Interview: Cincinnati Shoegaze Band Mary Henry

Return of the Sad Girl

This article, conducted in November of 2021, originally intended for Title Magazine, would not be possible without the direction of Chloe Sacre.

“Sad Girl” is an aesthetic with no singular definition. It’s provocative and comfortingly cliché. Maybe it evokes images of heavy eyeliner, or sobbing comic-book damsels, or lipstick-stained Marlboros, or glossy Lana Del Rey piano ballads, or platform boots, or even the grungy crest of the Riot Grrrl movement. Regardless, the concept of the Sad Girl is always emotional. Despite shifting values, society generally still sees emotions (and femininity) as weak or unimportant. But “Sad Girls” throughout history, from synthy 80’s punks to Kathleen Hanna devotees to the flashiness of y2k mall goths, have challenged existing gender dogmas by reclaiming certain concepts from their masculine connotations: Darkness, violence, anger. In the present world, abruptly pulled from individual isolations and largely disenchanted with the commodified brand of female empowerment slapped onto fast-fashion t-shirts, the art and emotions of women and non-binary people in alternative subcultures is a kaleidoscopic window into the future of expression, and should be revered as such. 

Named after a character in the 1962 horror film Carnival of Souls, Mary Henry are a shoegaze band from Cincinnati, Ohio, consisting of Hanna Katt on guitar, Clare Shaw on omnichord, Zoe Clark on bass, Alyssa Cassata on keys, and Corrie Cicale on drums. They share the task of singing. They often perform under a bloody wash of red lights that suits their sound fabulously: An amorphous, potent strain of post-punk that’s made them stand out in the scene, which is dominated both by indie rock, and men performing said indie rock. 

It’s a cold Sunday in November when I put on all my layers and embark on my walk to the house where three-fifths of the band lives, and all of them practice. I show up about an hour before their rehearsal and step into a comfortably human scene: The drumset is deconstructed on the practice room’s hardwood. A lava lamp glows on a bookshelf in the dining room, where a Sonic Youth clock ticks away on the wall. Mary Henry’s members (although Corrie is unfortunately absent) and I gather here, where one of the seating options is a detached car seat against the wall. I sit next to Clare, who has on a pair of Adventure Time themed Doc Martens. After a very informative conversation about Skinwalkers, we begin.

Do you think alternative music and fashion has experienced a reemergence in the past year? And in what ways?

Hanna: We formed our band during quarantine, I would say that from the local scene, there’s been a lot of people that have done the same thing where they started, like, using the time off from regular concerts to go do their own local projects. So that’s been really cool. I think at least from Cincinnati I can tell there’s a resurgence.

Clare: Yeah, I think the same with alternative fashion, I guess, because I learned how to use a sewing machine during COVID. And then I started doing a bunch of DIY clothes and stuff.

So I think that’s also had an influence on people, like the way people dress and stuff. 

MK: I can see that happening, because all the time alone with yourself…it kind of forces you to think “I should learn how to do this.”

Hanna: Yeah. I’ve been going to clothing swaps and stuff. I feel like sustainability just keeps getting more popular. 

How has your style evolved since you were younger? And what do you think has shaped that?

Zoe: I feel like when I was younger, probably 13, 14, 15, my style was more like how it is now, and I wasn’t as concerned about what people thought, and just kind of did whatever I wanted. And then as I got later in high school, I feel like I kind of went, like, “normie-core.” But I think that just leaving home and having a new opportunity to live somewhere else kind of helped me. And COVID too, like what you were saying about that “forced isolation,” definitely. It was an opportunity to do whatever you wanted, because there was no embarrassment because no one was there to see it, and you get comfortable doing it. And then, you know, you’re slowly coming back out into the world, and those things that you cared about for the past year and a half are like still with you, but now you’re going out and doing them, too.

Hanna: Yeah. I told Alyssa this earlier. I basically went from Aeropostale to my grandma’s clothes.

MK: I know so many people–and like, honestly, me too–who had a year or two in high school where they were like: “I’m going to be normal.” Then they just went right back [to alternative fashion]. 

Hanna: Yeah. Like high school, I found out about Goodwill for shopping. And I was like, “oh cool. I can find all these unique things and not have to go to the mall.”

I love Etsy and getting clothes off of there.

Clare: I went to Catholic school, so I feel like I was pretty “normal” there, but also it was a really country area, so I was the only person who wasn’t white. So when I started wearing different clothes, everyone made it like, “Oh, Asian style! That’s so cool!” And then I found the internet, and I was on Tumblr and stuff. So that’s where a lot of [my style] came from.

Alyssa: I guess I’d say it took me until high school. I don’t think I was very, like, conscious of what I was wearing until high school: Just starting to listen to music that wasn’t just whatever was on the radio. My dad introduced me to The Smiths and it just kinda went from there.

I think in high school, I thought I was doing something a lot of the time, but I like…wasn’t. Like I’d wear Crocs and I would be like, “Whoa, this is…’different.’” But then it probably really took me til college to experiment with different styles and stuff that I actually wanted to do.

