As we grow older, we learn that the idea of "teen angst" was kind of a myth. The dark shit remains. The desire to self-destruct barely abates. It was never "just a phase." Morgan and Mercedes Lander, who documented their own teenage angst with their band Kittie, have taken this sentiment into adulthood, and distilled it into something more sophisticated.
"I'd call it 'refined angst,'" says Mercedes, "and I'm trademarking that."
The Lander sisters formed Kittie in London, Ontario, aged 12 and 14. Though limited by age, experience and circumstance, their talent for transposing the urgent emotions of adolescence was boundless. At the turn of the new millennium, they released their debut album, Spit, which — thanks in part to its infectious single "Brackish" — went on to become one of the unlikeliest hits of the early 2000s.
With its raw intensity, driving melodicism and industrial embellishments, Spit scored Kittie a legendary slot at Ozzfest and a gold record, all while the members were still in high school. This was not just the story of teenage angst. This was not just a passing phase. This was history in the making. Kittie helped define the soon-to-be-dominant nu-metal style and paved the way for women in the heavy-music space going forward.
So, why haven't they been treated in kind?
Having grown up in the music industry, the Lander sisters have been subject to a volatile, highly mutable and often exploitative business. When they started in the late Nineties, selling a few million records would have secured them a flash lifestyle. But now, in the age of Spotify, their millions of streams only bring home a few-hundred bucks. The cost of touring has also become extortionate, with many bands today failing to break even. In most cases, it's no longer feasible for mid-tier acts to sustain a music career.
After almost three decades in the industry, six studio albums and several lineup changes, the Landers finally put Kittie on hiatus in 2013. They went back to their families, their day jobs, their quiet, civilian lives — all the while failing to truly disentangle themselves from the band. Later, in 2017, they released a documentary, Kittie: Origins/Evolutions, which paid tribute to their winding career. Unable to close the door on Kittie, they left it slightly ajar — just in case.
And then, it happened. After the pandemic, nu-metal — the ultimate soundtrack to teen angst — experienced something of a revival among the youth on TikTok, who were discovering the genre for the first time. Kittie's songs went viral on the app. Post-genre pop-metal auteur Poppy carried their torch by covering "Spit" last year. Touring and festival bookers came calling. Sumerian Records did, too.
Though they'd sat with the idea of remaining a legacy band, Sumerian offered them the second chance they'd learned to stop hoping for. Fire, Kittie's first studio album in 13 years, is the result: a blaze of refined angst that encompasses every iteration of the band, from their nu-metal beginnings ("We Are Shadows") and death-metal- inflected expressions ("Eyes Wide Open") to their more melodic and textural late-career sound ("One Foot in the Grave").
Revolver spoke to the Lander sisters about growing up in the spotlight, embracing their nu-metal legacy and turning their angst into fire on Kittie's incendiary new album.
I wanted to start out pretty broadly because I think as a band, when people write about you, there's an overemphasis on Kittie's beginnings. So, let's throw this out to you: What are the core moments in your evolution as a band that haven't really been spoken about enough?
MERCEDES LANDER I can tell you one right now, and that is the entrance of [guitarist] Tara [McLeod] and [bassist] Ivy [Jenkins]. Tara has been in the band for 20 years. Ivy has been in the band since 2007. They absolutely overshadow everyone else that's been in the band by decades. And they don't get talked about enough. Like, let's give credit where credit is due. The two of them have been here for the long haul, and they've stuck it out for a really long time.
MORGAN LANDER Yeah. I would venture to say, as well, that the later albums in our career are some of our most accomplished work, as far as musicianship and writing.
MERCEDES Creatively.
MORGAN Yeah, creatively. And I think those things also don't get talked about enough, because — I don't want to say they were in the sunset of things — but, you know, they were later albums for us; not piggybacking on the early 2000 nu-metal hype. I mean, we've had a really long career with lots of ups and downs. But I think through it all, a lot of the music that we made after our first album doesn't get talked about as much. And that's OK. I think there are people that are still discovering the band as well. And, you know, hopefully this new album will be an opportunity for people to sort of move backwards and hear some of the other stuff.
