On his new EP Kumamoto, Canada-born, Australia-based artist Garrett Kato pays tribute to his Japanese heritage with a powerful look at triumph and trauma, past and present.
Written during the turmoil of 2020 and recorded in his home studio in Byron Bay, the songs were a way of coping with an uncertain future. The EP title, Kumamoto, is a nod to the city where the Kato bloodline began in southern Japan.
“Australia was on fire, and, soon after, a worldwide pandemic hit that changed the world for the foreseeable future,” says Garrett. “I began thinking of what generations before us went through, about my grandparents; victims of internment camps of World War II. How strong people can be, despite overwhelming odds.”
Known for his reflective musings on love, life and vices, singer-songwriter and platinum-award winning producer Garrett Kato’s unique style of folk-pop is catching fire around the globe. A string of powerful releases, including sophomore album hemispheres, has seen him perform sold-out shows alongside Damien Rice and Ziggy Alberts and amass over 65 million worldwide streams.
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The EP’s first single, ‘Be’, was also the fastest song Garrett had ever written and produced. The track is about Garrett’s daughter and the accompanying music video was created using old family home videos.
“When I wrote the song, the world was changing so rapidly, it was hard to not have a level of anxiety and stress daily. It wasn’t until my six-year-old daughter asked why I was so sad, and said I shouldn’t be, because it’s a beautiful day and we are going to play. It was like she pulled me out of this dark maze into a space of calm and tranquillity,’ says Garrett.
This theme of human connection continues into the second single, ‘Firestarter’, co-written with his friend, singer/songwriter Ainslie Wills. “We wrote it over two days with a certain old-time nostalgia in mind for the chords and melodies. The idea behind the song was to create a sense of longing for human connection which was something the world needed in the time of lockdown,” says Garrett.
Third single ‘Never Be Us’ came from a poignant conversation Garrett had with his six-year-old daughter about the Black Lives Matter protests in America. “She didn’t understand why people would treat others differently because of their skin colour or race and said ‘that would never be us.’”
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‘Delusional’ was written with Gordi (Sophie Patton) about Covid-19 conspiracy theories and the mass state of hysteria the world is in. “I had recently seen a documentary about people suffering from schizophrenia and how they would believe things to be true that were delusions,” says Garrett. “Sophie and I came to some conclusions in our discussion that blossomed into the song that we are all slightly delusional from our overconsumption of media and fear-fuelled echo chambers of social media algorithms.”
Of ‘Hard Times’, Garrett says, “The song started from a baritone guitar riff and quickly grew into a narrative of falling away from someone so close. I wrote this with a friend in LA named Jake Newton. It was the first time we met, and we hit it off instantly.”
Finally, ‘Past Life’ explores Japanese beliefs in reincarnation that claim we travel with our loved ones, and even adversaries, through generations and lives. “We are meant to learn a lesson from our time in this life to open ourselves up to a higher place. These were often the words that were spoken to me by my semi-drunk Japanese grandpa on most family get-togethers,” laughs Garrett.
Australian tastemaker triple j dubbed Garrett as the “producer and musician behind some of the most prominent sounds coming out the Byron Bay’s booming buskers scene,” and rightly so; the EP was self-produced by Garrett at his home studio, where he has also worked with a string of artists including Julia Stone, Pete Murray, Tones and I, Kyle Lionhart, Riley Pearce, Pierce Brothers, Jack Botts and more.
