Sunday 29 May 2016

The Gaptooth Tarot Interview!

Gaptooth is a kick-ass electro-pop one-woman-band based in London, UK. Her gorgeous, catchy-as-hell music never fails to get the crowd moving, and her lyrics contain some of the smartest political commentary that I’ve come across in years. Here’s what happened when I interviewed her with the Tarot of the Cat People deck (Karen Kuykenall/US Games).



Tarot Cat : Firstly, I absolutely love your new record, the Pillow Fort EP! Its classic Gaptooth - cheeky pop synths, a touch of punk, and lyrics that are as playful as they are political. Underneath the humour there is a lot of cynicism, perhaps even a touch of apathy at times? Thinking about this, I drew a card - the Page of Wands. This is an interesting card to reflect on cynicism; a young-looking figure holds up a lantern and has a fat, adoring cat as a companion. It seems to be a hopeful, positive card; we might see this Page as someone who is enthusiastically learning new things, with an open minded approach to their creativity. Do you feel its important to have a positive, playful approach when dealing with cynicism? What other things might this Page be saying about your music? 

Gaptooth : Thanks for your nice words about my music! Ive always liked songwriting that was a bit cynical but with an underlying sense of hope. Songwriters like Stephin Merritt (The Magnetic Fields) and John Darnielle (The Mountain Goats) who bring a heavy dose of cynicism and dark humour, but give you a sense that deep down they do believe in life and love and romance, in the broadest sense of the word. Ultimately, if you dont believe in something theres no point, is there? Theres a line I wrote in Plans and Friends and Records that says misanthropy is boring. Sometimes I just write life lessons into my lyrics to remind myself when I forget them.

Apathy is something I try to avoid, but sometimes its important to make a distinction between apathy and self-care. One song on the EP, I Built a Fort, is about frustration with the current state of the world war, climate change, austerity, oppression and so on and a desire to hide away from it all. The song is tongue-in-cheek, and I think its important not to walk away from injustices and pretend theyre not happening, but its also important to look after yourself sometimes. In my day job I work on issues around gender and violence, and in my spare time Im very involved in feminist activism which can take up a lot of evenings and weekends, so sometimes its really important to take a step back from that and think about self-care.


This card made me think of that because the character has a cat by their side, which looks like their faithful companion. My music and my cats are a really important part of my self-care strategies. Ive always had felines around the place and they look after me as much as I look after them.

Tarot Cat : Youre a strong advocate of feminism, both in your music and in your wider working life too. Thinking about your approach to human rights, I drew the Knight of Swords. This is a really powerful, no-bullshit card. A warrior-type figure sits on a huge panther. No cuddly kitty this time around! The figure holds up a purple sword (interesting colour for a mighty weapon!) and seems to be extremely alert and confident. Theres an element of defence in the way the sword is being held - it seems more like a strong reaction to attack, rather than an instigation of attack. What does this reflect in your approach to feminism, both in your music and other areas in your life?

Gaptooth : I love this card! My favourite colour is purple, and Ive always thought that if I was a super hero I would ride a big cat.

I guess like a lot of women, I came to feminism in part through personal experiences of sexism, through feeling like I was under attack in different ways. I think most women I know have had some fairly horrible experiences in Good Guys I sing the line all my female friends have stories of assault, which I dont think is even an exaggeration. Songs like Stay Away From Me and Tigerstrikes are about trying to reclaim your personal power in the face of situations of abuse. This card sums that up pretty well You mistook me for a pussycat / so watch out for when the tiger strikes.

Im really involved in activism against government cuts to services for survivors of domestic violence. It very much feels like many of the things feminists have worked hard to achieve in recent decades are under attack from this government. Its frustrating and exhausting, but organising politically with other women and has been a really empowering experience. Sometimes getting out on the street and shouting can make you feel a whole lot better about the world.



