Cat Clyde

Cat Clyde, a Canadian singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, weaves roots elements from blues, soul, folk, jump, jazz, and swing throughout her music. Her crystalline contralto delivers each syllable with clarity, lending resonance and depth to her material. The 2017 debut Ivory Castanets attracted attention for pitting youthful vocals against enduring song structures. Hunter’s Trance, issued in 2019 on Cinematic Music Group, placed Clyde in front of a hard-driving garage band across a tracklist that alternated between ballads and barroom rockers. Blue Blue Blue, a stripped-down 2020 collaboration with partner and singer/songwriter Jeremie Albino, presented covers of classic roots songs, while Down Rounder, recorded in six days at a Los Angeles studio with producer Tony Berg and a select group of musicians, reached completion only after Clyde spent more than two years shaping sketches into finished masters.

Born in southwestern Ontario, Clyde relocated with her family at age ten to Perth County near Stratford. The rural setting supplied daily immersion in woods and natural cycles, an experience widely credited for the nature imagery that later surfaced in her writing. At fourteen her family, owners of a local music shop, presented her with a guitar; a neighborhood boy supplied initial guidance, after which she progressed rapidly enough to begin instructing other children at the store. The same shop gave rise to her first band, the Big Wheels, whose members were fellow music tutors. Though the group performed only a handful of dates at fairs and festivals, the exposure helped the naturally reserved Clyde overcome stage shyness and spurred her to write songs more seriously.

She later moved to Stratford, busking through warmer months while studying recording, engineering, and record production at college. Connections made through classmates led her to surf-punk outfit the Shibats, where she served as vocalist and met future partner, singer/songwriter Strummer Jasson. Still a student, Clyde enlisted bassist Steve Clark along with brothers Andrew Fockler on drums and Patrick Fockler as co-producer, guitarist, and keyboardist to record Ivory Castanets. The album’s balanced acoustic and electric arrangements earned Canadian radio play, favorable reviews, and a deal with Cinematic Music Group.

Clyde and Jasson then settled in Quebec to cut the nine-song Hunter’s Trance, released in 2019. Though the backing band went uncredited, the set maintained a careful blend of acoustic and roots-inflected electric instrumentation; the swaggering opener “Bird Bone” and the full-band reading of “The River” drew notice in both Canada and Europe. Clyde toured extensively on both sides of the border, building strong streaming numbers in the United States.

Those activities ceased in March 2020 with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Shortly before returning to their Quebec apartment, Clyde recorded the acoustic collection Good Bones, pulling material from her first two albums; issued on streaming platforms, it reached new listeners and earned praise from previously unfamiliar critics. The couple converted their home into a studio intending to wait out the crisis, yet both soon fell repeatedly ill from non-COVID causes. An environmental test revealed aggressive mold spores throughout the unit, traced by the landlord to a decaying bird’s nest inside the ceiling above their bed. They vacated permanently, relocating instead to Stratford, where they completed Blue Blue Blue using their makeshift setup. The album featured covers ranging from Willie McTell’s “You Were Born to Die” and Bob Dylan’s “Girl from the North Country” to Elizabeth Cotten’s “Freight Train” and A.P. Carter’s “Hello Stranger.”

Throughout the pandemic Clyde possessed a finished set of songs but lacked recording access. After a year of unproductive outreach she contacted producer Tony Berg, whose recent credits included work with Phoebe Bridgers. Working via Zoom, the pair pared the material to essentials before rebuilding it; once Berg’s schedule cleared, Clyde traveled to Los Angeles, where he assembled a band at Sound City Studios. The sessions for Down Rounder lasted six days. Released in February 2023, the woolly yet hook-laden Americana single “Everywhere I Go” attracted attention and carried the album onto streaming charts.