You hesitated to refer to your later career as a "sunset." But even still, do you consider your new album, Fire, a, well, sunrise?
MORGAN Absolutely. Fire is the second chance that we never thought that we would get. You know, the last few albums that we put out, we toured heavily on them. And when we came back from that last tour [supporting 2011's I've Failed You], we just kind of never did anything again. We did the documentary to put a cap on everything. In a way, it was supposed to be a farewell — but there was always a question mark at the end of it.
At the end of the Origins/Evolutions documentary, you sort of refused to offer a final statement. It seemed like you weren't prepared to close the door on Kittie. Were you ever really able to get closure or to resign yourself to closure?
MORGAN No, I don't think so. And I think that is simply because, especially for Mercedes and I, Kittie is part of our identity. We formed the band when we were 12 and 14 years old, and I'm 42 years old now. For me, there was no point in making a big statement and making a declaration of the band being over if there was ever a chance we could come back. Having that door fully closed, I don't think is ever a possibility for us.
MERCEDES We wanted to keep the door cracked open in case something like what happened in 2022 happened. I feel like completely closing the door would have closed us off to a lot of opportunities.
What happened in 2022?
MERCEDES We got a bunch of show offers: Blue Ridge [Rock Fest], When We Were Young. The offers were coming in at a potentially really interesting time, when we were thinking about maybe going out and playing a couple shows. That was the expectation, that we were just going to play a couple shows and then slink back off into whatever life we had. It's not like we had grander plans of writing a record and signing a record deal. We were like, "Let's just play some shows and have some fun."
Was it ever possible to disentangle your identity from Kittie during that period between 2013 and 2022?
MERCEDES Oh, no.
MORGAN In the period between leaving the last tour that we did in 2012, over the last 10 years, we just sort of moved on — got normal jobs and lives. Some of us started families, got married to our partners. But it really was difficult to divorce those things from Kittie. But also, in entering the normal world, you kind of realize how many people are listening to the band. So, you know, you could go to your normal day job or whatever, but there is a person that might send you a message or an email being like, "Hey, I just wanted to tell you I really loved your band and I've been listening to you." That's really interesting to grapple with.
Why do you think interest in Kittie started to pick back up in 2022?
MERCEDES I think the first thing was the documentary finally being released onto streaming platforms, so people were discovering the band for the first time. And then, there were people that also were like, "Oh, wow, I haven't heard this band forever." Then, of course, with the introduction of TikTok, we had a few songs that went viral. It just got the ball rolling again.
Would you have been content with being a legacy band and just doing legacy projects, or was there an itch to create something new as Kittie?
MORGAN I think we had settled on doing legacy projects. We were planning on keeping the Kittie name alive with the documentary and things like that. The idea of new music was something we never thought of as a possibility, but here we are.
Listening to Fire, I hear a lot of tension and a lot of drama. It makes me wonder what kind of mindset you were in and whether you felt like the stakes had increased now that you'd be given this second opportunity at something you thought may have ended?
MORGAN I think that coming back with new music after such a long hiatus, the first thing you put out has to be important. It's going to be a statement. It's going to be a testament to all the hard work that you've done. And, you know, another foot forward in your band's legacy. But I think underneath all the grandeur and big sounds of this album, there are just four people trying to write an album. You know, when you're away for so long and then you're thrust into creating again, it's a difficult mindset to get back into.
For many of us who grew up listening to metal, we were told it would just be a phase, that it was teenage angst. Now that you're still playing it into your forties, do you think the idea of "teenage angst" holds much weight?
MERCEDES I feel like as you get older, the angst starts to become refined. Yeah, refined angst. Would you agree with that, Morgan?
MORGAN Yeah. Well, I think when you're a young person, a lot of these emotions are very new. You are confronted with the world, and you don't know what to do with yourself. I think a lot of that teen angst feels very unrefined and uncontained. And as you grow up and go out into the world, you know, unfortunately, sometimes you've got to put your mask on and be a normal human being. But that doesn't change the core of your conviction and your feeling. I listen back to some of the first songs that we wrote and that's still me; I'm still that same person. I've gone through the world and the ringer, and the rage definitely becomes quieter.
When you were younger, did you even expect to make it to your forties?
