Katy Hurt is a UK born country singer with the added experience of spending her childhood in the US. Growing up with country music all around her, it was inevitable that her own music journey would lead her back to the music she loved.
Catching up just as the warm weather hit the UK (finally) earlier this year, Hurt and I spoke about her slot on the Café Nero stage at Black Deer festival, her new song ‘Oh Girl’ and why its message is so important to everyone.
On the back of headlining the Café Nero stage at Black Deer Festival, Kent, Hurt remembers how packed out the tent was and how many people showed up to watch them play. “We had a full tent and it was really nice,” she says about the set, “I think because it was the tent that everybody went to to relax, meant that the vibe was just really lovely.”
Black Deer festival was also a weekend where Hurt got to watch one of her idols, Sheryl Crow. “The moment our set finished I was like sprinting across the field because I wanted to be front row for Sheryl Crow,” Hurt says about her mission to get to the barrier for the set, “she is someone that I look up to and have just been heavily influenced by.”
As Hurt settles into her identity as an artist, she observes those that inspire her in a different way than she used to. “I love her musicianship,” she says about Crow, “I love the way that she just trades instruments every song and knows exactly what everybody's doing on stage… that was kind of mesmerising and just made me want to go home and start working harder I think than I have ever before.”
“It’s one of the things that I both love and hate about seeing other gigs,” Hurt says about struggling to be in the moment at gigs, “I'm half there just like freaking out fangirling and half just writing lists of jobs to do for myself, because it does, it lights that fire. It makes you want to get better every time.”
Having navigated her headline slot during a festival that was definitely on the soggy side – she still has the mud on her guitar case - and working through rehearsals tirelessly beforehand Hurt remembers being beside her parents and soaking in Sheryl Crow’s performance, “I think the moment that was done, I felt such a sigh of relief,” she says about finishing up her set, “my mum actually managed to get a video of me and my dad…we were watching Shell Crow. Just like, I think I fully was just vibing. Super, super fun. So yeah, definitely enjoyed the festival as both a performer and a fan.”
It's not all glam being a headliner, and this festival was definitely one to stay humble at. “It's so funny. I mean, I think it's such a misconception that being a musician is glamorous,” she laughs as she recounts her experience, “Especially when it comes to festivals… You can't put anything on the ground because the ground is wet… we ended up walking back to our car, which was like a mile and a half away. It was when the heavens just opened. And I actually have a video that my mum took of me and the band with all of our like hoods up, gear in hand, just like, Saturday night headliners.”
“But I think, you know, that's the kind of stuff that you remember as well. Like you do remember the ridiculous nature of some of the situations you put yourself in. Most of the time you're just changing in the bathroom. Like you're going into the little venues, tiny bathroom, because they don't even have a backstage that you can put stuff in and you're just changing in a cubicle. So I've gotten very good at changing in awkward situations.”
Hurt’s latest song, ‘Oh Girl,’ is the fifth single from her upcoming album which she is yet to reveal the name of. The album was recorded in January and February 2020, live room style with Hurt and her band, just weeks ahead of Hurt playing C2C in London. And, well, we all know what happens next. March 2020 we all went into lockdown.
“I held onto it and I didn't know what to do with it and we couldn't even finish it really because we hadn't been able to do any of the photo shoots for the artwork. We still needed to record the strings and we hadn't been able to get them into the studio in time. So there was a bunch that just still needed to be done, but we just couldn't do. And so I held onto it for a long time and then I think maybe October 21, I released the first single.”
Hurt has been slowly releasing singles ever since, with ‘Oh Girl’ being the most recent. “I’m so desperate to give this music to people,” she says about her work, “but being an independent artist and doing this completely by myself, navigating what has happened in the last four years in music, was incredibly difficult.”
Doing what she can to save on expenses – and therefore invest back in her music – Hurt has taken to holding her photoshoots in her own home. “’The Kiss’ is taken in my conservatory,” she says about her album artwork, “and ‘What Have You Got To Lose’ was taken in our basement after it flooded.”
Inspired by one of her friends, ‘Oh Girl’ explores the complexities of following your own advice. “It’s easy to write songs about what you can tell your friends and it's easy to put it on paper when somebody asks you a question, but to actually listen to it and to actually do it is really hard.”
After her friend struggled with depression and anxiety, Hurt found herself battling with her own ability to appreciate and support them. “I could not understand it,” she opens up, “it just didn't make any sense to me. Her life from the outside was so perfect.”
“And then over the past couple of years, I have struggled with some of those things myself and realised exactly why she was thinking the way that she was thinking. I know exactly how easy it is for life to seem great on the outside, but you're really struggling and it's okay. Everybody feels that way.”
“I want people to listen to this when they're in the car and they're just taking a minute, you know? I don't know whether other people do that, but sometimes when I'm on a long drive and I'm thinking too much because I have nothing else to do except think and drive, it's nice when a song comes on that you can just, it feels like it fits the moment.”
‘Oh Girl’ was cowritten with Murray Pulver, Gab Schapka and Rihanna Ray-Sage and sits as a deliberate thought-provoking song on Hurt’s eclectic album. “I have Pedal Steel on the record,” she says about what we can expect from the album, “I have Strings on the record, we have all sorts of different stuff going on.”
Although we don’t have the album yet, Hurt spoke about the parts of the tracklisting that she could divulge, particularly the significance of the ‘bookends’ of the album – the first and last track.
“The track listing was decided by how many songs would fit onto each side of a vinyl,” Hurt shares about the initial arrangements, “the first song actually is It starts with a riff which is kind of kicks you in straight away…it’s a true story about me and my band and the things we've done and how we've gotten here and so I think it's a nice place to start.”
“The last track is actually going to be a single, I'm going to put it out later this year. I haven't announced it yet, but it's a duet. And it has one of my favourite artists ever on... to have that vocal on the record, it felt like a really nice way to end…It's a ballad, but it's about two people and how they don't fit together, but they try anyway.”
Having handwritten the tracks onto pieces of paper and laying them out to get a feel for the album, Hurt and the band spent a lot of time moving them around to work out which arrangement flowed the best. “We would look at it and be like, having now recorded this one, maybe that can't go there, maybe that needs to go here,” she says about the significance of the track listing, “so there was a lot of thought that went into flow.”
‘Oh Girl’ is deeply personal for Katy Hurt and holds a lot of meaning to her. The importance of getting this track and its overarching message out to the world weighs heavy for her and she has a parting message to anyone who’s going through it – whatever it may be…
I hope you know that - and I don't say this because I know it sounds like a postcard or a self -help thing – but it gets better. Like it is not serious, it's not permanent. And as someone who has been there myself and who has watched close friends go through it, I know how hard it is to see the big picture. But one of the reasons why I really felt it was important that we put this song out as a single was because I wanted to remind people of that. And there are people you can go to for help. So please, if you need help, reach out and ask for it.
Keep up to date with Katy Hurt and her upcoming shows and music through her website
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