Crash the Great revive old songs in “New Name” | News, Sports, Jobs

Staff photo / Andy Gray Kat Fitzgerald, who performs as Crash the Great, will host a release party for her debut album, “A New Name,” at Modern Methods Brewing Company on Saturday

Crash the Great see their debut album “A New Name” as a look back at the person they once were.

“It feels like an elegy for someone who is gone, but I’m paying tribute to and doing justice to, my younger self,” said Kat Fitzgerald, who performs as a solo artist under the name Crash the Great and also plays in the band Flowers for Bill. “My 20s weren’t easy. I’ve come a long way since then and I want to honor that.”

Fitzgerald, who grew up in Youngstown and lives in Warren, will play a CD release show at Modern Methods Brewing Company on Saturday night, and “A New Name” will be available on all major streaming services starting Sunday.

The album features five originals and four covers. Fitzgerald wrote the originals between 2011 and 2017, and two of them were released as singles when they were signed to an independent label in 2016.

“It just wasn’t a good partnership,” Fitzgerald said. “They had no experience in what they were doing and neither did I.”

Fitzgerald always wanted to give her early material the treatment she felt the songs deserved, and so with the encouragement of Joe Carbon Jr., the drummer for Flowers for Bill and the producer of “A New Name,” Fitzgerald decided to do a “quasi-Taylor Swift thing” and revive those songs.

“I wanted to release them as someone with a little more experience,” they said. “I’m a stronger musician now. I wanted to do them justice… It’s like reaching back and embracing that person – ‘You were worth it. Your work was worth it. I know you didn’t think that way then, but you deserve to be heard in the best way possible.’ It’s like saying goodbye to the younger version of myself while also accepting them as part of my story.”

They decided to record the album with just vocals and piano, with no other musicians, and will be played as Crash the Great when Fitzgerald performs at various venues in the area.

Some of the songs, however, Fitzgerald hasn’t played in years. “Route 80” was the first song Fitzgerald wrote and hasn’t been played since their first band. “Redemption,” a song they wrote music for years ago to a poem by their friend Fritz Houy, had only been played once before, to make a primitive recording as a gift to Houy.

“It’s a very dark song, very dark material, but I wanted to highlight my compositional skills,” Fitzgerald said. “It was the first time I’d ever just written music for something, and also he’s a very gifted writer who hasn’t had the opportunity to put his stuff out there, so I wanted to take this opportunity to do that for us and for him.”

The dark tone of the originals is also reflected in the selected cover songs. The most famous is Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”, which Fitzgerald fell in love with as a child after hearing it in the film “Shrek”.

“It’s one of the first songs I learned on the piano,” they said. “It’s one of my favorite songs to sing. You can put so much power into it. It’s a tender song, but also a really raw song. I know there are a million cover versions out there, but I wanted to contribute my own.”

Fitzgerald also covers “Tomorrow Is Today,” an obscure early song by Billy Joel.

“That song was Billy Joel’s suicide letter,” Fitzgerald said. “He attempted suicide in his 20s, and that (the lyrics) was his letter. After he survived, he put it on ‘Cold Spring Harbor’ (Joel’s album before ‘Piano Man’). It’s kind of about giving up, but also holding on to that one little spark of hope you have left.”

“I really felt that deep in my soul back then and that song has always been very important to me. I love the lyrics, I love the piano part. It’s my favorite and has influenced me a lot. I wanted to pay tribute to it and I couldn’t think of a better song.”

Fitzgerald also sings “Echo,” which features lyrics by her Flowers for Bill bandmate Alyson Byerly Carbon and music by the bands 713 BC (the duo of Alyson and Joe Carbon) and Amnesty for Astronauts (the Carbons’ previous group).

“Aly and I have a lot of the same family traumas, and that’s what this song is about,” Fitzgerald said. “She was like, ‘I feel like you understand this song,’ and was kind enough to let me record it. One of the sweetest things she said to me was, ‘Now that you’re singing the song, after all these years, I finally feel like it’s finished because you understand it.'”

“Hope” was originally written and recorded by metal band Crucify the Hopeless, who signed to the same label as Fitzgerald, who also briefly worked as the band’s tour manager. They created a solo piano arrangement of the song and received their permission to record it.

“I hope it’s some kind of bright spot on the album,” Fitzgerald said. “It definitely has some spiritual undertones. I’m not a religious person, but I’m definitely a spiritual person. It’s not a happy, super-optimistic song, but it’s a spiritually bright song, and I’m very grateful to Nick (Cheatle) and Derek (McGrath) for giving me the opportunity to record it.”

Fitzgerald will play “A New Name” in full at the release show. Music begins at around 9 p.m. Saturday at Modern Methods. Fitzgerald hopes the CDs will arrive in time to be sold at the event. If not, CDs will be available for order at the release show.

The start time was moved up to avoid clashing with a 7 p.m. candlelight vigil in Sharon, Pennsylvania, for Pauly Likens, a 14-year-old transgender teenager who was murdered last month.

While “A New Name” gives Fitzgerald a chance to revisit their past, they also look to the future. Fitzgerald is working on new songs and plans to release one of them in the fall.

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