was bewitching. A generous double album featuring thirty-five songs drawn from The Cat’s Miaow’s history, \u003ci\u003eSkipping Stones\u003c\/i\u003e lets listeners in on a bunch more secrets.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAn even deeper pass through the archives of The Cat’s Miaow,\u003ci\u003e Skipping Stones\u003c\/i\u003e is a welcome follow-up to 2022’s \u003ci\u003eSongs ’94-’98,\u003c\/i\u003e which pulled together material from seven-inch singles and compilations. Diving into the four cassettes that the group released over a two-year period, \u003ci\u003eSkipping Stones\u003c\/i\u003e is full of surprises, rich with unexpected and inspired detours, while reminding everyone just how clear and distinct The Cat’s Miaow’s music was from the very start. Looking in from the outside, they always felt like a group that knew just what they were doing, but intuitive as they are, they weren’t forcing anything: these songs always sound exactly what they need to be, rough edges, playful moments and all.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIt's also a fascinating snapshot of one arm of the ‘international pop underground’. While they were clearly listening to music from the US, UK and elsewhere – there are glimpses of Galaxie 500, Spacemen 3, Beat Happening, and The Pastels in some of the songs here – The Cat’s Miaow also feel, consciously or not, part of a continuum of Australian underground pop that takes in The Particles, The Lighthouse Keepers, The Cannanes, The Honeys, Even As We Speak, and The Sugargliders (who they would cover several times). Like those before them, The Cat’s Miaow balanced opposing forces in their music: naivete and knowingness; fragility and strength; worldliness and world-weariness; play and seriousness; heartache and pleasure.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe four cassettes that\u003ci\u003e Skipping Stones\u003c\/i\u003e draws from – \u003ci\u003eLittle Baby Sour Puss, Pet Sounds \u003c\/i\u003e(both 1992), \u003ci\u003eFrom My Window\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eHow Did Everything Get So Fucked Up\u003c\/i\u003e (both 1993) – were released or assisted by Toytown, a Melbourne cassette label of rare taste, savvy and intelligence, run by Wayne Davidson. Toytown felt like the perfect early home for The Cat’s Miaow, their cassettes rubbing shoulders in the label’s catalogue with brilliant groups like Sukpatch, The Ah Club, Kitty Craft, and Land Of The Loops. The local context is just as important, too, with The Cat’s Miaow sharing their time and creative vision with friends in The Ampersands, Stinky Fire Engine, Girl Of The World, Super Falling Star, Pencil Tin and The Sugargliders. And cassettes were an important form of exchange – cheap, easy to reproduce, not too expensive to send interstate or overseas, they were the most accessible DIY format for any group starting to spread the word about their noise.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll of this is to say, the thirty-five songs here landed in several different contexts, national and international, which goes part-way to explaining the group’s curious cosmopolitanism, the style and spirit in their sound. The Cat’s Miaow may have been bedroom dreamers, but their songs were richly informed, with the sweetest of girl-pop moves sashaying into walls of tremolo-d and distorted guitar, jangling six strings tangling with melodic bass that’s pure Peter Hook\/Naomi Yang, while the gentle trickle of a drum machine or the earthy twitch of brushes on drum skins provided the spine for Kerrie’s and Bart’s lovely, unforced singing.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThere are a clutch of gorgeous songs here that would reappear in a different form on later releases, classics like “The Phoebe I Know”, “Third Floor Fire Escape View”, “Not Like I Was Doing Anything” and “You Left A Note On The Table”, but plenty of other magic too, all of it finding its way to vinyl for the first time (some tracks appeared on compact disc via the compilations \u003ci\u003eA Kiss and A Cuddle\u003c\/i\u003e [Bus Stop, 1996] and \u003ci\u003eSongs\u003c\/i\u003e \u003ci\u003eFor Girls to Sing\u003c\/i\u003e [Drive-In, 1997]). Remarkably, The Cat’s Miaow have also recently released a split single with Rocketship featuring newly recorded material and returned to the stage for their second-ever gig.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBut this double LP on World Of Echo feels like the very core of the thing – some of the most heartbreakingly beautiful, effortlessly lush and deeply moving pop music you’re likely to hear.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"World of Echo","offers":[{"title":"Black LP","offer_id":50498342977867,"sku":"2185530","price":27.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/Cats_Miaow_-_Skipping_Stones__The_Cassette_Years_92-_71764746_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727745311"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/fr\/collections\/the-cats-miaow.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}