Over the years, the demo tape for Priceless Innuendo—which Cath kept after the recording sessions ended, and which lived for a while at the bottom of a suitcase after she relocated to Chicago in 1990—attained a kind of mythical status. Did it exist? What did the songs sound like? Would they ever come to light? Miaow fans were tantalized when “Carnal Drag” and “Fear of the Sun” appeared on the When It All Comes Down compilation. Those songs had been pulled ... << MORE >>

Microphones on both sides of the glass lead to a small discussion detailing a few Miaow matters in which Cath Carroll gives listeners a glimpse into her 80s Factory Records band.

Priceless Restoration
A cassette containing demos of the never-was Factory Records album by Miaow, dubbed "Priceless Innuendo" in 1987, is restored and available from Lilypad Records this Valentine's Day here.

Songs include:

• Marry Me Dusty ...

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Over the course of a few weekends in the fall of 1987, Miaow, a British indie band led by singer and songwriter Cath Carroll, holed up in a Victorian building in the South London district of Elephant and Castle to record a set of 8-track demos of songs intended for its debut album on Factory Records. The working title for the album was Priceless Innuendo, a phrase drawn from the broadly slapstick Carry On movies of the 1950s and ’60s, which in turn borrowed their humor from classic English music hall comedy. Listen to When It All Comes Down, a compilation of the band’s singles and radio sessions released in 2003, and you can hear echoes of music hall acts, torch songs, film noir soundtracks, Northern soul, and punk. Cath and the band—bassist Ron Caine, drummer Chris Fenner, and keyboardist Joe Korner —handily drew from a century of English culture, incorporating long-forgotten musical elements into their own unique pop constructions.

“She’s In Our Bed,” (media available here) which Cath describes as “vaudeville-disco,” has a spoken-word rap about a ménage a trois. The Pet Shop Boys would have been proud. -Peter Terzian (liner notes excerpt)<< MORE >>

Cath Carroll continues working on new material that will be released on Lilypad Records. ...<< MORE >>

Cath Carroll’s annual holiday song features her adaptation of the more obscure words to the poem,
‘A Visit from St Nicholas’ by Clement Clark Moore (1823).

Wishing you & yours the happiest of holidays!
Cath & Kerry | Lilypad Records

Visit from St. Nicholas
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny rein-deer
With a little old driver, so lively and ... << MORE >>

In May of 2000, Cath Carroll The Band was deep into the prep work needed for releasing Cath's third solo album titled Glommer. To our surprise, we found ourselves engaged in a record deal negotiation with indie label Heart & Soul Records after we had planned on self-releasing. Of course, in 2000, the notion of the self-release was still in the old-school mode and the internet did not represent the distribution model it does today.