The Catalyst interview: Colbie Caillat

Colbie Caillat’s debut single, “Bubbly,” was one of the breakout hits of 2007, with sales of more than 2.6 million downloads in America alone. The country – and the world – fell hard for the 21-year-old sloe-eyed blonde from Malibu and her sunny, optimistic acoustic pop song about the effervescence of pure love.

Caillat’s first album, Coco, sold more than two million copies.

Caillat, who shares the bill with fellow singer/songwriter Gavin DeGraw Friday at The Sound, topped the charts with her second album, 2009’s Breakthrough, and to date has racked up an impressive array of hit songs including “Realize,” “Fallin’ For You,” “Brighter Than the Sun,” “Lucky” (with Jason Mraz) and “Try.”

Musically restless, Caillat will release an acoustic country album, Along the Way, in September. It’s an extension of Gone West, an acoustic quartet she was part of from 2018 to 2020.

This is the only show Caillat and DeGraw are doing together in Florida.

St. Pete Catalyst: You called your second album Breakthrough. What was your own breakthrough like?

Colbie Caillat: Well, I auditioned for American Idol a couple of times. And I just wasn’t right for the show – all around, it wasn’t a right fit. So it made sense to me why I got turned down.

But my friend put my songs on Myspace, and that’s how I got found, and got a record deal. And the title of my album Breakthough is really me learning more who I was as an artist. I always had stage fright, and how my career happened for me, with Myspace and then going out on tour and performing with the stage fright, all of it was just really exhausting. And quite terrifying.

As much as I was grateful, and it was cool, it was really difficult for me. And so Breakthrough is really me just breaking through as an artist, just getting more comfortable with who I was and with the position I was fortunate to be in.

Is there a moment when you’re out there in front of thousands of people and you suddenly notice the stage fright is gone?

Yes, and it happens all the time. And I will say, both are still there. The stage fright is still there. I’ve never just, like, ‘Let me up onstage – I can’t wait to do this!’ It’s always ‘Oh, why did I say yes to this?’ And I don’t know why I always go back to that. But that’s my first reaction. And then once I’m up onstage, and the audience is singing and I’m having a blast, I’m like ‘I’m so glad I said yes to this. Why do I get scared?’

And then a week later I’m ‘Oh, I have another show? Shoot!’ And then it’s the same. It’s like amnesia.

Maybe it keeps you from getting complacent. Maybe you need to have that case of nerves every time.

You know, people say that, that ‘nerves means you care,’ but honestly I don’t like them. I don’t want them. ‘Cause it makes me feel like I’m ungrateful, to be not excited.

My friend Gavin DeGraw, he loves entertaining. He loves performing. He can’t wait to do it. And I wish I had that. So I am trying to re-train my brain. I think you can re-train your brain in a lot of ways, and so every time I start to think those negative thoughts I’m trying to shift it to the perspective of like ‘You’re going to have fun!’ ‘Oh my God, you GET the opportunity to do this!’

So it’s a process, but I think it’s working a little.

So you and Gavin are pals?

Oh yeah, we’re like best friends.

Have you toured together before?

We toured together back in 2012, I think it was, and we wrote a song together (‘We Both Know’) that was in this move Safe Haven. We were nominated for a Grammy together. So we’ve been close friends since then, and we’re still like BFF’s. It’s awesome.

Are you using a full band?

It’s a full band, but there’s lots of different dynamics to the show. He plays an hour, I play an hour, we play half an hour together. We have stripped-down parts of the show where it’s just me and a guitar player, or me and a piano player. Or Gavin’ll do something stripped down on his piano. We start one of my songs, ‘I Never Told You,’ Gavin plays it on the piano and the first verse and chorus is just me and him, and then the band kicks in.

So there’s lots of fun elements that keep it interesting for us onstage, and for the audience.

Some artists have that first huge hit, and they sort of outgrow it, but because it was so big they have to play it at every show for the rest of their lives. Is ‘Bubbly’ like that for you?

I think after maybe a few years where it was mostly ‘Bubbly’ that people were wanting, I definitely did feel like ‘Ack, I have to do this again? Is this all that they want?’ But then I kept releasing music, and I kept touring, and I kept collaborating with people – and now it’s not just the only song people want.

And I love singing it, still. I can play it by myself. I can’t play all my songs by myself – I’m not a great guitar player. I can definitely hold my own.

I still really love singing it, and I look forward to playing it, fortunately. But I think it’s gone through its waves of feeling that way, for sure. 

Hey, Neil Young wouldn’t play ‘Heart of Gold’ for years and years.

You can find appreciation for it again. I think that’s why a lot of artists also change up how they sing the song a bit, or they do a different version of it. It kind of makes you fall back in love with it again in a new way.

Find tickets for Friday’s concert at The Sound here.

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