Exclusive Interview With The Great Kat in DeansPlanet.com Celebrity Interviews

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Exclusive Interview With The Great Kat in DeansPlanet.com Celebrity Interviews
By Jeremy The Loner, DeansPlanet.com Celebrity Interviews

After completing my interview with guitar virtuoso The Great Kat, three thoughts immediately came to mind; The Great Kat is certainly not shy when it comes to self-promotion. The Great Kat probably spends a good potion of her waking hours SHOUTING. The word "humble" is not in The Great Kat's personal lexicon.
Maybe you've never heard of The Great Kat, also known as Katherine Thomas--if not, I wouldn't advise that you tell her that. Considered by many to be one of the premier shredders on the planet (male or female), Kat does interviews with the same ferocious intensity that she pours into her music, a genre she refers to as "shred/classical." A classically trained musician, The Great Kat graduated with honors from the Juilliard School of Music, where she was known as a violin prodigy. It was at Juilliard that Kat studied the work of classical masters such as Beethoven, Bach, Wagner and Mozart. As for whether she was drooling blood and whipping male "peons" back in those days is anybody's guess. But her chops as a violin player were so impressive, Kat managed to score a solo recital at the prestigious Carnegie Hall. Not long afterward, she decided that classical music was "dead" and that she was the only one who could resurrect it, reinvent it and bring it to the "moron masses." (It would seem that Kat has much the same attitude about the music buying public as I do--a lot of you must be morons, considering some of the s**t that's popular these days.)

I wasn't sure what to expect when I popped in The Great Kat's new DVD, Extreme Guitar Shred--but what I got was an intense, blistering set of short music videos complete with disturbing imagery and shrieking vocals. Kat herself comes off as a bondage queen from the depths of Hades, dressed in sexy bondage gear and scowling at the camera, seemingly making every effort to not look sexy. (As far as I can tell, this woman has never smiled prettily for the camera.) The songs are short, note for note arrangements of familiar classical arrangements, cranked up to 11 and played with dizzying speed. How ANYBODY could play in that style for an entire concert is beyond me--hell, just listening to it is enough to almost shred the skin right off your fingertips in a spray of sweat and blood. The Great Kat doesn't so much play her instruments; it's more like she beats the living shit out of them. And whether or not her style is your cup of tea, you have to admit this chick has some serious chops. That might well be part of the reason she seems so pissed off--in an industry dominated by men, it's still hard for some people to accept that a woman can truly shred on the guitar. Kat feels that she threatens the status quo, and the only thing keeping her from getting the recognition she deserves is the fact that she doesn't have a d**k. However, if she did have a d**k, I'm sure she'd be more than happy to tell you to s**k it. This attitude is made perfectly clear in the lyrics of some of her songs, such as these lyrics from the Punishment track found on her Wagner's War CD;

"Kick him in the face
Skin him alive
Disembowel and burn him to a crisp
Throw his cadaver in a pile of crap
PUNISH HIM!
SPIT ON HIM!"

I think you get the picture. The Great Kat is a fascinating character, always eager to tell you what a genius she is and how she's the ONLY musician alive that matters. She also has a penchant for referring to herself in the third person, with an extreme arrogance that's actually somewhat charming. I like the "balls" on this woman, if you catch my drift. Besides, if YOU don't think that you're great, how can you expect anybody else to?

I'm not sure where Katherine Thomas ends and The Great Kat begins--but after checking out her CD and DVD, I found myself strangely enthralled by her. I mean, take a look at some of these pictures... can you image this woman doing normal things like, say, waiting in line at the post office? Can you imagine The Great Kat buying milk at the grocery store, or spending a quiet evening reading in bed? I sure as hell can't. I'd prefer to think she's using a whip on someone as you read this, calling them a "peon" and forcing them to lick her leather boots.

So, here's the interview. It's definitely not like any of my others. In fact, Kat was so busy promoting herself, I'm not entirely sure she even read all of my questions. Some of the s**t she wrote had nothing to do with what I was asking, but seeing as how that tends to be her style, I didn't worry too much about it. She'd just as soon "throw my cadaver in a pile of crap" as she would answer my pointless questions. So here's how it went down, with her punctuation and use of ALL CAPS left intact;
The Great Kat: OF COURSE Beethoven would be into The Great Kat’s SHREDDING STYLE, because Beethoven was the FIRST METALHEAD and INVENTED the “TRIPLE FORTE (EXTREMELY LOUD) DYNAMICS” in SYMPHONIC ORCHESTRATION!!!! Beethoven slammed EVERY piano piece he wrote with FURIOUS ANGER and ABSOLUTE INTENSITY!!!!!!!!!!!! BEETHOVEN WOULD BE ON HIS KNEES THANKING THE GREAT KAT for CONTINUING his LEGACY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jeremy The Loner: Forgive this existential question, but I have to ask--does Katherine Thomas "become" The Great Kat in the same way Vincent Furnier "becomes" Alice Cooper? I've seen your DVD, and it makes me wonder if you're wearing leather and beating the hell out of a male subordinate as we're doing this interview.
The Great Kat: The Great Kat AND Katherine Thomas are BOTH GOD and we are WEARING LEATHER and BEATING THE HELL out of PEASANTS ALL DAY LONG-not JUST DURING THIS INTERVIEW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! NOW BOW SLAVE and LICK MY SPIKED HEEL, PEON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Jeremy The Loner: I know The Great Kat is the ONLY music that matters and that you listen to pretty much only classical. But come on, does EVERYTHING recorded this century suck?
Surely The Great Kat has some CDs in her car other than ones by Wagner and Beethoven.

The Great Kat: Yes, All Music besides The Great Kat and the Classical Masters SUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YOU ALREADY KNOW THAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jeremy The Loner: Let's say I'm a 17 year old kid that watches MTV religiously and listens only to Mariah Carey. Would you want to "convert" such a person, or are they not even worth bothering with?

The Great Kat: I don’t bother converting people!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jeremy The Loner: Would The Great Kat sell out and record a hip hop album (or something else just as mindless) if somebody offered her a multi-million dollar contract to do so?

The Great Kat: The Great Kat does NOT “Sell Out”!!! The Great Kat MAY BLESS any form of music that The Great Kat DEEMS WORTHY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jeremy The Loner: Why should the uninitiated buy your "Extreme Guitar Shred" DVD or any of your CDs? What is on there that they haven't seen or heard before?

Jeremy The Loner: Do you think The Great Kat will ever play Carnegie again? If so, in what capacity?

The Great Kat: If those OUT-OF-DATE, STUFFY, ARCHAIC, OLD-FASHIONED, RELIGIOUS, FEARFUL CLASSICAL IDIOTS at CARNEGIE HALL decide to UPDATE and GET INTO THE INTERNET AGE, then maybe I’ll BLESS THOSE OLD BASTARDS WITH MY SHREDDING BEETHOVEN BRILLIANCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jeremy The Loner: What would you say to your fans that are reading this interview?

The Great Kat: BOW!!! WORSHIP!!! SPREAD THE WORD OF SHRED/CLASSICAL TO THE UNINFORMED MASSES!!!!!!!!!!

Jeremy The Loner: So, what's next for the Great Kat? Should we all be very, very afraid?


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