Tarot Cat : In the past you have expressed a real distain for the UK music scene (which Im totally with you on for around one thousand reasons). I drew a card to reflect on your gripes with the way things are, and it was the Nine of Wands. A feminine figure stands before a prison-looking structure. Theres an army of hungry-looking cats behind the bars, scratching at her feet for attention. Again its the suit of Wands, hinting at creative projects. She looks wary, and seems to be protecting this strange kitty prison, perhaps expecting an intruder. How is this image relating to your attitude to the UK music scene?

Gaptooth : Theres a lot about the way the music industry is going that I find frustrating. I first became involved in it around 2002 when I started working for (the now defunct) Truck Records, recording bands, putting on gigs and working at Truck Festival. Since then it feels like it has become harder and harder for artists. Streaming services make it harder to recover the costs of recording, and many promoters are much more interested in how many followers you have on social media than on the quality of your music.

The fact that it has become easier for people to record and release music for themselves is great for so many reasons, but the sheer number of people doing it means that increasingly you need a big budget behind you in order to compete for exposure. So I suppose I sometimes feel a bit like one of those hungry kitties scratching for attention, without much luck.

Ive read a few articles online recently suggesting that bands who dont tour all the time and put out an album every year wont make it (whatever that means) because theyre being lazy. But the harder it gets to earn a living from music, the more artists face a choice between either fitting music around a full time job (as most do), which puts limits on how much you can do, or living in a state of extreme financial precariousness.

Tarot Cat : Do you have any musical plans right now? OH, its The Magician! Number one in the Major Arcana (the suit said to reflect major stages in life), the very beginning. This Magician is a tough-looking one, wearing a huge cloak and commanding three suits of cups, wands and pentacles with the final suit - a sword. In other words, The Magician seems to be bringing a very balanced approach to the situation, not focusing on one area, but rather balancing many approaches to look at the situation as a whole, with power, skill and determination. What is this Magician reflecting?


Gaptooth : Musically, I’m working on my second album and hoping to start gigging more around the country, having not really played live much in the last couple of years. I am also anticipating quite a big life change as I’m going back to uni in September to start a PhD. I’m hoping (possibly naively) that this will allow me to balance my work and my music better, as my lifestyle will be slightly more flexible. Working quite long hours in a job that has required me to travel a lot has made it quite difficult to focus on music at times. So I hope this will allow me to gig a bit more and get this album finished more quickly than the last one.

Tarot Cat : Finally, a question about the cards, but without the cards! Youre a fan of tarot yourself, arent you? What draws you to tarot, and how do you use it?

Gaptooth : My mum was a new age therapist, so I grew up with a lot of things that other people might think of as a bit kooky or weird. I have a Celtic tarot deck, which I chose because I liked the pictures (though I am super jealous of your deck, Tarot Cat!). I have a particular group of friends who I dont see that often but when I do, we usually do each others tarot. For some people its a spiritual thing, for others its more just a way of talking through things that are going on in your life and getting a different perspective on them.

Tarot Cat : Thanks so much to you Gaptooth! Youre a true pop inspiration in a world of bland, dumbed down music, and The Tarot Cat purrs lovingly at your smart, fabulous, feminist feet. Please dont stop doing what youre doing, and many purrs for giving me some your super-valuable time.

The Pillow Fort EP is out now and available on Bandcamp. It's incredible, trust me. You can also follow Gaptooth on Facebook and check out the amazing new DIY video for Stay Away from Me below, featuring some very confused Bristolians (keep an eye out for the charming, stalking dog!)


This interview is the first in a series of tarot interviews with incredible, out-there underground musicians. You can sign up to the blog by entering your email in the subscription bar (top right) - there’s some amazing interviews coming up I promise thee!

The Tarot Cat is an underground, DIY, tarot-reading musician based in Scotland. I adore providing tarot reading for musicians and creatives - or just about anyone who wants to look at something in a creative and interesting light! You can find out more about my approach to tarot and book readings on my main website. More tarot-music joy coming soon! Miaow for now! Love Ste xx 

Follow The Tarot Cat on Twitter

Thursday 12 May 2016

A Tarot Spread for Musicians (and other creatives!)

