CATALDO - DUMBER AND OLDER - REUNION TOUR

“I was born in the 80s:

Too late for the good shit, too early to get over it.

Too young to be dull, too old to be sharp.”

- “If You’re a Lifer”

With time, we become both older and wiser.

What a comforting thought - a salve to smooth over the battle scars, and accompanying wrinkles, as the years pass. If we are forced to move past the excitement and open horizon of youth, at least we get something for the trouble. We get self-assurance, an accumulation of knowledge, a hard-won peace at the core of who we are. We can finally rest.

But Cataldo’s Eric Anderson has one question - if that’s true, why does he feel so much dumber now? Why does everything feel more complicated, less certain, actually? Is it because things didn’t work out the way he planned? Is it just him? It can’t be, even a singer-songwriter knows that.

You see, since 2005 things have almost happened for Cataldo.

Anderson would have rather been featured on “Grey’s Anatomy” when a good sync was enough to rocket a mid-level band to stardom. No dice, but a Cataldo song was featured without credit on Sunday Night Football in 2021 for exactly 10 seconds.

Speaking of “a mid-level band struggling with their own limitations in the harsh face of stardom,” he would have rather soundtracked an iconic moment in a Cameron Crowe movie. Not in the cards, but Cameron Crowe did order a Cataldo CD (and never responded to a very heartfelt note Eric tucked into the shipment).

So while Cataldo has put out five records, worked with legendary West Coast producers like Tucker Martine and John Vanderslice, established a touring toe-hold on both coasts, and collaborated with powerhouse songwriters like Death Cab for Cutie’s Ben Gibbard, Anderson’s career has been one of the sleepers - a “musician’s musician” who makes enough on streaming to buy a reliable used car but remains under the radar for most.

With his sixth album, Dumber and Older, written during the pandemic when he had plenty of time to muse on where he had been versus where he thought he wanted to go, Anderson came to a surprising conclusion - maybe the almost happening but not like I meant it to happen is the best part.

Maybe that’s a relief. Maybe it’s better this way - bigger, messier, more nuanced, resistant to plans, and absolutely, without a doubt, extremely dumb.

“Of all the songwriters I know, Eric is one of the great ones”

- Ben Gibbard

Laid off from his day job of 11 years in 2020, Anderson suddenly had a lot of time to create Dumber and Older.

“I was writing late at night when the apartment was quiet, demoing and sending tracks back and forth with engineer Andy Park.” (Pedro the Lion, Deep Sea Diver, Deftones, and others).

Anderson found that the lyrics he was using as placeholders, lyrics he thought were too simple or intuitive, revealed themselves to be the most direct and sincere songs he had ever written.

He reflects back on the instinct to prove your worth through songs, and how that can obscure the core of the song itself. “You don’t get points for using a $3 word if something less pretentious is more precise, or sings better. It’s actually much harder and scarier to be straightforward, to be seen.”

The album’s opening track, “If You’re a Lifer” gets right to the point, looking at the younger generation coming up and opening the door rather than barring entrance. “If I’m James Dean, you’re Easy Rider. If I’m Led Zeppelin III, you’re Holy Diver. You’re Keanu in Speed, I’m your Winona Ryder. Why hide from history if you’re a lifer?”

It’s a balancing act between wit and sincerity, exhaustion and hope. In “Out of Reach” Anderson drives to the heart of how it feels to wait for things to just fall into place, while slowly realizing it’s never going to happen. “Let’s make a baby in a year or two, nature willing when there’s a little less on our plates. If I’m lucky it will be like you. ‘Cause if we stall ‘til my heart’s peaceful, god that’s gonna be a wait.”

“Good Moment At The Wrong Time” reminds us that getting older sometimes doesn’t look that different from our youth. In a breathtaking groove, Anderson propels the listener through a late night with a crush, reclaiming bad decisions and big feelings that don't fade if we don’t want them to.

Dumber and Older features the incredible vocals of Al Menne (Pickle Boy, Great Grandpa) and Caroline Smith. A who’s who grab bag of Northwest drummers are behind the kit including Micheal Lerner (Telekinesis), Jason McGerr (Death Cab For Cutie), Sheridan Riley (Alvvays), Sean Lane (Pedro the Lion), Aaron Benson, and Alex Westcoat. Erik Walters (Pedro the Lion) played guitar while Tyler Carroll (The Jonas Brothers, yup) picked up bass.

Being older and wiser is often thought of as the ultimate destination - finally having an accurate view of the world and your place in it.

But the only accurate view Anderson has reached after a few decades of the climb is this: being dumber might actually be wiser.

It’s getting comfortable with just not knowing. It’s being frustrated by what hasn’t happened, and grateful for what has, and being able to hold both of those things side by side.

It’s letting your life evolve in ways you never planned, like when Anderson used the pandemic years to help his wife Corrie expand her company, Good Luck Bread, into sourdough frozen pizza delivery.

It’s messing shit up, and getting some big stuff right. It’s letting your youthful certainty about how things work get slowly and ruthlessly dismantled. It’s leaving enough room, with yourself and others, for grace.

Dumber and Older speaks to that full, wobbly circle of hope and acceptance, because life is short and what you’ve got just might be enough.