For The Love Of It is a documentary film featuring the music of Cats In Space. But more than this, it has become a benchmark for what can be achieved when imagination and dedication far outstrips budget. MetalTalk’s Liz Medhurst spent an absorbing afternoon in the company of director James Heron of Carriage Return getting an insight into this madcap, but highly professional, world.
When you think of documentaries about music that have a lasting impact, there are a few that instantly come to mind. Peter Jackson’s Get Back threw open the creative process of The Beatles, snapshotting the final era of the band. Lemmy – The Film gave a candid profile and insight into the daily life of the Motörhead legend, while Anvil! The Story of Anvil was notable for how resilient bands have to be to survive in the unforgiving industry and how fortunes can change.
Now we have another documentary that can stand alone as a commentary on one aspect of today’s music scene. For The Love Of It is the perfect title, and the entire concept is summed up in those five short words. This is more than a behind-the-scenes look at how the recent Cats In Space theatre tour came together, which it portrays brilliantly with masses of charm and humour.Â
The real story is about the state of the music industry today and the expectations of audiences.
The Cats In Space Kickstart The Sun tour of 2023 hit the stages of twenty-two theatres with a staggeringly good show that no other band at this level were putting on, comprising a built stage set with multi-screen custom live projections. You could be excused for thinking that something as ambitious as this was not possible for the size of the band and their audiences. However, it succeeded with style.
The audio of the double-set tour has been immortalised in the lavish live album Fire In The Night – Live, which is beautifully mixed and recorded and will live on as an essential representation of the band’s live show.
You do not only have to be a fan of the band to appreciate this accompanying documentary which stands alone as a peek behind the curtain to find magic made via the tightest of shoestrings and the biggest of hearts. What you get is an inspirational behind-the-scenes from concept to stage blending stark reality, courage, a whole lotta love and a sprinkling of madness.
It is fascinating to see how things were put together – and also reassuring to see that 5 cm flexible conduit is still the go-to for anything spacey or sci-fi. There are some jaw-dropping moments in the film, almost watching behind fingers time as the realisation drops of exactly how tight these margins were and how much things went to the wire. One of the first things to strike you is the level of trust that the band put in James Heron, especially as there had been no production rehearsal and the band experienced the finished results for the first time on the opening night of the tour.
“The trust thing is interesting, actually, because the band should have been terrified,” James Heron told MetalTalk. “I’ve come from a production background, and I know what it’s like to do these things, but musicians are delicate people. You don’t mess with their environment. They have to concentrate on what they’re doing. A big production can easily ruin somebody’s creativity. I’ve seen shows where it’s just sucked the life out of the artists. The one thing you don’t wanna do with these productions is take a band down with your little folly.”
Thankfully, there was security here as James and the band had an agreement where Carriage Return would carry the risk for this visual aspect. James describes an attitude of “If you’re prepared to put your neck on the line and do this show, you can do it whichever way you want, but just don’t make us look stupid.”
There was pretty much no danger of the latter happening. Not only do all parties have a great working relationship, developed from shooting videos prior to the tour, but once you consider Heron’s background, you understand why he was the perfect choice. For many years, he ran a media company whose portfolio includes providing large-scale stage visuals for events such as the Eurovision Song Contest, the Super Bowl halftime, and We Will Rock You musicals, and that’s just for a start.
He knows how to make rock music theatrical, that’s for sure, and he is a genuine fan of Cats In Space, too. The thing is, for this show, there was one aspect that was very new. This was the first time James had been at the actual front end of doing the actual creation, building and operating, and for this he was on his own.
Compromises are inevitable when there are budgetary and other constraints, of course. However, the care and craft that went into the production was phenomenal, and on this it matches the ethos of the band.
“Greg [Hart] is open to any ideas,” James says. “As long as it fits within his framework of what Cats In Space is, he will allow it. If it doesn’t, you won’t get in the door. If you go to him and say we can save some space on this tour, but everybody has to play Kempers instead of Marshall stacks, he will immediately tell you to leave the room and not come back.”
In order to achieve the required standards, the set build involved calling in lots of favours from friends and experts, both practical and advisory, as shown to great effect in the film.
“I was really humbled by the reception that I got when I approached people saying, look, can you lend me some kit?” James says. “I thought they would just go, no James, you need to get back in the industry and stop dicking around with bands. But they went, no, you can have it if it’s here and if you make any money, give me some money. If you don’t, just take it.
“I was blown away by that because I think, at heart, even people who are working on big productions which are driven by finance genuinely believe in the creative process. I was very surprised at how welcoming people were to me, approaching them for free stuff. I think they all know there’s not that much money in rock ‘n’ roll anymore unless you get up beyond a certain point, you get to arena level.”
There is a great clip in the film where James describes his Amazon account order page, full of tools and materials right down to screws and nails, as he didn’t personally own a comprehensive tool kit. Then, of course, he had to work out how to use the stuff properly when he had it.
It’s a hard relate there. How many times have we optimistically started a project to find it’s a hell of a lot more complicated than first thought, although the stakes are probably not as high? There is wisdom from having come through this experience.
“You know, it’s not complicated,” James says, “but this is where you realise that the details take so much time. This is why bands don’t do it. They don’t have the time or the budget. If I was going to give any advice to any bands out there you should try and surround yourself with investors who invest in your band with skills [as well as money].”
The show may have been relatively humble when compared to the massive arena productions that are staged globally, but in the context of a small rock show, it was hugely above the level you would expect.
This has always been the case with The Cats, who have built their reputation on playing fully live, with no trace of a click track. So, the visuals had to match. This could never be merely a case of programming it and then sitting back. So that raised the stakes even higher.