Are you a musician, poet, writer, artist or creative who is feeling stuck? You might find that you’re trapped in some kind of 'artist identity' where you keep recreating the same kind of work simply because that’s what you do. If you are looking for a new direction with your work, or a new act altogether, then this tarot spread is for you.

The reasons that we get stuck and uninspired are complex and very personal. Here’s a tarot spread that I designed to help myself figure out why I’ve been like a broken record for years with my songwriting; I’m now finding it really useful with other creatives who I’ve been working with and I’d love you to try it out for yourself!

For the uninitiated, here is a basic description of what exactly a ‘tarot spread’ is. You can design your own spreads to represent anything you want to know, in any shape or design you fancy. Good, eh?

     

Here’s how we work with the Lego-Pyramid Spread. Starting with the bottom row of five cards, you will read the cards from left to right before progressing up to the next level of the pyramid. These cards (1-5) will represent challenging information which you need to conquer before progressing; they are your foundation. Happy creativity-based cards (6-8) lay on row two. At the very top is a final, overall advice card representing something you need to grasp before you mentally climb on top of it, raise your flag and proclaim yourself ready to embark on something truly new. Hooray! 

For my personal reading - given as an example below - I chose the Tarot of the Cat People deck to work with; the first tarot deck I ever bought back in 2004 and a truly gorgeous deck full of incredible symbolism and righteous, fantasy felines. 


Here’s what each card position represents:
  1. The Creative Phase That’s Died. This card will capture what you are really closing the door to, to gain extra understanding of where you’ve been before you move forward.
  2. Where You Are Right Now. Always helpful for some perspective - you’re never quite where you consciously want to be.
  3. What You Need To Work On. This could represent skills, attitudes; anything at all - practical, mental or emotional.
  4. Hidden Hopes. A card to uncover sub/unconscious motives.
  5. Hidden Fears. These things trip you up.
  6. Creative Inspiration. Something that will provide inspiration for a new direction. Keep an open mind!
  7. Assets available. Understand what’s in your favour right now and what will help you.
  8. Something Random and Fabulous. A baffling wildcard which will shout something helpful and cryptic at you. It may not make immediate sense - but it will slowly sink in.
  9. Final Advice. A card that waves its wise finger like a smart schoolteacher and says, “now before you start, always remember this, child!”
                                                    
(note - this is not from the tarot deck I'm using, it's just a random image from the internet. My taste in tarot decks can be kitsch at times - but this would be pushing it.)

Shuffle the cards and concentrate. Choose 9 cards at random in whatever way feels right for you. There are no right or wrong ways to choose the cards, providing they’re faced down. Pile the cards up one by one and then deal the bottom card to position one, the second to bottom card at position two, and so on until the final card is dealt to position nine.

Here’s what happened with my own reading which I conducted when I finally made the decision to end my previous music project of ten years. It was my main focus in life, seeing me release four albums and performing in over 15 countries; as you can imagine, it was a really big thing for me and this spread was very helpful. My personal notes were very detailed but I’m just offering a few sentences as an example. Reading in-depth tarot readings that others have performed for themselves can be as dull as hearing blow-by-blow accounts of other people’s dreams - it’s always far more interesting when it happens to you! Nonetheless, I hope it gives you an idea of how you can use the spread to full effect, so do delve in deep when taking notes for yourself.


