Chan Marshall, better known as Cat Power, took to the stage in Macau last month as part of The Script Road – Macau Literary Festival. Although it was the musician’s first time in Macau, it was not her first trip to China, having played at a festival in Shanghai last year, as well as visiting Taiwan on a number of occasions.
Of her experience with Chinese audiences, Chan was greatly impressed.
“People were gracious, awesome, and respectful and cool and knowledgeable, everything like everywhere else in the world”, she says.
The idea of being part of a literary festival did not faze the singer/songwriter one bit, being a published poet herself and often surrounding herself with writers.
“I’m a big fan of writers and I have a lot of writer friends. I used to do interviews for friends’ fanzines and I got to do interviews with many writers in the 90s”, she explains, adding with a laugh, “I’m a big fan of intelligent people”.
When it comes to writing lyrics, Chan is influenced by the world at large.
“I’m generally influenced by life, interaction, news, my past experiences, dreams, hopes”.
People such as the Dalai Lama, Gandhi and Malcom X, have all played a role in the singer’s spiritual development, as do “everyday people”.
As for writers, the singer favours a “more simplistic, direct response” approach, such as the work of Japanese writer Haruki Murakami.
“He writes fairly symbolically, and is quiet in a way”, she reflects, adding Oscar Wilde as another writer she admires. “I don’t think I pull directly from one or two”, Chan says of her influences, “it’s more like 400”.
“When I get to go to places like China, it means a lot to me because if I didn’t feel validated by people who respect me for what I do, I probably wouldn’t be alive”, Chan confesses. “People that respect me and invite me to their land, that makes me feel stronger and makes me respect my own life a lot more than I probably would”.
