Billy Joel seems like one of the least likely pop musicians to write a diss track, but if he ever did take to his piano with the intent of spitting venom don’t be surprised if his target is Katie Kate.
So why does the former Mr. Christie Brinkley have beef with one Seattle’s few female MCs?
During Joel’s last stop in town a few weeks ago a maitre d’ at a restaurant accidentally gave him a window seat. This made it easy for passersby on the street to identify the celebrity in their midst which did not make the Piano Man happy. That maitre d’ was, you guessed it, Katie Kate.
“He ended up giving me the Billy Joel stink eye,” Katie Kate (real name Katie Finn) told me with a laugh during an interview over coffee earlier this week.
Her recent brush with fame might be an indication of bigger things to come for this local beatmaker and rapper. While she isn’t a household name yet, Katie Kate has slowly been winning over fans with some high-profile performances including a set at last month’s Ladies Night at Neumos, a spot at 2009’s Go! Machine and an upcoming performance at Sunday’s Ear Candy Birthday Bash at Nectar Lounge.
Her lyrics contain themes of independence, feminism and feeling free to be yourself all delivered over dance-friendly beats. Take for example her latest track “Bodyout Princess.” The song features Katie Kate singing over a slow and winding futuristic sounds with sparse beats that’s a small bit reminiscent of Sir Mix A Lot’s “Romantic Interlude” but with more singing and less seduction.
“It’s different than anything else I’ve done musically,” she said. “It’s about feeling okay to dance by yourself and have your experience by yourself. Basically the inspiration is that you’re at a show and you’re really just trying to enjoy the music and dance and some dude comes and tries to dance up on you and it ruins your time.”
Like most local rappers, Katie Kate is not just skilled in the rhyme-writing department. She spent the past several years at Cornish College of the Arts where she received a degree in classical piano last week, which means if Billy Joel ever does write that diss track Katie Kate could fight back by taking to tickling the ivories herself. Those would be some dueling pianos well worth watching.
Now that she’s completed her classical music studies she’s ready to take on a different musical challenge.
“I’ve been in music school, which has taken up almost all of my time, so I haven’t been able to focus on anything else,” she said “Now I’m free and I’m really excited about committing myself fully to hip hop.”
As a farm girl from upstate New York, Katie Kate grew up listening to hip hop ranging from pop radio staples Nelly and T.I to underground names like A Tribe Called Quest and Blackalicious. She also studied classical music, which brought her to Cornish (she originally entered Cornish with the intent on studying classical flute). Upon moving to Seattle she befriended Terry Radjaw before he gained fame with Mad Rad and Fresh Espresso and a rising local hip-hop star was born.
“When I came to Seattle I met Gregory (Terry Radjaw) and he was a rapper and I started hanging out with him,” she recalled. “One day I was like ‘Hey I like rap and I can maybe do that,’ and he just totally called me out on my shit and said ‘Well do it.”
The result was “Ice Cream Social,” which led to Katie Kate starting to take rapping more seriously and Radjaw becoming her DJ.
“I made the beat for ‘Ice Cream Social’ and I threw a rap over it and I emailed it to Gregory. He was like, ‘Where did this come from? Get over here.’ … So that’s sort of how it started. It was a way for me to keep myself sane (while studying classical piano) and it let me do what I really enjoyed doing.”
She’s since worked on her own music as well as helped out elsewhere when asked (she appeared on the original take of Mad Rad’s “Sexy Bicycle”). She said she’s felt pressure to be known as Seattle’s version of Duffie or Lady Sovereign, but Katie Kate’s not having it.
“I think people see a lot of potential in me to go a lot of different directions and that people want to turn me into many things. But I want to be in charge of what I’m saying,” she said. “For me the true essence of hip hop is being genuine and I really want to be true to myself.”
That just goes to show that Katie Kate is comfortable being herself no matter who she upsets, even if it’s Billy Joel.