  1. The Phase That's Ending - Ten of Swords. The bad ending, the feeling of hopelessness that everything is ruined and nothing is salvageable. In the end, I felt completely irrelevant, like a total loser and I came to not even like my music much myself. This card nailed it and puts it in perspective exactly why I needed to stop.
  2. Where I Am - Strength. A figure rides on a huge leopard, travelling through the darkness in the areas of the land where nobody else goes for fear of attack. It’s the only Major Arcana card in my spread; the change is major, and positive. It’s a very self-explanatory card, a simple image. Move on, have Strength.
  3. What I Need to Work On - 8 of Pentacles. An older woman sits with a younger girl, teaching her to play an instrument. I know I’m capable of making different kinds of music, but am I able to get out of my laziness, take the time to learn, study and work on new approaches? Learn new tricks…..sound advice gals!
  4. Hopes - King of Wands. The king of his creative field. Here’s my embarrassing hidden hope : “I will astound and impress others with my ingenious and unique new project!”. A warning against arrogant, unrealistic (embarrassing) hopes which lead to disappointment. Hope to make something you’re proud of; don’t hope to be admired for doing it.
  5. Fears - 5 of Wands. 5’s; chaos, conflict, clashes. Wands (yep, wands again); passion and creativity. Chaos with creativity. A man is floating in air, trapped in 5 turning wands - it’s like he’s at the wheel of an imaginary car which is driving him. I often feel that everything needs to have quick deadlines and I’m already panicking that I’m not doing something new right now. Self-sabotage, taking on a million ideas at once.
  6. Inspiration - 6 of Wands. Card number 5 was the 5 of Wands, card number 6 is the 6 of Wands. How orderly! A man with heavy clothing and a big Russian-style hat appears from the darkness carrying 6 lights of success. Instantly, this guy is my very talented poet brother Chris (he even used to wear a hat like this), who was funded to undertake a huge poetry project. Chris helped me with a music-tarot funding bid I put in recently and this card was inspiration for me in requesting his help (note, I didn’t get the funding, but I did get a lot of new ideas from the application which I’m putting to use with this blog and new songs I’m writing). 
  7. Assets - 10 of Pentacles. A second number 10 - another completion of a journey, this time relating to earth (pentacles), home, finances. A chilled woman looks proud with her adopted kitten family; I've got a supportive husband, part-time satisfying work that leaves me the actual time to create and a lovely new home after hating where I used to live. These are homely assets that I shouldn’t take for granted. Safety and security will help my creativity.
  8. Something Random and Fabulous - Page of Wands (Reversed). At the time of doing this reading, I avoided reading 'reversals', but somehow I pulled a reversed Page regardless. The random is the inexplicable reversal (I shuffled them all upright). Am I the Page of Wands, who often represents an enthusiastic learner of new passions? Is this a stifled new beginning, delayed (reversed)? I just wasn’t ready to learn new tricks at the time of the spread and I'm not sure if I even am now, eight months on.
  9. Advice Before Starting - 9 of Wands. This is the 3rd time that the number of the card correlates with the number in the spread (9:9); rushing is pointless. 5 Wands out of 9 cards suggests an abundance of creativity present. The woman in the card stands before a prison; behind the bars, 4 or 5 scruffy cats claw at her from the darkness. She looks like she’s on guard against a threat. But if there is a threat, it’s the cats behind her, who she doesn’t notice. There’s a lot that I need to leave behind in Ste’s Historical Queer Punk World before I progress. Paranoia, defensiveness, ego. Look at what’s right in front of you, the negative ways you are already thinking; your problems lie right here, not in other people.
Now, that’s enough from the dark depths of my mind. Go try it out for yourself!

Did you get any interesting insights into what’s lurking in the back of your brain when trying this spread? Did anything confuse you, inspire you, freak you out? Did you get the urge to go out and try something new? Comment below or email me. I’d love to chat more with you and I really hope that this helps you on your creative journey, whatever it be!

Love Ste / Tarot Cat x



The Tarot Cat is a tarot-reading DIY musician based in Scotland. I blog about tarot (with a special focus on musical-tarot connections) and I provide creative tarot readings via my website.  

Wednesday 11 May 2016

Contemporary Music Inspired by Tarot. No Crashing Waves or Soothing Dolphins in Earshot!