As a newer band, what challenges have you faced in coming up, personal or other?

Hanna: We’ve been really grateful for all of the connections we’ve been kind of building over the years, like with me running Music Club and throwing shows around campus for that. So we haven’t had to plan any shows, but we definitely have been trying to find the balance between playing shows and writing new music and recording. We played a lot of gigs in October, and it’s hard to switch up your setlists when you’re just trying to perfect your gig line up.

Zoe: None of us had played a lot with other people in general before we started the band, which on one hand was kind of a challenge because there’s not necessarily one person who, like, really knows what’s going on, or what to do, or what’s right, or what’s normal. But also, it was a lot better that way too. I think because we had an opportunity to be really comfortable with each other and allow non-judgment. I feel like we’re all just kind of learning how to play with people. So one hand that was a challenge, but it was also a benefit.

Who are your influences and how do they play into your sound?

Hanna: Grouper is my number one because she’s just living this really cool life, like in the woods, and [she] field records and layers that into her music and stuff like that. It’s just very shoegazey, ambient, very mindful music. So I would say her. 

Obviously Slowdive is like a God to me with all the shoegaze influences and emotional pop, and probably Nirvana, cause I like when grunge and shoegaze kind of come together sometimes. So there’s bands like Nothing that are grunge-gaze.

Zoe: I feel like I have a lot of different influences. I don’t really feel like I can commit to a style or a particular genre, because there’s a lot that I feel like I can identify with, but I think within the past two years–and I know this isn’t much like what we play–I really like skramz and I really like emoviolence and powerviolence stuff. And I think that when I write a lot of the time, I kind of write it with stuff like that in mind, and then think about what we want to play in terms of our styles. But a lot of times when I do start writing something, it’s what I have in mind and then I just like, switch it up when I play with [the band]. And of course it’s going to sound like our own specific special style. 

I really liked like eighties hardcore and stuff as a kid, also shitty indie bands and stuff that’s fun. A little bit of everything. We’re just eclectic.

Clare: The thing that I least like about the music and art scene is I always feel like people are gonna be gatekeeping or pretentious about things. And it makes me want to not talk to anyone, and want to not do anything with music or go near it. 

But I think that [I’m influenced by] artists like Sydney Gish and Chai and ones that are super unserious, and you can tell they’re just having fun, doing whatever, not really caring about impressing anyone or being part of a specific scene necessarily. I don’t know if we ever sound like that or anything, but I think it’s bands like that that give me confidence to want to even attempt to make music.

Alyssa: I would say we started the band wanting to do some sort of shoegaze post-punk mix, and post punk is one of my favorite genres. So especially some of the synths in, like, Devo’s music–I’ve been on like a big Devo kick lately– and keyboards sounds like that would be cool to incorporate in future music.

What advice would you give to your younger self?

Hanna: I picked up guitar in fourth grade and would consistently play it for a little bit, put it back down, play with it, and not share it with anyone and be like; “I don’t know if I’m making any progress.” Finally once I met really good friends, it came together really well. So I think I’d probably tell my younger self to keep working at it and to find those meaningful connections to help take it to the next step.

Zoe: I think most kids worry about what’s going on around them and stuff, and if you’re growing up somewhere where it’s hard to find friends that are like-minded or have similar interests it can be kind of easy to minimize how passionate you are about something. 

I think I would probably just say spend more time alone. When I moved a lot–I moved a lot growing up–it was hard to make friends, and I knew I was moving soon and stuff, and it was kind of an opportunity for me to learn about myself. And then I entered my more “normie-core” era. That was when I had a lot more friends and was less, uh, introspective and doing stuff on my own less. Honestly, [my advice] probably would have been just to be single. Like not worry about what people think, who’s going to like me if I’m weird, and ugly, and stupid, and just, like, be weird, ugly, and stupid instead cause that’s what I wanted to do. Just be weird, and ugly and stupid! 

Oh, I have one more thing: Probably make myself uncomfortable by talking to more people that, you know, I think “Oh, they’re too good for me, I don’t belong here,” something like that. Just talk to people because everybody’s human and no one is, like, a magical person. 

MK: That’s good advice at any age I think. I’ve definitely noticed since moving here, since moving out of Findlay, Ohio, people care so much less about what you look like and what you do.

Clare: I’ve always kind of played instruments and tried to do more artistic things, but always on the side, just because I always was focusing on school and college and whatever. And now I’ve graduated, and I found a good job and I’m, like, conventionally successful, but I’m pretty unhappy. And I wish that I had spent more time doing things that I liked instead of listening to the people around me saying, “Oh, if you focus on these things, you’re going to be so much happier when you’re grown up,” because I’m not. I thought that like, “Whatever, I’ll be able to get money and then I’ll be happy or whatever,” and I have money now, but I hate working. Yeah, that’s it. I hate capitalism.

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*note: Corrie’s responses were added post-interview.