Neko Case reveals difficult journey to stardom in 'The Harder I Fight the More I Love You'

Transcript

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Geoff Bennett: Neko Case has won acclaim as both a singer and songwriter.

This month, she’s out with a memoir that reveals her difficult journey to indie stardom.

Special correspondent Tom Casciato spent time with Case for our arts and culture series, Canvas.

Tom Casciato: Neko Case’s new memoir is called “The Harder I Fight the More I Love You.”

And a big part of her story is right on the cover.

The cover of your book is you as a little kid hugging a cat. And then there’s this big scary-ass monster drawn behind you.

Neko Case, Musician: The monster was kind of my buddy who protected me. That was my rage. I’m not supposed to have that rage, but that rage has saved my life so many times. I’m not getting rid of that rage.

Tom Casciato: The roots of that rage are explored in painful detail in the book.

Neko Case: Well, my parents, they both were dealing with incredible trauma. And there was a part of them that was numb and turned off, and they had a kid.

Tom Casciato: And that was you?

Neko Case: That was me.

Tom Casciato: And you spent a lot of time literally by yourself.

Neko Case: A great deal of time by myself.

Tom Casciato: She describes a childhood of neglect. Her father, she says, barely spoke to her.

Neko Case: And then, if I was with my mom, my mom and my stepdad, they would leave around 6:00 or 7:00, and they would be gone until 6:00.

Tom Casciato: Here’s how she tells it in her audiobook.

Neko Case: At the river, there was a fabulous swimming hole big enough for three people, but there was almost always only me. I would go to my regular boulder, set down my towel, and immediately begin looking for bugs and animals.

Tom Casciato: Put a pin in that bit about the animals.

Neko Case: So I was only spending about three hours a day with other human beings, and then only my parents.

Tom Casciato: “There are stretches of time,” she writes, “that add up to literal years that I don’t remember, just because I was so sad.”

Add to the mix uncertainty about who she really was.

Neko Case: I have never felt like a girl, but I was raised as one, loosely raised as one.

Tom Casciato: Sounds like you were loosely raised.

Neko Case: I was loosely raised, but I did try out being a girl. I really resented it. I was like, I hate dresses. I don’t want to wear dresses. Get the dress. I will get the dress off me, if you don’t get the dress off me.

Tom Casciato: Adolescence brought violence that would scar her. Young adulthood brought traumas of its own. But it turns out there’s beauty in this story, if you just hold on a bit.

If you could give a message to that little kid who was lonely and was neglected, what would you say?

Neko Case: I would say, don’t worry, you’re going to play rock ‘n’ roll.

Tom Casciato: Play rock ‘n’ roll she does, but Neko Case has a voice that can just as easily nail the lonesome in a Hank Williams cover.

“Rolling Stone” once called her a punk dropout who became indie’s greatest singer. She started out as a punk drummer and writes lovingly about punk acts that inspired her, like Flat Duo Jets.

Neko Case: The Flat Duo Jets are everything to me.

I just remember feeling like whatever the yearning was now had a face and a sound.

Tom Casciato: But she was influenced by a lot more than punk.

Neko Case: I was helped very much by Trio Bulgarka, three women who are Bulgarian who sing harmonies and they use a lot of drones. That sound is really deep. It’s very beautiful, but also alarming almost.

Tom Casciato: When you’re performing, do you ever want to be or strive to be alarming?

Neko Case: I’m actually really glad you asked that. In our society and our culture, women tend to go for beautiful sounds. I’m working on a new record right now, and I’m definitely trying to not be so worried about hitting a really good note or sounding lovely.

Tom Casciato: Her memoir too sometimes seems to strive not to be lovely. It occasionally fails, especially in the parts about her lifelong antidote to loneliness. Remember she mentioned seeking out animals?

I actually found myself making a list of the animals we meet in your book.

(Laughter)

Tom Casciato: Buffy the dog, Bubba the dog, Stonia, the dog, Scratsey the cat, if I’m…

Neko Case: Shratsey.

Tom Casciato: Shratsey the cat.

(Laughter)

Tom Casciato: Cammy the cat, Frank the turkey.

This is just a partial list, mind you.

Norman, the horse.

Neko Case: Norman, sadly, we had to put him down last month. He was my first horse. And he kind of taught me how to let my guard down. And he had a really great sense of humor. He loved to do the thing where he wouldn’t let me catch him. He thought that was hilarious.

And then the second I would put my hand on him, he was like, OK, I just needed to get that out. He was the smartest, one of the smartest…

Tom Casciato: People?

Neko Case: … persons. He was a person.

Tom Casciato: Animals — and you might include that monster on the book cover — haven’t helped Neko Case figure all of it out, just some of it.

Neko Case: The older I get, the less I know and I can’t prove anything. But knowing who you are is a really big deal. I’m a gender-fluid person, for sure, and I do know that I’m part of the earth, and I am literally a mammal, and that is so comforting.

Not everything is so dire. We’re all animals.

Tom Casciato: Toward the end of the book, she makes a list of some of the things she’s seen on the road, some inspiring.

Neko Case: Pelicans suddenly rising like a swarm of army choppers over a sea cliff in Santa Cruz.

Tom Casciato: Some, she found hurtful.

Neko Case: Hate speech billboards put up by Christians in Missouri.

Tom Casciato: Some spectacular, if worrisome.

Neko Case: Acres of migrating endangered cranes out in stubby fields and wetlands.

Tom Casciato: Some not exactly applicable.

Neko Case: Signs telling me to reverse my vasectomy.

Tom Casciato: And considering the trauma and confusion she’s endured, she comes to a not entirely expected conclusion.

Neko Case: What a staggeringly beautiful world.

Tom Casciato: For the PBS “News Hour,” I’m Tom Casciato in New York City.