There are jazz cats, and than there are The Hissy Kits. Donning cat suits paired with shades and paw gloves, Whiskie and Scotch pop up in bars, stores and more to perform old-timey tunes and original songs peppered with meows, with both singing at the higher end of the vocal register. Scotch plays piano while Whiskie interacts with the crowd and plays the theremin, an electronic instrument with a catlike wail that inspired their feline personas.
The Milwaukee duo describes themselves as a cabaret act in the style of “Feline Expressionism” – playing a song “how a cat might express it,” Whiskie says. That means kitty noises, puns and props like yarn, but the alter egos also give the longtime professional musicians the chance to eschew perfectionism when recording. As cats, “we already assume we’re perfect,” Whiskie says.
Celebrate this year’s winners of the Betty Awards!
Their identity is a secret. Even when I met them for an interview, they arrived in full feline regalia. The mystery is part of the fun, they say. “The backstory of us is not nearly as interesting as the backstory of the Hissy Kits,” Scotch adds.
The shows started a year ago as an underground act for fellow musicians, and they were purely instrumental. When the duo’s theremin – an instrument notoriously sensitive to electromagnetic forces – died before a show in Chicago, Whiskie pivoted to singing Purcell’s famously tragic aria “Dido’s Lament,” entirely in meows. “That’s when the phenomenon started,” she says.
Since then, the Hissy Kits developed a signature style with their own lore. According to the liner notes of their first album, Just Add Meows, Whiskie and Scotch are residents of a mysterious Milwaukee supper club, Ruby Rae’s Hideaway, who learned to play musical instruments by sneaking onstage at night.
Their repertoire of early-20th-century songs stems from Scotch’s background in big band music – and the fact that the tunes are public domain, which means the duo doesn’t have to pay royalties to record. Plus, many venues that they play lack a license to perform copyrighted works, which limits them to booking “bands that only do originals or old-timey stuff,” Scotch says. “We do both.” Their own compositions, such as “The Enchanted Cat” and “Tails of Two Kitties,” still follow the stylings of the Great American Songbook.
“It’s kind of a sneaky way to introduce kids to some of the classic American songs,” Whiskie says. “We always say we gear our shows towards adults, but it’s for all ages, and especially well-behaved children are welcome.”
It was a TMJ4 segment that dragged them into the spotlight. Since then, the Hissy Kits have found a litter of fans who meow along. They’ve sold out shows in Chicago, played the Milwaukee Art Museum, and even showed up on “America’s Got Talent.” Whiskie says audiences expect them to be “so bad it’s good,” and then end up surprised by the show. “People come to jeer, stay to cheer.”
“We’re serious musicians,” Scotch says. “We might have fun with things, but we’re always absolutely playing our best.” After touring for much of October, the Hissy Kits will return to Milwaukee with a “purr-anormal” Halloween concert at the Central Library on Oct. 27 and two sold-out shows at MKE Ultra on Oct. 28.
