Q&A: Charlotte Sands Stands in Her Own Orbit in New ‘Satellite’ Era
INTERVIEW
INTERVIEW
☆ BY KIMBERLY KAPELA ☆
Photo Credit: Megan Clark
ALT POP’S FEARLESS VOICE IS STEPPING INTO A NEW ORBIT — Charlotte Sands has officially announced her highly anticipated new album, Satellite, set to arrive on March 6, 2026. Alongside the album reveal, Sands has unveiled a gripping new single, “one eye open,” offering fans a raw and electrifying look into the emotional depth and sonic punch that defines the forthcoming record.
Following in the emotional lineage of fan-favorite tracks like “HUSH,” “Afterlife,” and “neckdeep,” “one eye open” is a high-energy anthem of awakening. Driven by sharp production, pulsating beats, and Sands’ unmistakable vocal intensity, the track straddles the line between vulnerability and defiance, transforming personal turmoil into an arena-ready release of power.
“‘One eye open’ is about learning that love isn’t supposed to feel like survival,” Sands says. “It’s the realization you’ve been mistaking control for care and the breaking point that forces you to remove yourself from their grip and remember who you were before they made you doubt it. This song is about taking your power back and choosing your own peace over their chaos. I hope it gives you the strength to put yourself first and serves as a reminder of just how capable you really are.”
Self-reclamation and inner clarity pulses through the heart of Satellite. On this record, Sands stretches her alt-pop palette in bold new directions, experimenting with genre-blurring production while sharpening her songwriting to its most honest point yet.
“Most of these songs came from a desire to dive in and experiment, but I also wanted to make something that felt like a full, human experience,” she shares with Luna. “The album explores a wide range of perspectives and emotions: love, grief, obsession, reliance on others, and the confusion and anxiety that can come with attachment. Ultimately, I wanted to write honestly about the past few years of my life, everything I’ve felt and moved through, and try to capture it all in one body of work.”
True to its name, Satellite orbits themes of disconnection and rediscovery, of floating in uncertainty while being tethered to an undeniable internal compass.
“Satellite was born from a search for meaning, identity and self worth,” Sands says. “It’s a collection of moments from the last two years of my life, the highs and lows, the joy and the grief. It’s about drifting, discovering, questioning your purpose, and learning to trust the quiet pull that brings you back to yourself.”
With this new era, Sands is creating a whole universe of self-truth, resilience and sonic ambition.
Photo Credit: Megan Clark
LUNA: Thank you for talking to Luna. Our readers would love to get to know you and your music more. For any readers who aren’t familiar with you yet, what inspires the atmosphere or sonic world you aim to create for your listeners?
CHARLOTTE: That's a great question. I feel like I always strive to create music that makes people feel like they're less alone, and makes them feel like their experiences are similar to other human beings, and that they're not the only ones feeling certain emotions, and that we're all operating in very similar ways throughout our lives. My goal is to always create a space and a community where people feel like they're less alone and that they can be fully themselves.
LUNA: You describe your newest single “one eye open” as realizing love isn’t supposed to feel like survival. What is the inspiration behind the track or the feeling that pushed this story to the surface?
CHARLOTTE: A lot of the inspiration for that song came from my past experiences in relationships and friendships and having an anxious attachment style. I feel like there’s been so much conversation lately around attachment styles, and that really resonated with me. Writing the song felt like exploring that “butterflies” feeling — that uncertainty over whether the nerves and excitement of meeting someone new are coming from something healthy or from anxiety and toxicity. As you get older, you start to understand those feelings better, recognize where they’re coming from, and decide whether they truly serve you or are actually causing harm. This song was written from the experience of toxic attachment and the way control can exist in relationships and how it’s often mistaken for, or disguised as, love.
LUNA: “One eye open” is just a sneak peek into your upcoming album Satellite. What themes or narratives did you set out to explore with this project?
CHARLOTTE: I think my goal at the beginning of this project was to push my boundaries sonically and in terms of production — to really identify the sounds and art that inspire me, blend them together, and create my own version of those influences. Most of these songs came from a desire to dive in and experiment, but I also wanted to make something that felt like a full, human experience. The album explores a wide range of perspectives and emotions: love, grief, obsession, reliance on others, and the confusion and anxiety that can come with attachment. Ultimately, I wanted to write honestly about the past few years of my life, everything I’ve felt and moved through, and try to capture it all in one body of work.
LUNA: Your visuals feel just as expressive as your music. How did the visual world of Satellite take shape alongside the songs?
