Right now, learning to play Brazilian percussion is one of many to-dos for The Cat Empire, ahead of 50+ performances on the tail of their ninth studio album, Where the Angels Fall.
As the ARIA award-winning band moves into a third decade, they’re committed to evolving while holding onto their energetic essence.
In 2021, Ryan Monro (bass, backing vocals) retired from the group, followed by Harry James Angus (trumpet, vocals), Will Hull-Brown (drums), and Jamshid “Jumps” Khadiwhala (turntables, percussion) in April 2022. The band, in their original form, had their final group show at Bluesfest Byron Bay 2022.
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Felix Riebl (lead vocals, percussion) remains with another original member, Ollie McGill (keyboards, backing vocals), to beckon in a new era.
“I met Olly when I was 13 years old,” Riebl says, “His mum had dropped him off. He was the same age, and we barely said hello. I was looking for musicians to put a band together, and someone told me there was this amazing musician from another school in another part of town. I somehow got his phone number, called him up, and he came over.”
The teenagers started a band, and in the years following, they’ve been “putting bands together and dreaming up bands.” Today, they’re bringing the band central to their lives into “a new place.”
“Our relationship has been based around music. We don’t need to say too much to each other to understand what we should do. When members of the band were going to move on, it just took a conversation [between us]. Instead of breaking up the band, it was a natural process to be like: there’s too much for us to explore. We’ve been doing it since we were 13 years old. Let’s have a new adventure together.”
New talent joins them for the next iteration of the band: award-winning musical force Grace Barbe, hailing from the Indian Ocean islands of the Seychelles on bass and vocals. Cuban-born trumpeter and vocalist Lazaro Numa joins long-time tinmen Ross Irwin and Kieran Conrau in the Empire Horns.
To Cat Empire fans, Daniel Farrugia’s drumming won’t be unfamiliar. He’s toured with the band multiple times and is one of the most exciting and in-demand live and studio drummers in Australia.
Finally, bolstering the percussion section is Neda Rahmani – a dear friend of The Cat Empire whose love of language and community has connected her to Afro and Brazilian drumming cultures in Australia and around the world.
Their first album together, released in August, features 75 musicians and 49 instruments in total. By July, its singles Thunder Rumbles, Rock’n’Roll and Money Coming My Way collectively amassed over 1 million streams.
“There’s new energy, new personalities on stage, some of the same personalities, but the band’s spirit is the same,” says Riebl.
“As is creating a sense of excitement, surprise and musical diversity with real intent with our amazing audience. They’re an extra member of the band, in a way.”
The album celebrates The Cat Empire’s international reach by spanning and referencing a plethora of global sounds: Afro-Cuban, flamenco, Brazilian, West African, reggae, dub, New Orleans jazz, soul, rock & roll, ’90s house, classical, film score, mariachi, Polynesian, and reggae-ton.
“It’s a vibrant, colourful, overflowing album,” Riebl says, with each song designed as a world of its own. The band layered the production process; for instance, some songs started by recording a Brazilian street percussion ensemble and building the remainder of the tract from that base.
One song, Owl, has “an epic flamenco moment” with a “blazing” trumpet solo following the final chorus for the last section of the song. “I think it’s probably the most ambitious epic sound that we’ve ever managed to record.”
In the current of change comes grief – and hope, too. During this transitional period for the band, Riebl faced immense loss, as his little brother battled and died from cancer. The album was born from his personal grief and realising music as “a form of survival and renewal.”
In this, the album’s approach holds purpose, as Riebl explains, “the combination of everything terrible and wonderful and banal turns into a song. This album is full of life for that reason.” Be With You Again, a song written for his brother, opens up with a drum break after the climax, toward an intangible moment of joy.
Riebl anticipates the album’s dynamic layers transferring to the stage and beyond with “spectacular” experiences through continuing to build up songs live, with potential for band members to rove in the crowd (hence, their current commitment to Brazilian percussion).
The band recently announced an Australian tour prior to a 28-date tour of North America at the end of 2023 and a 23-date UK/EU tour in early 2024. Tickets are on sale for Sydney, Byron Bay, Brisbane, Adelaide and Melbourne for five shows between September 15 and October 6.
“The Cat Empire is here to celebrate something, to bring an audience together out of their everyday,” he says. “That’s what we do.”
To get tickets to the upcoming tour and find out more, head here.