When I think about the words “tarot” and “music” in the same sentence, the first thing that springs to mind is meditation music. Dolphins, crashing waves and the oh-so-soothing language of the whale. Nice and relaxing for your tarot readings maybe, but what I’m interested as both a DIY musician and a tarot reader is not what music might be pleasant in a tarot setting, but rather what happens when musicians of all genres get their heads stuck into a deck and allow the cards to inspire the music itself. I’ve started targeting musicians as part of a big tarot-music project, and I can tell you that the results so far are fascinating!

There’s a whole world out there of musicians being inspired by tarot, both past and present (and future, obviously). I’m currently investigating these artists and I’ll be blogging these babies right here over the coming months, so if you’re as interested in discovering beautiful musical Fools as I am, then stay right here!

To whet your whistle, let’s start with two well known names in the music world : 

Robert DeLong’s album In the Cards has been on repeat around here a lot recently. I first came across this guy through a heads-up in the TABI newsletter, and since getting the album I’ve been blown away by the lush pop, intelligent lyrics and the fascinating way that this talented maestro has made a contemporary pop album inspired by the cards. Watch this gem in action!



If softer guitar-pop is more your bag, pop legend Suzanne Vega released an album called From the Realm of the Queen of Pentacles in 2014. It’s a gorgeous, subtle and thoughtful record which has tarot references all over it. Here’s a taster, the beautiful Fool's Complaint :



I hope you’ve enjoyed scratching the surface of some of the tarot-inspired music out there. If you know of any tarot-inspired musicians/bands, or if you’re a musician inspired by tarot, please share links in the comments section or email me and I’ll send you a big non-threatening, cuddly cyber-hug in return.


Creative tarot readings can be ordered here - I'm especially interested in reading for creatives but I adore working with lovely people with all kinds of dilemmas. Miaow!

Saturday 7 May 2016

Give Your Sweet Tarot Brain a Rest!

There’s so much information out there on tarot. Tarot history, different traditions, approaches to ethics, additional divination tools, reversals/no reversals, intuitive/traditional, esoteric beliefs/none, counselling approaches, jungian theory.....the list goes on. And on. Books, books, books! Blogs, blogs blogs! Podcasts! Workshops! Youtube videos! Follow this reader on Twitter! Get that newsletter weekly from another reader! 

Trying to take in every idea and approach that's out there can be really, really exhausting.

Now, to lay my cards on the table : I’m a professional tarot reader. I know nothing about the Thoth. I don’t read reversals. I personally find no useful link between astrology and tarot (and I promise you that I tried). Besides the occasional celtic cross, I have no regular spreads. I design each spread for each client based on their question, and then I never go back to it. I don’t meditate. I don't own some of the major 'classic' books on tarot. I don’t even have a solid belief in what is actually happening when I read the cards. Is it spiritual, psychological? I’m interested, but for the large part I just don’t care all that much. Tarot works, and that’s enough for me.  

Want to know something else? I get extremely positive and encouraging feedback from my clients.

I do have a love for what is largely considered to be the 'system' of the tarot - the generally accepted Major Arcana meanings, the elements, basic numerical associations etc. I’ve lost count of the amount of tarot books I’ve read, and I’ve immersed myself in blogs, videos, podcasts, you name it - for hours, weeks, months, years. I don't, however, have any tarot 'Bibles". I dip into books, falling in love with some chapters, and occasionally wanting to throw the book across the room when I read other chapters. If you love something as much as we readers love tarot, it’s hard not to want to read a lot about it isn’t it? But blimey, it can get messy.


(Pic : "My personal approach to tarot is to dance with an intuitive, agile cat before each reading, before releasing a deep breath and meditating to a rare Mama Cass 12" record. Once you try this, you'll find that your readings become so much more insightful and you'll wonder what on earth you were doing for all of those years!!")

