Kate Nash – The Collapse Board Interview
Out of all the places that you’ve travelled what’s one of your favourite places you’ve been?
KN: Brazil was the most amazing place that I have ever been. It was so beautiful and the people were so beautiful, lovely, warm and friendly to you straight away. I had one of my best days when we went up Sugarloaf Mountain and there was just all these amazing views and nature, it was so stunning. We ended up going out that night because it was the beginning of their carnival season and there were loads of people out dancing. You hear about Brazil being quite sexual, especially with dancing and stuff. I wondered what guys were going to be like towards girls out there. You’d be dancing and guys would come up to you and be like, “Do you want to dance?” and you’d be like, oh no sorry I just want to dance on my own. Then they’re like, “OK” and they dance with someone else. It’s a really free-spirited and non-aggressive culture. I feel like in England, if someone comes up to you and asks you to dance and you say no they’re like, “Fuck you, you bitch! I never wanted you anyway you ugly whore”. It’s classic getting rejected by an insecure guy. If you say “no” he thinks you’re ugly and a slag. In Brazil everyone was just happy all the time and non-threatening. I felt so comfortable there. I love the people. Rio was just amazing.
You’ve been to Dubai as well?
KN: Yeah. That was interesting. I thought I wasn’t going to like it but we had an amazing time. We stayed in one of the most incredible hotels, actually the most incredible hotel I’ve ever seen, it was so decadent. It was stunning. There were little rivers and boats that took you to the restaurant. Amazing fresh food on the beach every day and swimming in the sea and riding on a camel. We were treated so well. Dubai is so new, I’m really into the old, it doesn’t have too much history. I know it has a lot of weird ways of women being treated. My experience of it was being treated really, really well in a decadent hotel so there wasn’t really a way I couldn’t have had a really good time.
I met a few of the young girls at my show, they ran down the front of the stage, I called all of them down. They were so different and cute. I wasn’t allowed to swear in my show. All these girls were like, “Sing Dickhead! Sing Dickhead!” I was like, I actually cant! I wanted to respect the Middle Eastern culture. They were like, “We’ll sing it!” I was like, oh I don’t know if I’ll get in trouble for that. They told me just to sing something else. One girl said, “Just say Pinhead”. So I sang: why are you being a Pinhead for? All these girls were singing it with me. It was really cool because I’d never been there and I’d been making music for five or six years and they wanted that song and I could still sing it to them. It was fun!
What’s one of your favourite songs to sing live currently?
KN: All my new stuff. I played a really tiny show in a 100 capacity venue. I played all of the new stuff. I’m really excited to go tour. This is some of my best work; it’s come to me most instantly, in a really natural way. I feel really excited to get on the road with it and release it.
Is there a theme running through the songs?
KN: Last year was a really difficult year for me emotionally and it’s been really good to get a lot of that out of my system. It’s been really liberating because I don’t care what anyone thinks of me anymore. I feel really liberated by that feeling. It’s kind of bratty in a way, but in a good way, that I don’t care what people think of me anymore! [laughs].
Kate’s blog: My Ignorant Youth
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