Children of the Rat Temple
Southern Illinois
Katt Holiday and Jonathan Nelson started a band together when they were in junior high. They called themselves Rat House and covered their favorite punk bands. Fast forward years later and they may have altered their name but their love for making music has stayed the same.
Children of the Rat Temple are coming back for their second DEVIATE performance and are sure to bring something different to the stage with their sound that’s a little bit of everything including punk, EDM, psych, folk, blues and more. They plan to showcase their new songs and even plan on bringing more visual elements to the stage this year! See for yourself this year in downtown Beloit on September 16.
September 16
Tell us about your music? How would you describe your style/sound? Our music is pretty wide ranging sonically and accordingly seems to appeal to a diverse crowd (which we love). In our music there are strains of punk, EDM, psych, Latin music, Ska, glam, Dub, even some maybe less apparent elements like blues and folk and many other influences all sort of filtered through a lens of exploration. We try not to limit ourselves too much as far as what can be incorporated.
Our good friends in the band Subtropolis described us as “electro-psychedelic world beat”, which is the best short description I have heard so far.
Where do you find the inspiration for your music?
Everywhere! Films, books, conversation, meditation, memory, experience, death/rebirth, human nature, Mother Nature, the passage of time, struggle, trauma, joy, pain, desire, love, dreams…in a word - life. Inspiration is not a fixed element, it doesn’t come from specific places and personally it’s not necessarily important when, where, or how it might make itself known…you just need keep yourself as open to it as possible.
Where can we find your work? What other events have you been involved in? Currently you can find our music on Bandcamp, Spotify, and pretty much all major (and minor) streaming platforms - and we have a growing number of videos on YouTube (via our own channel and our partners Alt. News 2646) — physical copies can be ordered through our Bandcamp page and also can be found at various music stores across the Midwestern US.
What do you want us to know about your music/style? We are not your typical “rock” band or typical “EDM” artist…we fall somewhere on the far edges of those two anchor points maybe, but we keep our minds/hearts/ears open to what life has to offer.
What’s your background? How did you get into music? Give us a little history! Rat Temple at its core is myself (Katt Holiday) and my oldest and dearest friend Jonathan Nelson - we have been friends basically our whole lives, and both played music from a very young age. We started playing music together in junior high and started our first band around that time called RAT HOUSE, playing covers of our favorite punk bands at the time: Operation Ivy, Ramones, Mustard Plug, etc. We started writing originals, added a couple members and the band name changed to SKANK. That went on for a while through high-school and eventually we parted ways, a few of us moved away for college/other bands/life, etc.
Eventually Jonnie and I both moved back to our home area and started playing music together again - and since it was just he and I like it was in the first place, we decided to revert to our original name (with an added spiritual element) to become what we always were: Children of the Rat Temple.
How was your DEVIATE experience last year? Why did you want to come back again? Deviate last year was great. So many cool artists (both audio AND visual) and so much going on all in the space of a day. We played right after Tynacity - a rapper from the Dallas, Texas area…really loved his set and I think our styles worked well together. We wanted to come back because we had such a good time last year, and the event was so different than other things we get to play. Seeing so many different forms of expression in the span of a day was refreshing, and as for our set - the crowd was into it (even though probably only a couple of them had ever seen us before) …and that kind of positive response is what you always want as a performer.
Do you plan on doing anything differently at Deviate this year? We have been busy writing, recording, and performing in the past year so we will have new music we will definitely be bringing to the Deviate stage this year, which is exciting. We have also added more visual and ritual elements to our stage show since last year…but I don’t want to give too much of that away… people will have to just wait and see. Anyways, the anticipation always makes things better!
What are you looking forward to at Deviate this year? This year at Deviate we are looking forward to meeting other artists and seeing what new and interesting art will be showcased. There was so much to see last year I would imagine it will be even better this year! Also, we have a friend or two that will be featured artists, so it will be nice to hopefully catch up with them.
Why should people come to Deviate this year? Deviate is an “it is what you make it” kind of event…what I mean by that is - if someone wanted to just sort of walk through and see the sights they could certainly do that - but I feel like most booths and artists really invited a more hands-on kind of interaction…thinking of last year there was the coaster ping-pong game, the tattoo booth, so many others, the fashion show, it’s really an interactive event and there’s so much to see and do in one place, and I feel like that amount of diversity allows someone to really make the event their own as far as what they see and do. It’s malleable in a way that a lot of other events are not.