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Kate Nash: “I would never say I’m straight. I don’t have an identity in that way.”

Kate Nash is a girl after my own heart. Most likely yours, too. The 23-year-old singer from London is best known for her piano-driven singles like “Foundations,” “Do-Wah-Doo” and “Merry Happy,” but if you have a chance to see her on this year’s Lilith Fair, you’ll see she’s got much more to her than most of her pop music counterparts.

Kate’s first date on the Lilith Fair 2010 was in Chicago, where I was determined to ask her about her song “I’ve Got a Secret” from her second album, My Best Friend is You, which was released earlier this year. The lyrics make its theme quite obvious:

I’ve got a secret I can’t tell you / You would judge / Why can’t we be friends/ You can’t pretend that you don’t love me / You don’t love me / Why can’t I kiss her lips? / Why can’t I be with him? / Homophobic pricks / Homophobic

At the daily press conference, Nash – sporting a short highlighted bob flipped up on the ends and dark black eyeshadow – explained how she came to pen the song.

“I recently, when I was writing the song at the time, had a few people close to me ‘coming out.’ [Air quotes] And it was interesting because it kind of made me aware, again, that it was a big deal to some people and that that prejudice is still very much in existence. And I’ve kind of grown up in London and have a very open minded family and friends and have done theater and friends in music and you kind of forget that that exists. You forget that people are still sort of evil and ignorant and I had these friends that are coming out and it’s a big deal, and I just wanted to write a song about it and make a point about saying that it’s a very wrong view and homophobia is very present in existence and it’s wrong and being gay.”

“I don’t even really agree in coming out,” she continued, “because I don’t think straight people come out and introduce themselves as being straight and why should somebody have to say ‘Hi, I’m gay.’ It just felt close to my heart and I wanted to make a point of it.”

Nash had to leave early because she was performing on the main stage before the conference would end, and I rushed over to see her set directly after. I was just in time to see her take the stage and plop down in front of her keyboard which was covered with a black cloak and a message of neon tape reading “A c–t is a useful thing.” It was the most true and non-corporate whitewashing of feminism I saw at Lilith Fair all day, and I’m glad to note she not only uses this at all women’s festivals – she has it on her keyboard at major festivals like Glastonbury as well.

And Kate Nash is an unabashed feminist. On stage, she stepped out from behind her keyboard to perform a high-energy rock track that was evocative of one of her favorite bands – Bikini Kill – called “Model Behavior.” She prefaced the song by saying it was based on a industry party she attended and wrote right after she went into the studio the next day. The chorus of the song repeats the line, “You don’t have to suck d–k to succeed,” which Nash sings and slides into screeching in true riot grrrl form This song didn’t make it onto either of her albums but Lilith was a perfect venue to perform it live, as she won over new fans that chanted along and broke into applause at the end of her set.”

Later I was able to talk to Kate backstage. She had changed from a black-and-white striped poncho dress into a black and neon pink, green and orange square pattered shirt. Her style, along with her ability to write close-to-perfect and yet interesting pop songs, is one of the things that has made Kate famous in the UK and abroad.

She sat on an amp outside of her dressing room, taking questions from myself and a blogger from Yahoo. Right away I asked about her riot grrrl influence, which she had briefly touched on in the press conference when she said Bikini Kill’s album Reject All American was one of her favorites.

“I discovered it later in life because I was too young,” she said. “I wish I would have been around for that time because it would have been so cool. I was maybe born in the wrong year or something. I got into them when I was about 17, 18 and it was actually when I was touring and in doing this whole music thing that they became more and more important to be because the whole lifestyle and sexism I experienced and the realization of the fact that it is different being a woman in life and in work and in music, which is what I work in and where I feel it. It’s always like you feel like you have something to prove. When I do interviews, I’m very aware of what people ask. Like what a guy will ask – I never get to talk about my music. They wonder about my boyfriend and my clothes and my hair and my makeup. You know, fine, but it’s just different and it’s almost like – I get insecure about it. I hope that women can be respected in the same way as men.”

Kate said she listens to Bikini Kill before she goes on stage to get “geared up.” “And I just really like Kathleen Hanna and her spoken word stuff, apart from the fact that she’s a feminist and women need music, she’s just really cool and really good.”

She also cited Janis Joplin, Cyndi Lauper, Celine Dion and Whitney Houston as influences while she was growing up and then said, “One of my favorite bands is Sleater-Kinney. I really love them and their music.” I told her about a recent Paste magazine article on Lilith Fair which had Corin Tucker of Sleater-Kinney talking about why the band had passed on an opportunity to play the first Lilith go-around, saying the wasn’t really their scene. I asked if Kate thought of Lilith as being driven by folk music, at least when it came to her thoughts on the festival’s origin.

