(*both laugh*) Episode 48: The Return of Josh Caterer (Smoking Popes)

The good ship (*both laugh*) keeps sailing along with our 48th episode, and it features one of our only repeat guests to date. He's the owner of one of my favorite voices in the pantheon of punk rock, and he's also one of my favorite songwriters and one of, in my opinion, the most underrated guitar players in the scene. A triple threat!

Anyway, he's the inimitable Josh Caterer, and if you remember back at the beginning of 2021, we chatted about what was to be his first solo release, The Hideout Sessions. It was an album recorded in front of a live stream online audience at an otherwise empty club in Chicago, and it marked the first real appearance of any sort by this particular project, which featured Caterer on guitar and vocals, John Perrin on drums and John San Juan on bass.

To mark the release of that album this spring, the band played an album release show, but because all of the clubs were still closed to the public, they did it via live stream and recorded it as an album...AGAIN! If you're keeping score at home, that makes not one but TWO live albums recorded before actually playing a show in front of an in-person, human audience. The result of that latter show is The SPACE Sessions, due out next week (December 17th) on Pravda Records. It was recorded at - you guessed it - at SPACE in Evanston, Illinois, and like The Hideout Sessions, it features an interesting mix of songs from Caterer's catalog (via Smoking Popes and, yes, Duvall!!!) and some standards that you might otherwise think of as from the big band era, because they were popularized by the likes of Judy Garland and Sammy Davis Jr. and Elvis Presley and, in the case of "At Last," which happens to be my wedding song...Etta James.

The set also closes with Caterer being joined on vocals by his daughter, Phoebe, for an updated take on "Somethin' Stupid," popularized by Frank Sinatra and his own daughter, Nancy. If been even tangentially aware of the punk scene over the course of the last three decades, you're of course aware of a legion of bands that have covered songs from outside the typical punk rock milieu, but they've done them with a fair amount of tongue planted firmly in cheek, as in "oh, isn't it funny/ironic that we're playing this song this way!" Sometimes it works great and sometimes it's a gag that tires after the first few listens, much like a comedy album. What's different about the old standards that Caterer et al., take on is the appreciation that the band has for the source material, paying considerable homage in their modern retellings.

Anyway, I'm rambling (I know, right?)...if you liked The Hideout Sessions, you'll love the SPACE Sessions. I'll add pre-order links when they're available (it'll be available digitally and on CD next weekend but the vinyl will have to wait until...who knows, honestly. Friggin' Adele...).

Catch the Josh Caterer Trio (along with the Sunshine Boys) live and in person:

December 16th at SPACE in Evanston, IL

December 17th at The Lyric Room in Green Bay, WI

December 18th at the Back Room at Colectivo in Milwaukee, WI

https://joshcaterer.bandcamp.com/music

https://sunshineboys.net/

https://www.pravdamusic.com/

(*both laughs*) theme song is an excerpt from [laughs] track "Hurts To Laugh." © KALI MASI 2021 ℗ Take This To Heart Records 2021