There are a lot of misconceptions about life in the music biz. While late nights and travel are a big part of it, day jobs always influence the process and the product. In Don’t Quit Your Day Job, Scene Point Blank looks at how careers influence the scene.
In this edition, we chat with Kate Hiltz, she who is namedropped in Bouncing Souls titles, the band’s former manager, and the head of Chunksaah Records. We caught up with Kate to talk about her other venture: running a vegan diner in Philadelphia named The Tasty.
Scene Point Blank: You manage bands (probably best known for Bouncing Souls) and own Chunksaah Records -- both of which are super cool, but for the purpose of this interview series, we focus on "day jobs." You also own a vegan diner called The Tasty. What is your official job title?
Kate Hiltz: I am going to go with “Co-owner, co-worker, line cook, prep cook, and dishwasher”? It’s a very small operation trying to do big things, not unlike The Souls or Chunksaah, tbf. This whole “title” thing has always been hard for me. In the most sincere way, in that I know that it is ridiculous, I want to live in that punk ethos where everyone works their asses off towards the greater good, no titles or divisions needed -- kind of hippy dippy shit. I remember when Anchors Aweigh came out (2003 for you youngsters out there) and I was horrified at the idea of the credits listing me as the Souls' manager, and so Bryan wrote “Empress Dowager.” All of the folks involved with Chunksaah over the years have been “comrades.” Up the punx!
Scene Point Blank: What is your primary role and how would you describe your day-to-day?
Kate Hiltz: Feeding the people! Between me and my business partner Sofia, we do all of the ordering, prepping, cooking, cleaning, and overseeing. Some days are very long, but I feel truly blessed to be able to spend so much time making food for people.
Scene Point Blank: What led you to the food industry, career wise?
Kate Hiltz: Music! Music has saved my life and given me ways to be involved with it, even though I cannot play any instruments or stay in tune and have stagefright! As far back as I can remember, I have loved to make food for a group of friends -- an excuse to get together and hang out. In my early days with the Souls in New Brunswick, I would host “Borf and Bowl” at my apartment, cooking up a big pile of pasta or grilled cheese or some wild idea I had like “bold manouevers” (if you know, you know) and we would go to one of the places that had cheap weeknight bowling or sometimes I’d cook carb bombs after The Melody closed. I loved making veggie versions of grease truck sandwiches and fast food and NYC street food. In 1998 my friend Sharry (who I know from Timmy Chunks) asked me if I would be the vegetarian chef on the Warped Tour. I immediately said yes. I worked so hard that summer but learned so much: mostly that I could count on the Souls (who played that whole tour) to help peel potatoes or wash dishes when I needed them.
I started catering veg and vegan friends’ weddings and functions, which is insane when I think back on it. I live blocks away from The Asbury Lanes and so I would often host people for dinner before the show, or bands would stay over and I would cook brunch in the morning. I started doing “punk nights” there and would do all of the catering, do snack bar takeovers… Jen and Layney would let me do vegan specials and pop-ups… When the Souls/Chunksaah did “Home For THe Holidays” I did all of the backstage catering, first to save money because our hospitality budget all had to go to beer, hahahaah, but it became such a big part of the whole family vibe, and I was so honored to host it and feed everyone! Sofia helped me cater it. [Then] we started doing pop-ups at The Lanes and The Pony and the punk rock flea market…So, when the band was taking a few years to slow down to be with their families more, I saw a chance to fulfill my own dream of working in a vegan restaurant!
Scene Point Blank: Did you create the menu too, or is that mix of staff contributions?
Kate Hiltz: It has evolved over the years. In the beginning, Sofia and I put our ideas together and tried to figure out what was reasonable in terms of how many things we could prep/store/offer/make at the same time and had ideas of starting with about half of the things and then working up to it. Well, we never got that far and instead had to re-imagine our stations and offerings on the fly over the first few months of a very steep learning curve. So the shorter reply is… Sofia and I have been working on that menu and will probably never stop editing!
Scene Point Blank: You've been open for a few years now. How has the restaurant evolved or changed? (COVID questions next, so other than that...)
Kate Hiltz: It has changed so much! It’s so hard to answer without COVID because that changed everything so completely so I’m just going to conflate the two questions. I lead with… We are so lucky to have so many customers who have supported us through so much. It was a real shitshow in the beginning and again just before the pandemic. It grew too fast, in spurts, and we couldn’t keep up or seemingly ever have the right staffing at the right time, or ever learn that shit is going to break on Saturday night and ruin your Sunday. We switched to takeout during COVID and most of our staff left within the first couple of weeks, so Sofia and I and a couple others were just shut up inside doing phone orders and pickups for years, and we really honed in on what we wanted to do differently from “the before times.” We were very lucky to be supported by our regulars throughout those lean years, and we also got a “restaurant recovery grant” just when we were getting paid so little for so long that we didn’t know how we could go on. [We are] very grateful to have made it to the other side, and now to be open and having things be so much more personal and, we think, a better experience.