CHARLOTTE: For this album, I really wanted to lean into some of the albums that have always inspired me. It's the Y2K Hilary Duff, Kelly Clarkson, the 2000s glossy magazine artwork and cover art and those types of things that I've always really drawn inspiration from. I wanted to blend my more masculine and more feminine sides, and the darker sides, and the more outgoing and more optimistic. There's so many dimensions of people, and I was just really trying to find a way to mix these versions of myself and be able to show all of them and do that with the visuals and experiment with those different dimensions.
LUNA: Do you have a personal favorite song on Satellite — one that feels closest to your heart or most revealing of who Charlotte Sands is right now?
CHARLOTTE: I would say the song “Satellite” on the album is one of my favorites, just because it was the first song. It felt like I was beginning this new era, and it's a reminder of that excitement of when we first started this new phase. The last song on the album is called “Sunday,” and they're almost the complete contrast of the entire album, and they're almost the opposites of each other. I also really, really love “Sunday” because I feel like it's the resolution of the entire album. It's the resolution of the last two years. It's the peace and my center that I came back to after experiencing all of these emotions song by song. I really, really love that one. I feel like that one definitely feels the most peaceful to me, and I think that's where I am in my life right now.
LUNA: How do you hope listeners — especially your femme audience — can connect with or find power in this new era of music from you? What emotions or messages do you want to leave with them?
CHARLOTTE: I think the message and emotions I'd want to leave are that I hope people find their confidence in some of these songs, the ability to know what they want and what they need in their life, and to set boundaries and create the relationships and the life that they deserve and that they want. I think this album is for every person. There's songs that are gentle, there's songs that feel rebellious and loud, and I really tried to make something for every type of listener, so that everyone can relate, no matter what type of experiences they're going through that day. I really hope that people are able to feel seen and know that there are other human beings on earth that can understand and relate to their experiences and that are existing, learning, growing, and making mistakes at the same exact time, and we're all just changing and evolving and doing our best.
LUNA: How does Satellite represent a new version of Charlotte Sands compared to your past releases?
CHARLOTTE: I think this album, to me, is coming from a very adult version of myself. It feels like the music is more mature. It feels like the boundaries in my life and the messaging in the music is coming from a mature headspace of learning myself, knowing myself better than I did a few years ago, really being overly particular and intentional with the people I surround myself with and the energy I surround myself with. I think that's the whole point of it really is choosing wisely with the energy of your life and the people in your life, and prioritizing yourself and allowing yourself to change your mind. I think that this version of me is definitely so far the most self aware of who I am and but still always giving myself space to grow out of that I'll probably be saying the same thing in another two years, and hopefully that's the goal.
LUNA: When you feel a creative spark coming on, what do you need in your space to nurture it? Are there any rituals, objects, or energies you always return to?
CHARLOTTE: It's always been really helpful for me to have guitars around. I feel really lucky to live in a house right now that has so many musical instruments that I feel like it's always a welcoming, creative space, and that's really inspiring. I think for me, a lot of the time, I love journaling. I think it's so important to have a place to put your emotions that are not your body, and have a place to hold them and reflect on them and validate them. I also write a lot in my Notes app, and just having something that I can do constantly at any moment of the day or wake up in the middle of the night, I always am writing things down. I tried to be as open to the muses as possible. I really believe in the fact that creativity is always around us, and it's the people who allow themselves to be open to it, are the people who receive it, and so I try to consistently let my brain wander in that space.
LUNA: What’s fueling your creative fire right now?
CHARLOTTE: I think the biggest fuel for me is just surrounding myself with people that are also really inspiring and inspired by each other, and people who romanticize their lives. I think it's so important to be around people who are happy or in the pursuit of happiness and joy and genuinely in trying to enjoy their lives. I think that's such a beautiful thing inside and out of music is just being around people who actually are curious about life and curious about the experience as a human and wanting to take advantage of the time that we have on this planet. I think that I really, really gravitate towards people who want to experience that in the same way. I think that's changed my life a lot in the last year. I am just surrounding myself with other people who are trying to enjoy their lives and find peace, harmony and happiness.
LUNA: How are you feeling in this current era of your career and what does the upcoming year look like that you would like to share with Luna?
CHARLOTTE: I'm so excited. I think there is always a balance between the stress of releasing a project and releasing it independently. I think so often my brain is like 80% business mode and 20% creative in these phases and this time of releasing a huge project and planning tours and those types of things, but I feel so grateful that I get to do this, and it's every problem I have.
I feel lucky that's the problem in my life, and I am really excited about this next year and this next era, and just being able to reconnect with a lot of people all over the world that I feel like I haven't seen in a long time. We've taken some time off the road in the last year, more so than I have in the five years, and so hopefully next year, I'll be out on the road a lot and revisiting all the places that I've loved, playing shows so much over the years. That is definitely a huge goal of mine, and always new music.
Photo Credit: Megan Clark
