The Organ singer Katie Sketch explains the band’s break up
October 20th, 2008
In 2006, Canada’s second most famous indie lesbian band broke up. It was a big surprise - The Organ had finally been noticed by the press, they had released a couple of well-received singles and by all accounts were on the verge of being The Next Big Thing. Then they broke up, with no explanation. Now, 2 years later, singer Katie Sketch has finally explained what happened.
In an interview with The Lipster, Sketch explains how the pressures of touring damaged the relationships in the band and caused her to have a mental breakdown: “If a band is really supportive of one another and can help each other through things, it works really well, but at the end we were completely unable to communicate. We’d all become self-deprecating, we were fighting all the time… we were basically just drunk all the time. We had no time to separate, so it was like being in a bad domestic situation, all the time.”
“We were at that point where everyone in a band wants to get, right where the financial stuff isn’t going to be such a big deal, where we’d be able to tour and take personal space, but our relationships had deteriorated so much by that point. And quite frankly, I was not mentally well. Straight up. And I needed to get away from it, or something really bad was going to happen.”
“By the end, I feel like everybody in the band was mentally ill. Honestly. We really needed a break and the record label, everybody, was pushing, pushing, pushing.”
Despite the band breaking up, The Organ have released another EP, called Thieves
“I was not happy with that. At all. Threatening isn’t the right word, but I heard they were thinking about releasing it. So I freaked out, and during that freak-out period I realised that I really like the songs. People have been writing us, fans, asking about the songs, so I thought we should record them while we still remember them.”
Thieves will be the last recording for The Organ, and possible for Sketch as a musician too, due to problems with her record contract. “I can play live, but when it comes to releasing a record, they’ve [the record company] straight up said to me, if you release any music you will be sued. And that kind of pressure, after all the work that I’ve done, really isn’t like anything I need in my life right now.”
If they’re threatening to sue her, it’s probably b/c she broke a contract with them. I’m not quite sure that I can feel sorry for her. (obviously, we don’t know the whole story).