According to Urban Dictionary, teenagers are defined as “people who are treated like children but expected to act like adults.” Call an informal crowd-sourced dictionary an unreliable reference, but Cat Clyde remembers that same frustratingly illogical contradiction like it was yesterday. Her 2016 single “Mama Said” verbalizes her adolescent aggravation with a particularly contentious departure from her childhood home.  To no parent’s surprise, Clyde’s mother is chosen as the memorable antagonist in an argument about abruptly packing up their belongings and heading for the hills. The outward bitterness in the Ontario native’s voice is unmistakable, but the same lingering anger and resentment can be felt in her backing instrumentals. Cat Clyde’s’s supporting bandmate Patrick Fockler’s twangy slide guitar further stresses Clyde’s unstructured and organic viewpoint on life that sprouted as a headstrong kid feuding with her mother.

The only thing that saves Cat Clyde from complete teenage despair is her natural outlook within a inescapably technological world. As Clyde told Pigeons & Planes, “Doing things naturally is very essential for me. I don’t like to be involved in anything without authenticity.  I don’t really fit into the chaos of city life and modern things. If I had it my way, I would be living in a cabin in the mountains somewhere with no phone or internet.” Clyde’s debut 2017 album Ivory Castanets is an added testament to her ecological assertiveness and honest indignation towards her socially poisoned upbringing. The reoccurring themes of environmental beauty and societal separation continually disconnect Clyde from any distractions she feels are impure and brings her closer to the music that defined her a young restlessness and indignation.