Listen to article \u2022\u00a00:00 min<\/p>\n
Even by rock and roll standards, the egos and drama within Tuna and the Rock Cats are something to behold. <\/p>\n
Sometimes, in the middle of a show, the band\u2019s lead guitarist \u2014 St. Claude \u2014 will decide that he\u2019d prefer to play Christmas music, and begin performing \u201cJingle Bells.\u201d <\/p>\n
Roux, on clarinet, is a prodigy. But Annie, who plays the chimes, can be volatile; sometimes, if it gets too hot during a show, she\u2019ll simply lie down onstage, refusing to continue. <\/p>\n
\u201cAnnie also plays guitar,\u201d says Samantha Martin, the band\u2019s founder. \u201cBut she wants to beat up the keyboard player, and we can\u2019t have brawls onstage.\u201d <\/p>\n
Behind the meowsic<\/p>\n
Despite this artistic anarchy \u2014 or perhaps because of it \u2014 Tuna and the Rock Cats have become an extremely hot ticket. Billed as the world\u2019s only all-cat band, the Georgia-based group has been selling out venues across the country for years \u2014 strumming guitars, pawing piano keys, and batting at chimes from Seattle to St. Louis.<\/p>\n
Just how big are The Rock Cats?<\/p>\n
In Philadelphia, their current stop on a two-month U.S. tour, they were originally slated to play four shows at the 350-seat Suzanne Roberts Theatre<\/a> on Broad Street. <\/p>\n When those quickly sold out, a fifth show was added. <\/p>\n On Instagram, the group has nearly 100,000 followers<\/a>. They\u2019ve been featured on the Netflix series Cat People.<\/a> A couple years ago, they left Theo Von mesmerized during an appearance on his wildly-popular podcast, This Past Weekend<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cIt really is just fascinating to think about them cats and everything they\u2019re doin\u2019,\u201d Von gushed.<\/p>\n Martin, a former wildlife educator, has been directing this Meowtly Cr\u00fce for about two decades, in addition to training animals for TV and film.<\/p>\n Early in her career, she gravitated toward \u201cmisfit\u201d animals: snakes, spiders, rats. (\u201cRats will never let you down,\u201d she explains.) But then she eventually met Tuna, a cat \u201cso brilliant I said, \u2018Let\u2019s give this cat thing a try.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n The band\u2019s first show was in 2006, at an art gallery in Chicago. The group had only three members then, but when people heard there was a troupe of cats ready to perform, they lined up to get in.<\/p>\n The show, Martin says, was \u201chorrible.\u201d<\/p>\n Which is to say, it went fabulously. <\/p>\n \u201cPeople loved that the show was horrible,\u201d Martin says. \u201cThey love the fails more than the successes.\u201d <\/p>\n Since then, she\u2019s taught an array of cats to \u201cplay\u201d a variety of instruments, some better than others. During performances, Martin joins the band onstage, giving visual and verbal cues \u2014 she mimes a tapping motion when she wants a cat to paw its instrument, for instance \u2014 and doling out treats for a job well done.<\/p>\n How are the Rock Cats, musically?<\/p>\n That depends who you ask.<\/p>\n While their commercial success is undeniable, critical acclaim has been mixed. One reviewer, in Seattle, described the group\u2019s style as \u201can unpredictable assortment of instrument clanging,\u201d adding that \u201crarely does it sound like the cats are playing the same song, let alone an actual, fully realized piece of music.\u201d Another bemoaned the fact that, at a Christmas-themed performance, the band did not actually play much holiday music \u2014 though this critique seemed a bit harsh. <\/p>\n They are, after all, cats.<\/p>\n On the road<\/p>\n Tour life is not all bottle-service and Fancy Feast. <\/p>\n Packed onto their tour bus at any given time are Martin, tour manager Ashley Murnan, tour assistant Amanda Fenick, feline care coordinator Willie Zamora, roughly 15 cats, and a chicken named Cluck Norris, who plays the cymbal.<\/p>\n While the cats largely have the run of the bus, \u201cthe humans have a six-foot, coffin-sized bunk in a drawer,\u201d says Murnan. Earlier on their current tour, in Baltimore, their generator \u2014 which powers the entire bus \u2014 went out for two weeks, putting them 10 days behind schedule.<\/p>\n And this is to say nothing of the challenge inherent in managing 16 distinct personalities \u2014 a mixed bag of climbers, swatters, and what have you. <\/p>\n \u201cThe band is chaos,\u201d says Martin. \u201cThey\u2019re all over the place.\u201d<\/p>\n She never misses a show.<\/p>\n Martin has performed with a broken foot, with cancer, and with a voice so raspy it could hardly be heard through her microphone. Once, she paid to have the band\u2019s broken-down tour bus towed from Wisconsin to Chicago in order to get to a show on time.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a $2,000 tow,\u201d she says, \u201cbut we made it.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite the drama, Martin adores the cats, all of whom were once orphans, rescues, or strays. When they\u2019re not touring, they live with her in Georgia, where she cooks them fresh chicken and salmon and turkey. (Martin also runs a nonprofit \u2014 Rock Cats Rescue, Inc. \u2014 that partners with local organizations to get cats adopted.) <\/p>\n Even Miki \u2014 her impossibly apathetic trumpet player who was found abandoned in a discarded Huggies box \u2014 has stolen her heart. <\/p>\n \u201cThey put a roof over my head,\u201d she says. \u201cGranted, it\u2019s leaky and the gutters are falling off.\u201d<\/p>\n