“One of the other reasons why people don’t do these shows anymore is if you do a big show, it is gonna embarrass everybody if it doesn’t work,” James says. “You take a spare media server, you take out spare lights, you take out extra crew members to help you out. You will have a contingency budget, and the rental companies will do you a deal on a backup item for anything that you rent from them for a tour.
“We didn’t have that. So there was a risk, which is why we had to work so hard to make sure that it was reliable and proven. This is one of the great things about doing absolutely everything from the ground up. I mean, I literally soldered every cable on the show. I purchased all the items myself that I didn’t blag free off somebody, and I tested everything in a big warehouse.
“I went through the show over and over and over with the songs playing, and I cued it, and I did all eventualities. If that song moves to there, does that fade out? Does that fade out properly? Does this happen? And I ironed out most of those problems, so we didn’t really have any failures at all.”
Controlling visuals live, as opposed to running a tape, sounds like a massive technological challenge and of course, it was put to the test almost immediately.
“The thing about being real-time media services is that you can generate loop videos and things like that”, James explains. “The Cats rehearsed the opening song, and when it came out of the intro and went into King Of Stars, sometimes Damian Edwards would do eight bars of not singing, or sometimes he would do sixteen.
“The first time round, I hit the space bar [after eight bars], and then he didn’t start singing, and I’m like Shit, ‘cos we hadn’t rehearsed. Ironically, when they did it live on the last tour, he left it longer because he was saying hello to the crowd. But this time, they did it like they did on the album.
“But the great thing is everything loops, and nothing changes. It’s where video steals discipline from lighting. Lighting will stay doing what it’s doing until you tell it to do something else. It’s hard to do that with video because it has a beginning and an end. But the way that real-time video works is that it will continue until you tell it to do something else. You have to make sure that this is either a seamless loop or it’s really long.
“I’ve got sections from bits of songs where this section is only ten seconds long, but the clip is one minute long. It’s one minute long for the simple reason that if they decide to jam over the top of it, it will still be there, and then I just jump out of it and jump into something else. So it is a very live show.”
Once on the road, the challenges did not stop. James is incredibly grateful for the extra mile gone by the Cats In Space crew who helped him out where possible, above and beyond their roles as guitar tech, etc.
Our conversation, along with the film, reinforces the utter professionalism and talent of the band, James and the entire crew and missteps really were kept to the absolute minimum, with only one major near-miss.
“As always, it’s the one bit that you’re not in control of,” James says. “We did Lancaster early on in the tour. I had tried not to make it too tediously technical. I take out a 50m network cable, and I sit out the front, and all the brains of the show sit on the stage. You can run the entire show from the stage. All I have is a little laptop, and I send commands to the big brains on the stage. All I need is a reliable network cable.
“At Lancaster, I used a venue cable [and it failed], which is why I ended up doing the last four songs of the set by legging it through the audience and operating it at the side of the stage. We had a few times when I hit the space bar at the wrong time. It’s like being a musician, you know, you hit a bum note now and again.”
So, the tour was a massive artistic success, of which there is no doubt. It is also clear that the biggest tension was between what could be achieved and the financial cost, which returns us to the title once more.
Forget about the halcyon days filled with money, drugs and girls. These days, you have to be in rock ‘n’ roll for the love of the craft and the related creative processes. It’s not impossible to make a living, but it’s so much harder in today’s climate.
As James confirms, “Let’s face it, we would have had a production rehearsal if we had the money, but we just didn’t.”
The cost is always an issue, but Cats In Space is a band that is not ruled by spreadsheets. It is an important discussion, though, about how once you start taking things away, it loses the essence.
“Greg and I have this conversation all the time,” James says, “which is, well, maybe we could save a little bit of money on the tour and make it more efficient, put more back in the pot and whatever. Then we go, yeah, but it’s not gonna be Cats In Space then, is it?”
Exactly. Art matters. It matters a lot. It supports us through the toughest of times and makes life worth living. James sums it up nicely when he says, “We know that what we’re doing is ridiculous. We are not stupid.
“But the trouble is, it is art, and you cannot change it. It’s like going into an art exhibition and going well, that’s not worth it, is it? You could make that for half the price. Yeah, but part of what you pay for is its individuality and the fact that it was crafted by one person in an old-school way.”
It’s a major achievement to have collaborated on a production where all parties had the freedom to express their art so harmoniously and create something very special indeed.
It is no surprise then to hear that things are not going to be left as a one-off, and James is currently working on the production for the next tour this autumn for the album Time Machine.
He couldn’t really say no. “What would it be like to see the band go out on tour and not have a show behind it,” James reflects, “having done what we did last year? How would I feel if I went to watch a gig? Say I disconnected myself from the band, saying, music industry? Waste of time. No money, too much work. Then I went to see them at Stockport, bought a ticket and just went along?
“The answer is I would wish I had done it, and I’m at a stage in my life where I don’t not do things that I wish I had done.”
Fortunately, there are some things that he has got a head start on now.
“The great thing about the Time Machine tour that’s up and coming is that I have those tools now. I literally open a drawer, and the crimpers are there. The screwdriver is there. It’s just that little bit easier. Last time around, we didn’t even have the basics, so it was a really hard slog.
“I have to thank the guys who helped me with it. Julian [Hall], Simon [Warrington], and particularly Ste Kenny on the first tour because he was so instrumental in the design.”
Tickets are now on sale for the Time Machine tour, and it looks like the tradition of delighting audiences will continue. It’s a win-win situation for band, crew and audiences artistically and satisfaction-wise. One can only hope that that material rewards will follow.
On this, James is pragmatic. “We are either gonna have a monumental success at some point,” he says, “or we’re all gonna die happy, knowing we did what was true to our hearts.”
