Q&A: LEXA Embraces Chaos and Vulnerability with “Baggage Claim”
INTERVIEW
INTERVIEW
☆ BY KRISTEN CASE☆
LEXA ISN’T JUST REVISITING HEARTBREAK—she's unraveling everything that lingers after it. Blending dreamy pop melodies, nostalgic indie-rock grit and emotionally raw storytelling, the single captures the strange in-between of letting someone go while still carrying the weight of loving them. “Baggage Claim” embraces imperfection, chaos and vulnerability in a way that feels refreshingly human in an era obsessed with polish. Created alongside collaborators SATCH and Charlieeeee, advocacy work and a nonprofit merch campaign with Climate Live, the track channels catharsis through fuzzy guitars, candid lyricism, and the kind of emotional honesty that refuses to look away.
The Luna Collective caught up with LEXA to talk about heartbreak, storytelling, rejecting perfectionism, and how “Baggage Claim” became one of her most personal releases yet.
LUNA: Congratulations to your newest single “Baggage Claim.” It is both nostalgic and completely fresh at the same time. What was the emotional starting point for the song, and how did that evolve during the writing process?
LEXA: “Baggage Claim’’ is the first single to be released from my third EP, A Guide to Heartbreak, which is a sonic recount of my most recent breakup. It’s a celebration of love and the departure from it. An exclusive for Luna, with “Baggage Claim” will be second on the tracklist, capturing the worry and inability to move on that I was experiencing post-breakup. I came up with the concept for the track after a conversation I had with my ex. I’d been left with this uncomfortable feeling that I knew breaking up was the right thing for us both, yet I couldn’t help but still worry about them, think about them so deeply, love them and carry their emotional baggage. I wanted to challenge the idea that when you commit to a breakup with someone, you can just immediately let go of the care you hold with. Even though the good parts of a relationship are often lost early on, the weight and worry still remain. Ironically, just two weeks after sitting with songwriter SATCH and creating this song, I discovered my ex works in an airport. It was a very weird coincidence.
LUNA: The production blends dreamy pop melodies with indie-rock energy and funky guitar riffs. How intentional was that balance between softness and chaos?
LEXA: As a trans girl who grew up in musical theatre, aspiring to be Kylie Minogue and adoring Ariana Grande, dreamy pop-inspired melodies are second nature to my songwriting. However, my parents are big indie rock fans, and it is the only genre I have digested consistently throughout my entire life, and in so many ways feels the most liberating and rebellious, both as a woman and a human It was important in my new artist direction to capture a sense of messiness, and imperfection and rock induced chaos, as an escape from the AI driven ”perfectionism” we have seen filter into more media today.
LUNA: How would you describe the sonic world of the track in your own words?
LEXA: “Baggage Claim” is an indie-rock banger with a girly-pop twist. Nostalgic 00s indie-rock, with candidly emotive lyricism and dreamy melodies, think Scouting For Girlypop or Transvil Levine.
LUNA: Working with SATCH and Charlieeeee brought together an entirely trans+ creative team. How did that shared lived experience shape the atmosphere in the studio and the final version of the track?
LEXA: It’s rare for me to release a track for my artist project that is so collaborative. I consider SATCH and Charlieeeee two of my closest friends in the industry and working collaboratively on a project so personal and emotionally charged was a vulnerable but connecting experience. Being in a room with two people I acclaim so highly for attention to detail and elevated musical production, both well-versed in indie-rock, allowed me to focus on the storytelling and trust that the outcome of the track was in good hands.
LUNA: Was there a specific moment in the recording process where a take, sound, or production choice completely changed how the track came together?
LEXA: SATCH and I first wrote the song together in essentially a cupboard, in Brighton. It was before SATCH had moved into his new studio, but we’d wanted to write together for years and the concept I had for “Baggage Claim” was itching to come out of me. The track started a lot slower and softer but I was craving an injection of indie-rock and I knew I had to take it to Charlieeeee. We were singing through it and Charlie was like… “can we speed it up?” and I was like “WELL YES”, and then we were just messing around when Charlie began playing that chorus riff, and instantly the song felt like a banger, dancing round the studio on three hours of sleep like we had no care in the world. It was magical.
LUNA: The track has a really authentic, human feel to it. Was that a deliberate choice in how you approached the vocals and production?
LEXA: It truly was intentional. I think collectively, there is a craving for the imperfect, for the human, in a world increasingly saturated with AI-generated media. Rock is fundamentally messy, which is why it’s so cathartic and emotive and nostalgic for us all. It’s much more important to me to honor the emotion of a track through storytelling and more avant-garde production than it is to create sonic perfection or a sense of sterile, repurposed music, even if it’s less likely to gain commercial success.
LUNA: How did the lyric writing process for “Baggage Claim” come together, and what shaped the tone and imagery you leaned into throughout the track?
LEXA: SATCH is a lyrical genius in my eyes and following our work together on other projects previously, I knew that he would be the perfect co-writer to help bring my concept of “crying at the [metaphorical] baggage claim” to life. It was an important track in setting the narrative of the EP, staging the breakup as recent and detailing the difficulties I was having both inside the relationship and out of it. We committed to the metaphor of the “baggage claim,” painting the idea that a breakup isn’t dissimilar from returning from a holiday. We hoped to evoke memories of landing back on home soil, returning to a sense of home and safety, whilst feeling emptier, with less to look forward to and missing the excitement. I thought this was solid imagery to convey the emptiness and yearning I was experiencing post-breakup, recognising the return to safety but missing the sense of excitement and escapism the relationship gave me.
LUNA: What was the biggest thing you learned creatively while making this track?
LEXA: Charlieeeee’s prowess is in indie-rock, jungle and drum&bass, which all have an inclination towards messiness, so co-producing our first track together definitely taught me to become less of a perfectionist in my production style. Watching Charlie’s competent chaos gave me a sense of freedom. I started to experiment and see the production side of things as less of a science and more of a storytelling element in itself. It became fun and simple and raw which was absolutely necessary to inhabit for the rest of the EP I went on to work on as well.
LUNA: Between the music, advocacy work and nonprofit merch campaign with Climate Live, there’s a strong sense of purpose behind this release. What do you hope listeners take away from “Baggage Claim” beyond just the song itself?
LEXA: All I could hope for with my music is that people understand me and, in turn, feel seen. Perhaps this is a symptom of my own London microcosm, but I’ve observed an increasing sense of isolation and rigid independence within my communities, and I hope that music can be the homing pigeon for us all that guides us back to community and connection. “Baggage Claim” is about parting ways with a loved one but still nurturing the love and celebrating the care that you previously gave them, and I feel love and care need to be more celebrated and nurtured in all of us.
LUNA: Looking ahead, are there any upcoming projects, collaborations, live shows or creative goals that you’re especially excited for fans to experience next?
LEXA: I am so excited to release the final installment of my EP trilogy in the autumn and be able to share the upcoming tracks with fans live over the summer. One show I’m particularly excited to announce is that I am performing on the mainstage of Pride in London this year on the Trafalgar Square stage. To think most of the music I release was written and produced in my bedroom about heartbreak, and gets to be shared to such a huge crowd, feels incredibly rewarding. See you there on the fourth of July.
