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Music

Listen to a New Native Cats Song and Help Support Trans Lifeline

The Hobart duo are calling on support for the US helpline that has received a record number of calls since the election result.

​At the moment, Tasmania feels a long way from Washington, DC, both geographically and politically. But Hobart duo Native Cats are calling on people to help Trans Lifeline​, a US-based support hotline that has taken a record number of calls since the US election result.

The duo of Chloe Alison Escott and Julian Teakle have released a new track "Soft Chambers" as a pay-what-you-want download on their Bandcamp page, with all money going to support the San Francisco​ based organisation.

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Taken from an upcoming album to be released on RIP Society​ in early 2017, "Soft Chambers"​ was written in early 2015 before Chloe started transitioning and she says it's the most complex song the band have tackled. "We wrote the bare bones (Julian's bass, my lyrics) in my last months of denial before I came out and started transitioning. This year I came back to it with my new lease on life and made it what it is now. Appropriately it's a song about healing from trauma and physically revisiting moments from your past."

The track features a spoken recording from poet and podcaster merritt k, the vocals of Lisa Rime from Bad Luck Charms, and Ithaca, New York percussionist Sarah Hennies.

On a statement on their Bandcamp page Chloe says that the work of merrtit k was an important help with her own experience. "I don't know her personally but back in 2013 when I didn't know jack shit about trans people I started following her work and learned a VERY important fact of which I was NOT previously aware, which is that you can be trans and also a hilarious punk if you want to, AND I DID WANT TO. (And now you know too!)"

Chloe also writes about  the dangers and fears that many face in the United States right now.

"Hate crimes have been on the rise in the US all year as their perpetrators feel more emboldened and justified. Between immediate physical threats and online hate and very real fears over the many ways life could become a lot less manageable in the next few years, there are countless people right now, queer people and Muslims and people of colour and everyone else who's been targeted in one way or another by the president-elect and his crew, who are trying to stay safe or find reasons to keep living or not relapse into addiction or --

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In short: shit's gonna happen but shit's already happening, and it was happening before but it just got a lot worse."

Read the full statement here​ and listen/download/support the track below.

The new Native Cats album will be released on RIP Society​ in early 2017.

​Image: Kirsty Madden