MERCEDES No. I definitely thought I'd be dead by now.
MORGAN I certainly didn't envision myself doing this in my forties back when I was 17 years old. Very early on we just had to take everything day by day. There wasn't really an opportunity to plan for the future or think about what the next 10 years would look like.
MERCEDES Looking back, there was always so much threat of it all being taken away from us so quickly.
Most of us locked ourselves away in our rooms while we went through puberty. You, on the other hand, essentially had to go through it in public. How do you think that affected your growth as people?
MORGAN Well, it's interesting because I feel like a lot of people in bands are not mature. And so, when we were out there in the world as teenage girls, a lot of the grown men around us were still at our sort of stage. I've always felt that being in a band has this strange dichotomy of being forced to grow up very quickly because of the responsibilities placed upon you at a young age, but it also enables you to stay the same age forever.
MERCEDES Yeah, it's like part of us stalled at 15 and 17, and then the other part is an 85-year-old woman.
Looking back, do you feel as though you were sexualized as teenagers?
MORGAN Oh yeah.
MERCEDES You know what's really disgusting? There were so many times where we had to kick journalists off the bus for asking us inappropriate questions. This was at the height of the boy band, the girl band; Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera. And for some reason, that leaked over to us. So we had journalists writing articles that were full of cancel-worthy stuff in this day and age. The things we were asked, the things that were insinuated about us, were absolutely disgusting.
I'm curious to hear about your relationship with nu-metal and whether you ever really identified with that term?
MORGAN I would say yes and no. Like, I certainly can agree that the earliest incarnations of the band were certainly influenced by nu-metal music and nu-metal bands. Our debut came out at a time when nu-metal was huge and we were sort of put in that category, but as we evolved as musicians and as players and as a band, we gravitated away from that sound. I think for me, for a really long time, nu-metal was sort of like a bad word. It's tough when you're associated with a genre that you don't necessarily identify with. But I have learned over time to be proud of having an album that is part of that seminal nu-metal movement. I'm proud of our contribution.
With Fire, I wanted to marry the many identities of Kittie that we've had through-out our career, and so I think that there are some which harken back to some nu-metal ideas, but it's definitely not a nu-metal album.
How long were the songs on Fire marinating before you tracked them in the studio?
MERCEDES We were writing songs basically up to the point of us going into the studio. It just took me saying to Morgan, "Come on over." And then we'd send Dropbox riff ideas to the others. This was the first time we've ever done it that way, without everybody in the same space.
MORGAN And it was a bit of a learning curve for demoing things like that, because for past albums, everyday we'd get together and write the songs. But it came together pretty quickly, within maybe eight or nine months.
What was it like preparing for those first live shows?
MORGAN Mercedes and I started rehearsing at the beginning of last year, and our comeback show at Louder Than Life was in September, so we were practicing for months and months. We hadn't played together as Kittie for, like, five years. And so it was really important for us to start building up our stamina and making sure that we were feeling very comfortable again before we did the practices with the other girls. It was definitely a process relearning the songs. Some of the stuff will never leave our brains after playing them for 25 years. But a lot of it was a slow process.
Now that the new album is about to come out and you're also gearing up for some headlining summer tour dates — what's your mindset like now?
MERCEDES I'm just excited to be able to have this chance. At this point, the super hard work is done — now it's just the fun stuff. Like, we get to go out and play shows and meet new people and see people that we haven't seen in 13 or 14 years. That's the reason why I do this. And this really is our second chance at it.
I'd love to take a moment to reflect on Trish [Doan, the band's former bassist who died in 2017]. Would you feel ok telling me how you're grappling with that loss nowadays?
MORGAN It's something that we think about often. It was just her birthday the other day.
MERCEDES Yeah. I mean, it's really tough. She was a big part of our lives and a really close friend of all of us. And I know that she would have wanted to be a part of this in some way, or would have supported us in some way. You know, it never gets easier, losing someone that close to you. It's been a number of years now. It's hard to believe how much time has passed.
MORGAN Yeah. Sometimes you just have to take the shit you've been through and turn it into fire.
Order Kittie's new album, Fire, on exclusive, limited-edition "orange in red" vinyl at Revolver's shop.