“To be honest, I think that it does have that more folky feel,” Nash said. “I feel like it’s good they’re trying to broaden and get the message across that it should be more diverse. I think that maybe some artists that have dropped out have been a little afraid of that. But I’m happy to be here and to reach out to – it’s kind of scary and more challenging as well as a chance to reach out to a group of people that aren’t really of your fans and they’re like ‘What the hell is going on?’ I try to get them to understand what I’m saying and connect to me and if you get even four people to be into you than that’s cool. I think it’s good that they’re expanding.”

It’s interesting that Lilith Fair in general doesn’t make use of the word “feminism” during its dates or surrounding press, and Kate was surely the most radical thing about the festival. She was the only one I heard use the F word all day.

“I’m happy to be a feminist,” she said. “My mom is a very strong-minded woman and I think I got that from her. I think the reason – I’m starting to understand it more, especially being musicians – is because they don’t ‘want to be seen as a woman in music. They just want to be seen as a musician. And we should be, but we’re not there yet and I feel like it’s important to be a feminist. And I feel like it’s important for males to be feminists. Feminism is equality – it doesn’t matter what you know about the history of it, or what you’ve read, post-feminism – it’s not about any of that crap for me, it’s just equality. That’s what I believe in. Not to say that any of that stuff isn’t important, but in terms of how messy it gets and how frightening and almost aggressive the word gets, it’s not aggressive, it’s very simple and I can understand why they don’t want to be called that, but I’m happily one and it’s important to me to be that.”

In case you couldn’t tell, Nash is very well-spoken and responds quickly to each question but gives so much intel as to why she feels how she does that you’d think she’s pondered it for hours. When I found out she was only 23, I was a little shocked, as she’s not only incredibly intelligent and talented, but she’s arguably one of the newest artists on the Lilith Fair bill and seemed to be using the opportunity for more than a paycheck and some additional press. While the festival has been losing steam, canceling dates, having performers drop out and being forced to offer seat upgrades at a highly discounted rate on site, Nash felt like the only performer of the day to use the stage as something other than a self-marketing tool. But considering she dedicated a song on her album to her feelings on homophobia when she could have used the space for another love song her record label might deem single-worthy, this doesn’t appear to be out of character.

“‘I’ve Got a Secret’ is to make a point about homosexuality and homophobia,” Kate said. “I wanted to so people could ask me about it and I could say I don’t accept homophobia. I say to people at my gigs, ‘If you’re homophobic, go home where you along. F–k you, I don’t want you to come to my gigs anymore.'”

I asked how she feels about her peers like Vanessa Carlton who make public announcements about their sexuality, and Nash finds that the press surrounding it can only be a positive thing for the gay community.

“The thing I don’t like is when people do the whole ‘sexy lesbian’ thing in like music videos or to create a sexual image for men,” Nash said. “It’s not actually doing anything for gay people. Gay people aren’t represented everywhere as normal human beings. Men are camp and queens like [in a faux-gay male voice] ‘Oh my god! Best friends! Gay and so dramatic!’ And women are [in a deep porno-esque purr] so ‘sexy and curious and I don’t really know what I’m doing but I’m going to try this!’ It doesn’t seem like they’re a normal person who has a job and friends and a life and a family. I think that’s wrong.”

Kate understands us so well that I had to ask: Does she identify as straight?

Without missing a beat she replies, “I don’t know. I don’t really. I’ve never felt like I have to be one thing. I have a boyfriend. I feel like I’ve had feelings for girls before growing up. I’m with a guy now, but it wouldn’t be a surprise to me if I was with a girl at some point in my life. But I’m in love with a guy, so I think for me, I feel like I just fall in love with human beings for who they are. That’s how I feel.”

“I would never say ‘I’m straight, I’m bisexual, I’m gay.’ I feel like I will fall in love with a human being for who they are. I’m not afraid to say I’ve been attracted to a woman before and I’ve kissed girls before and been in love with them before. I’ve never really had a girlfriend or anything and I would never say I’m anything, really. I don’t have an identity in that way.”

And as someone whose style has changed considerably from her debut in 2007 – when she was 19 – it’s not surprising that Kate Nash would be someone unwilling to compromise in how the public views her personal life. She joins a growing group of modern women who don’t belong to one specific number on the Kinsey scale, at least not by age 23. Artists like La Roux’s Elly Jackson, Rihanna, Thao Ngyen, Sia, Allison Goldfrapp and Christina Aguilera have all made statements at one time or another that have been attracted to other women or don’t think of themselves as either gay or straight and not even bisexual. Sexually fluid is the best way to describe it, if there has to be a label, and they aren’t alone – females of all ages experience this uncertainty and likely struggle to figure themselves out one way or another once they’ve hit puberty. But women like Kate Nash are the best examples possible for the indecisive – you don’t have to choose. Your inability to do so can be a beautiful thing.

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