Scene Point Blank: Did you previously work at other restaurants? If so, how did that overlap with your role in the music scene? Were you working in one field before the other? (Did you start working in restaurants, for example, because the schedule works better with your musical paths? Or is it all separate or coincidental?)
Kate Hiltz: Not really. Other than the stuff I rambled on about earlier, I had a couple of waitress gigs when I was younger. I worked at other things on the side, when I spent most of my life on tour, like a seamstress and a bookkeeper -- skills that still come in handy!
Scene Point Blank: Does The Tasty host music or have a jukebox or anything that ties it to your "other life"?
Kate Hiltz: We have talked about it over the years, but it’s really too small of a place for events. We have had friends/bands in for meals and done parties and catering and photo shoots and stuff for music folks, we play music all of the time (a lot of WXPN! Represent). We certainly wouldn’t exist without the support of “the scene” that we both came up through!
Scene Point Blank: How often does music come up a lot on the job?
Kate Hiltz: Always listening to and talking about it! Always knowing people there eating because of it.
Scene Point Blank: Have your experiences from the music world or touring influenced your day job(s) in any surprising ways? (Menu items seems like an obvious possibility here, or maybe other restaurants that inspired you.)
Kate Hiltz: I was always a food tourist, that annoying person trying to get everyone to detour to some whack place out of the way and probably closed so I could get a cake or a sandwich. I was lucky to have vegan comrades on the crew who would adventure with me to so many places and meals that inspired me to even dream of having a place of my own. Our menu is pretty straight-forward diner fare, but I often harken back to my travels and inspirations for specials.
Scene Point Blank: What about vice versa? Do your logistics/ownership experiences affect how you work with bands or the label? It seems there would be shared skillsets between band management and restaurant management. (A lot of herding cats, haha.)
Kate Hiltz: I have herded so many cats! When we first started The Tasty, I was trying to manage the band still and do the label and I just drowned. I slowly gave up the band altogether over the first two years the diner opened, and though Chunksaah still exists and sort of functions, it is just a very part-time hobby and reason to hang out with comrades and artistes, and still a money pit, haha. But, certainly, it’s all a big soup. When I first knew the Souls, I was managing the futon shop where they worked, so arguably they plucked me out of there and kept me in the van for 23 years because they knew I could take care of business without being a tyrant and having a lot of fun and tasty meals!!! So I had the confidence that we could open a restaurant even though we didn’t really know how.
Scene Point Blank: How do you balance everything? Do you set schedules or block off time by topic?
Kate Hiltz: I failed so much. And I am bad at failure, bad at being bad at things. So, like I said, I had to work with the band to make a new structure for their tour and financial lives, and walk away and keep my lip zipped. They are still like family, I would lay down and die for any one of them, and I know with my whole heart that they are proud of me for, one big time, choosing myself over them.
Scene Point Blank: To kind of summarize everything: How intertwined are your "professional life" and "music life"?
Kate Hiltz: Music will always be the reason I know all of the best people, and “the scene” is the foundation that has let me do so many different cool things for fun and money at the same time for decades. Up the Punx!!! That is my summary for everything.
Scene Point Blank: What advice would you give to a musician who is interested in the restaurant industry?
Kate Hiltz: The thing I say about my own life all of the time is that for the first part of my “adult” life, I somehow helped a punk band stay together and above water, against all odds. The slim chance of being/staying a working band is only slightly statistically better than succeeding (read: staying open) in the restaurant business. You have to work so hard for so long, same as music. So my advice is, be true to yourself and ask how much you love it and if you can count on yourself to do the work and not give up. Same ethos, doing different things with your hands and your brain. Find what’s good and make it last.
Scene Point Blank: What is your favorite item, today, on The Tasty's menu?
Kate Hiltz: I don’t know anyone who works in a restaurant who eats a menu item! I usually eat a modification of menu items… Sofia makes me a burrito with tofu scramble, cheddar, jalapeños, and red onion. I put some kale salad inside of it. Sometimes I dip it in gravy if there is some left in my pan. If we don’t sell all of the danishes or jelly donuts, they belong to me :)
Check out previous entries in the Don’t Quit Your Day Job series.
