KATCHAFIRE, whose band name is an appropriation of The Wailers’ hugely influential 1973 record, Catch A Fire, have become one of the world’s most embraced proponents of reggae music. Natives of Hamilton, on the north island of New Zealand, the seven-piece group are returning to their Australian fans for a run of shows in August and September. Lead vocalist and guitarist LOGAN BELL explains to NICK MILLIGAN why, after 15 years, the group want to infuse the traditionally Jamaican genre with more of their homegrown culture.
Have you always received a warm welcome from Australian fans?
We’ve been blessed ever since the first time we came to Australian shores, with a lot of Kiwis being in Aussie, but also a lot of reggae lovers.
‘Irie’ is your new single and I believe in Jamaican it means ‘excellent’. Why was it the best name for your Australian tour?
For us, it’s about fun and getting back to see our loved ones and the friends we’ve met in Australia, and the friends we are going to make. That’s what we mean by the ‘Irie’ tour – it’s about good vibes.
Has the popularity of reggae remained strong around the world or has it had ups and downs since you guys formed in 1997?
I think it’s just gone from strength to strength. When we first started it was definitely a lot harder – it was hard to get onto commercial radio. But reggae is a huge world genre and I’m amazed that every part of the world we go to loves reggae, from Poland to Egypt to Dubai. These places all love a bit of reggae, good vibes – irie vibes!
You’re a very hardworking band. How many shows would you have played since releasing your fourth record, On The Road Again, in 2010?
I would say… close to 300. I would say we average 100 shows a year – it just trips me out thinking about that.
Katchafire formed as a Bob Marley tribute act. How did you start writing original songs?
[Original music] was an afterthought – definitely a natural evolution. Some of the guys were writing before the tribute band, but the tribute band brought us together and gave us a good grounding and schooling in roots reggae – the genre that we love. We got to play great songs every night from the greatest reggae artist that ever lived. A year into playing bars and nightclubs around our home city, we started writing our own music and going abroad a bit more.
Is writing reggae songs a similar to process other genres of music? And is it true that there are five songwriters in Katchafire?
At the start there were two [songwriters] and now the rest of the band get in on the fun. [Writing reggae] is a similar process [to other genres]. Most of the writing is broken down to a guitar or a keyboard – for most melodies the weapon of choice is the guitar. A lot of the songs are written on the road, at gigs or downtime in airports, hotels. A lot of the ideas start on the road, then we take them into the studio and refine them a little bit more. We just let it happen naturally.
Katchafire have started work on album number five. Do you have any clear ideas about how you want it to sound?
The boys aren’t too much for sitting around and conceptualising, we’re more emotionally driven and feel our way a bit more. Because there are five songwriters we have a massive pool of creativity to choose from. That works in our favour. But because there are so many writers it’s hard to pull together an underlying theme, so we’ve started thinking a little bit about that. The thing we came up with, to have in the back of our minds when being creative, is to think about who we are as a [New Zealand] people and how unique it is [compared] to the rest of the world. We see our home as a very special place, and our culture as well. It’s inspiration to draw from. So we want to bring that through in the music as well. I think that’s the reason why we want to bring our New Zealand-ness out more in the songwriting.
In what ways does your Kiwi heritage already make you different to reggae bands from other corners of the globe?
We are very unique [as a culture] and maybe our past albums haven’t showed that as much. But in terms of the sound we are definitely unique in the fact that we like to sing a lot and harmonise. We’re very heavy on three-part harmonies [and] singing good melodies. That’s one point of difference from other reggae territories. But we try to stay very pure to our roots – roots reggae.
Katchafire perform at the Cambridge Hotel, Newcastle on Sunday, September 23, 2012.