Kate Fagan

Vocalist and songwriter Kate Fagan, who also fronts the Chicago ska outfit Heavy Manners, co-established the Disturbing Records imprint specifically to issue her first solo single in 1981. Captured Tracks later assembled every surviving solo recording from that decade on the 2023 archival set I Don't Wanna Be Too Cool (Expanded Edition).

After passing time in New York amid the height of disco and its attendant pretentious, superficial milieu, Fagan settled in Chicago during the early '80s. She voiced her reaction to those surroundings in the song “I Don't Wanna Be Too Cool,” which skewers shallow partygoers and materialistic attitudes atop a brisk new wave backing track. While active in the city’s punk community through her band BB Spin, she cut the track and paired it as a 7-inch A-side with the anti-war B-side “Waiting for the Crisis.” The release ranked among the earliest offerings from Disturbing Records, the label she helped create and which would shelter numerous punk and new wave acts throughout the '80s and afterward.

Following the single’s appearance, Fagan concentrated chiefly on Heavy Manners, yet the record found strong regional support in Chicago and quickly exhausted its first pressing of 1,000 copies. She eventually moved to New Orleans while maintaining an ongoing involvement in music. Manufactured Recordings, an affiliate of Captured Tracks, reissued the 7-inch in 2016 together with two previously unheard tracks. Captured Tracks revisited her catalog again in 2023, expanding the original single into a full-length album that incorporated four additional unreleased songs originally composed for her rock opera The Kissing Concept. The expanded collection appeared in both digital formats and a limited vinyl edition during February 2023.