Recently I became stressed out by all of the literature I was reading, the podcasts I was listening to and the blogs I was reading (okay, I'm still reading a lot of tarot blogs). The hardcore views of certain tarot readers chipped at my confidence and made me feel inadequate; it wasn't helpful. In my view, the best teachers should always encourage you to find your own approach by offering you suggestions, whilst owning those suggestions as  personal preferences (please note I’m talking about reading styles here - good ethics with clients is non negotiable!). If I hear one more tarot reader proclaiming that not reading reversals is “stupid”, I will scream. Who cares if my cards sit upside down or not? It's not how your cards are sitting that's important darling, it's how you are reading them. If reversals help you read more deeply, that's great. Sometimes we study certain things (like I studied reversals), and we choose to reject them. Sometimes we choose not to study certain things (like I choose not to study the Thoth) because we know from the outset that they won’t inspire us. We know to trust our intuition with our readings, so why shouldn’t we trust it when exploring different decks and approaches? If your one and only deck is the Hello Kitty and you have no interest in expanding on that, then good for you. 




(Pics : “The Marseille is the only real tarot!”, “The Rider Waite Smith is the only deck you'll ever need!”, “The Hello Kitty has the richest, deepest symbolism that will stimulate the most intuitive of intuitives!”)

No single, solid approach proposed by any ‘expert’ fits the bill for me.  A while back, every time I thought I’d found my ‘one true tarot master’, they would then proclaim something that pissed me off. That, right there, is the nature of the human being; nobody has all of the answers. Tarot is not mathematics. There is no one, superior approach to reading. I blend a bit of this, a bit of that, and a whole dose of my own approach (which is always changing). One reading can be fairly traditional (that good old celtic cross eh?), and the next might pay no attention to the generally accepted meanings at all, lining up the cards and reading them as one large image, like I've never heard of the tarot before in my life. You can read the cards however you like!

I love both the Rider Waite Smith and Marseille traditions, but I don’t think that any one approach is superior to the other. Blending them together into a spread is fabulous, yet I only seem to read a ‘one versus the other’ viewpoint in books and blogs, and it’s tiresome. Tarot is largely illogical; that’s why I find the fact that it works so fascinating. ‘Logic’ as a 24/7 thing, at times, simply fails us. Why should our approach to tarot be rigid and logical when that’s exactly what we’re trying to dismiss when we read the cards? How can anyone claim that their way is the best way? Doing what feels right for us as individual readers is the only thing that will consistently work. For you, that might mean only using the celtic cross with the Rider Waite Smith deck. That’s amazing. That’s your thing, and I bet you’ll still be doing that differently and uniquely from the next person who uses the RWS and the celtic cross. Don’t let any tarot snob tell you otherwise.



(Pic : Okay, posting Edvard Munch's The Scream is a bit of a lazy and obvious way to capture feelings of frustration. It's good though, innit?)

The Tarot de Marseille and other older decks didn’t come with any guidebook. That doesn’t mean that you shouldn't learn things from tarot teachers and authors - this is not my point. Studying other people’s approaches has helped me to decide what works for me, and what doesn’t. Other people’s ideas (which are often inspired by years of work and study) can help you to take huge short cuts down roads which you might have been travelling already, and they can offer amazing ideas that you might never have come across otherwise. 

If, however, you’re getting to the point where reading so many opposing ideas are starting to stress you out, take my advice and put the books down, get your head back into your other interests for a while, and just enjoy your cards. It’s true that with tarot, you never stop learning. But looking to someone else constantly to get in touch with your own style is a bit like asking someone else what you need to do to become the real you, and any LGBT+ person will tell you how that approach desperately fails. Only you have that answer. Be inspired by others, but don't follow in their footsteps. If it feels messy, then rip it up and start again. The pieces that are left on the floor after a good tidy are the only pieces that you need to keep. 


Love Ste / The Tarot Cat xxx



I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments!  You can visit my main website here. Miaow x