Catriona Shaw is a multi-talented artist and musician, she is from Scotland but lives in Berlin now. You might recognize her from her work as lead singer of Queen of Japan or as part of the duo Hektor und Rositha. Most recently she has been hitting the scene solo as Miss le Bomb bringing her programmed beats and coordinated outfits to welcoming audiences across the globe.
I caught up with Catriona along Oranienstraße recently and she told me some things. She also slipped me this exclusive unreleased track to add to your collection. It’s a cover of “Islands in the Stream,” as made famous by Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers in 1983.
JW: What is one of your favorite sounds and what does it mean to you?
CS: I would have to say the sound of bricks (red ones mostly) being dropped on each other or at least toppling on each other… It makes a kind of dull heavy ringing sound but also soft and crumbly… something about it just makes me happy. There is one particular scene in the Blues Brothers, quite near the beginning, when Carrie Fisher blows up the apartment building that Elwood and Jake are living in. The whole thing tumbles to the ground and they, immortal souls that they are, survive and break out of a heap of bricks - you can hear the sound I love very well in this clip.
JW: Tell me about one of your most cherished records and why it is so important to you.
CS: It’s probably my Nancy & Lee record with a beige/brown toned cover which used to belong to my father. He gave it to me when I asked him for it ‘cos I’d always been fascinated by the ugliness of the cover then found out I quite liked the musical content. I think I like it so much because its a record my Dad bought in the 60s trying to be cool but in actual fact not having much knowledge of the current pop music at that time - I like the idea of trying to fit in but actually your personality just getting the better of you in the end - he never listened to the record cos he was never really interested in that kind of music. Ah those teenage years and the insecurity…
JW: What is the stupidest, most ridiculous, most sexist comment/joke you have ever heard?
CS: That is one of the most difficult questions… I actually haven’t got a clue right now what the stupidest would be!? Probably a horrible pop lyric like that one in the Bryan Adams song “When you can see the unborn children in her eyes, you really know you love a woman…” There are some really terrible jokes about women, like the one about what do you call a woman with two brain cells? Pregnant… There we go - babies again.
Download: Miss le Bomb - Islands in the Stream