MUSIC: Katie back with a bang for CoastOut

Following her departure from girl group Bardot and for much of the last decade, flame-haired singer Katie Underwood was something of a regular fixture on Melbourne’s LGBTI scene. You were just as likely to see her on the dance floor with friends as performing her latest DJ collaboration on stage.

In July 2011, though, Underwood gave birth to twin girls, and her party commitments fell by the wayside.

Now, more than two years later, Underwood returns to the stage once more with a brand new track and an exclusive headline stint at this year’s CoastOut Festival.

“I was everywhere for a few years there, almost to the point of overdoing it. I love Lindt balls, but if I eat 100 of them in a day…I almost felt the same way about my own presence on the scene,” she told the Star Observer.

“Certainly having family slowed me down a little. Do I want to get back out there? I’m happy to dip my toe in. I would dearly love to have a hot track out there that people think is awesome, but performing in 100 different nightclubs? Not sure I’m quite ready to go back to that.”

Underwood’s new track came about thanks to the persistence of CoastOut festival organiser Todd Buttery. It’s due to Buttery’s incredible tenacity that CoastOut has grown into one of the jewels in the Coffs Harbour calendar – and he used that same persuasiveness to get Underwood locked in as this year’s headliner.

“Todd Buttery and I go way back, and ever since he moved to Coffs he’s been trying to get me to CoastOut. Because of babies and other reasons I kept saying no. I didn’t want to put myself back out there unless I had something new, but this year I said yes because I was working on tracks with someone overseas,” she explained.

“That ended up falling by the wayside, and I was having second thoughts about doing CoastOut, until Todd quite rightly said to me, ‘Well why don’t you just write something new? It is what you do, isn’t it?’ I really have to thank him for pushing me. He hooked me up with the Mystery Blonde crew, Damien [Goundrie], Andy [Young] and DJ Dan Murphy.”

Underwood couldn’t give too much away about the collaboration, but did say it’s ‘very much in theme’ with CoastOut. She’ll perform across three events at the Festival, starting with the welcome cocktail party at Park Beach Reserve on Friday October 25.

“I’ll be doing some tracks from my jazz album – a bit of a subdued and classy start, I suppose.”

From there, Underwood will unleash her dance diva for the rest of the weekend, with a set at the Party in the Park daytime event before debuting the new track at the Sweet Dance Party that evening.

“I thought, Todd’s getting me up there, he may as well exploit me as much as possible! I’ll be doing three different shows, but I’ll also get to kick back and relax with the rest of the festivalgoers – I’ll be there all weekend.”

 

INFO: CoastOut Festival, October 25-27. www.coastout.com.au