Thank you very much for your time! Before we introduce your new release to our readers – what kind of drink would you recommend to zip on while they listen to your new music?
Maybe the best drink to sip on while listening to this song would be an energy drink, preferably something with a lurid colour and distinctly unnatural taste. The song is pretty high energy and intense, so anything that gets you hyped and moving. I’ve been drinking energy drinks right before playing my shows recently and I think it helps me go extra hard, although it also made me feel pretty sick the last show I played… alternatively you could just drink water. We could all do with some more hydration. Or drink Drambenessy. That’s Drambuie mixed with Henessy, and it’s pretty disgusting.
Please give us an update about – new single, new album, tour dates, new videos?!
Well The Chase is the first ever Sufferin Mall single, so that’s very exciting to me. I have a lot of music that’s going to be released slowly over the next year or so, but the next single after this one is coming out September 1st, so look out for that. And then my EP, Crushed, is coming out at the end of September. I’m also going to be playing a number of shows in Toronto over the next few months.
We live in times of many conspiracy theories. Which, harmless, theory would you wish were true? (For example Dinos living inside Earth or E.T. living in a home in California)
I don’t really go for conspiracy theories much, because I think they often turn out quite sinister. But I was briefly interested in Gnosticism, which posits that we are living in a fallen world and that the biblical God is in fact this evil demiurge who is manipulating and deceiving us. Something like that. It sounds pretty metal anyway. I find conspiracy theories to be kind of funny, because the world is already fucked up and crazy and absurd on the surface, so trying to find the hidden stuff can feel a little redundant.
What fashion style or brand would best describe your music?
I love clothes, and I like to dress a little bit trashy and extra, which I think suits my music well, wearing lots of jewelry and attention grabbing pieces. My music is pretty bright and bold as well, shiny and shimmery, especially on this first EP. There was a long period where I dressed very subdued and didn’t want people to look at me, but now I think it’s fun. Dressing up feels like another creative outlet for me. I don’t know if there’s a brand that suits the music. I’ve been looking at a lot of Gaultier mesh tops online lately. Can’t afford them, but they’re beautiful. I like mesh, fishnet, things like that, especially for performing.
Tell us more about your songs! Topics! Message!?
My songs, and the Sufferin Mall project as a whole, are generally about the intersection of desire and suffering. Of course, desire is what makes life exciting and feel vital, but it’s also what causes us so much misery and suffering, both on an individual level, and also as a species and planet, when we think about what consumerism has done to the environment, and what we do to each other in the name of greed. Desire is the engine of an exploitative economy, but also the source of so much of our pleasure. On an individual level, desire inspired these songs, but also made my life miserable for a long time. Many spiritual traditions warn against desire. So these songs explore desire, the way it can cause suffering, but also the way in which suffering can be enjoyable. That’s why the the initials of Sufferin Mall — S&M — are important, because there’s a sadomasochistic dimension to desire as a whole, and to pop music.
Beside music, do you have any special talents?
I’m also a poet. My first collection of poetry is coming out in 2023 with Vehicule Press. It’s a book length poem about the body and the apocalypse, written in a visceral and intuitive language.
Name 5 things we all should know about you as an artist?!
1. Sufferin Mall is going to encompass more than just music. It may one day include books, games, prayer groups, etc.
2. My favourite part of making music is playing live and sharing that energy with an audience.
3. No two Sufferin Mall projects will be the same — I see music as a vast, expansive field which I’m eager to explore.
4. I’m currently working on an allegorical novel set in Sufferin Mall.
5. Sufferin Mall is named after the iconic Dufferin Mall, which is near where I grew up in Toronto.
A question you’d like to answer, but never been asked in an interview before?! + Answer pls
Q. Where is Arcadia? A. At the end of Sufferin Mall.
Your Instagram: @sufferinmall
Artwork by Lina Wu