Q&A: Stitched Up Heart Usher in new ‘MEDUSA’ Era
INTERVIEW
INTERVIEW
☆ BY KIMBERLY KAPELA ☆
A LOVE LETTER TO EVERY FIERCE E-GIRL BADDIE — LA-based hard rock band Stitched Up Heart are entering a bold new era. The band has announced their forthcoming full-length album, MEDUSA, arriving June 12 that also marks their first project under Judge and Jury Records, the powerhouse label founded by legendary producer Howard Benson and Three Days Grace drummer Neil Sanderson.
Leading the charge is the band’s latest single, “GLITCH BITCH,” featuring Conquer Divide, is a fearless anthem for the internet era, where online identity is a canvas for self-expression and empowerment. Heavy guitars and fierce vocals fuse into a track that is both aggressive and bewitching.
“‘GLITCH BITCH’ is a love letter to every fierce e-girl baddie out there shattering expectations, and leaving a trail of broken hearts in your digital wake,” Mixi says. “You’re the queens of turning pixels into power, and making the internet pretty. Reminding us all that code is confidence and beauty’s a weapon.”
The “GLITCH BITCH” music video doubles down on that energy, visually immersing viewers in the band’s world.
Singing, “This is for the twisted e-girl misfits,” Stitched Up Heart unapologetically embraces their community. The video unfolds during a chaotic house party, featuring Kiarely and Kristen of Conquer Divide, alongside popular goth and emo influencers.
With MEDUSA, Stitched Up Heart promises a fearless blend of heaviness and heart.
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 kind of atmosphere or emotional space do you aim to create for your listeners?
MIXI: I feel like the way that we write, it goes based on albums. This record that we just finished coming out this year, MEDUSA, we were in the mindset of having fun in the live performance mentality. We wanted something bouncy, energetic, playful and crazy, really just no boundaries and a little bit untraditional. I like the weird stuff.
LUNA: Your newest single “GLITCH BITCH” is a sneak peek into your upcoming record. “GLITCH BITCH” is a bold, unapologetic anthem rooted in internet-era confidence. What inspired you to explore online identity and digital self-expression as a source of power rather than pressure?
MIXI: I think that we're so trapped in this little social media community online and everything is in here. I think the idea is just pointing out what we all already know. We know it's not good for us to just be doom scrolling all day. We know it's not good to always be posting and checking numbers. If you don't get enough, you get emotional and unvalidated by strangers on the internet. I think that there's just a lot of emotion that goes into it. I have so many girl crushes on the internet and it would be fun to write a song for all the baddies that are online that make it a little more playful out there.
LUNA: The “GLITCH BITCH” video feels like a celebratory snapshot of subculture. What did you want to capture in the video and how was your experience filming it?
MIXI: I wanted to get every single one of my friends, like a sweet 16 birthday together, all of them. Since I wrote the song for the baddies on the internet, I was sliding into everybody's DMs. It just made sense to do the video with all the baddies. I basically hit up just a bunch of girl crushes and people that I talked to and a lot of people came out. It just got better and better as it unfolded. It got a lot bigger than we expected.
LUNA: Collaborating with Conquer Divide feels especially meaningful given the song’s message. How did Kiarely and Kristen’s presence shape the energy of both the track and the video?
MIXI: They're awesome. Kristin, first off, is a mastermind. She wanted to add and change a couple things in the verse for Kiarely with her vocals. I had this song for a year, and I didn't think that it could get any better, and when she came in she changed it, her vocals are just so good to listen to. They're very pleasant on your ears. It's just a really beautiful vocal. I met Kristin at NAMM (National Association of Music Merchants) a year or two ago, and we bonded over the fact that we have a song called “Conquer and Divide,” and they are Conquer Divide, and that's how we bonded. Music brings people together. And this is what happened.
LUNA: This release marks your first with Judge and Jury Records. What about Howard Benson and Neil Sanderson’s vision for the label made it feel like the right next chapter for Stitched Up Heart?
MIXI: We were in a crazy, weird place before we started working with them. We were in a transition with labels and things like that. We worked on a feature with Dead Rabbits, Craig from Escape the Fate’s band, and they're on Judge and Jury. He asked if we wanted to sing this on the tour coming up, so we did, and it was really cool to meet him. Howard's a freaking legend. I'm still a little intimidated. I told him already, some of the songs that you were in the studio writing, got me through so many breakups. Some songs that are staples in my life. He's an incredible person, you can just tell, and Neil as well, super cool and super awesome. We have a lot of cool stuff in store. The whole team, the whole Judge and Jury camp, there's Melody, she's my new bestie, and Graham, he's working on socials, and just a huge team of awesome people.
LUNA: You are about to release your upcoming album MEDUSA later this summer. MEDUSA is such a powerful title, loaded with mythology and femininity. What does Medusa symbolize for you as a band, and how does that theme thread through the album?
MIXI: Medusa is such an interesting character in history, and the tale of a woman that was very beautiful and she was a threat. She got cursed to look like a monster. And then they, of course, spoiler alert, cut her head off and she was a villain after that. The innocence that you have before you're cheated and destroyed by all the people that hurt you and turn you into this monster.
LUNA: How does this record compare to your previous work in terms of style and sound? Have you taken any new creative risks with this project?
MIXI: We had so much freedom to do whatever we wanted, because we wrote it without anybody except our management and Monster Energy. At the time when we were writing the record, we wrote it with the producers with no nobody to answer to really. It was just so easy to do. We tried jump scares and time change signatures and just a little more quirky, cutesy stuff, but I just wanted to have fun and make it a crazy psycho vibe and just good times.
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 do you hope listeners feel or reclaim within themselves after spending time with this album?
MIXI: I hope they find some empowerment in it. I hope that it can get them through things that they're going through when they're listening to it, and I hope that they can resonate, relate, and connect with me to what I felt and thought at those times when we were writing it. I just want them to have a good time with it. I really wanted to write a girls record. We did write some boy songs too, but I really wanted to write one for the girls.
LUNA: What is fueling your fire right now that’s pushing you into this next chapter in your career?
MIXI: Honestly, I just keep putting one foot in front of the other and things keep happening in a positive way. One thing I've noticed is if you keep doing what you want and what your heart keeps telling you to do, even though things happen all the time that are always going to push you down and question what you're doing, but I just keep following the heart. I just keep following it no matter what. And if I didn't, there's so many cool things I would not have experienced. If you really want something, just do it. There's nothing more fulfilling. It sucks, just like any other job sometimes, but there's nothing more fulfilling than following your passion.
LUNA: How are you feeling in this current era of your career and what does the rest of the year look like that you would like to share with Luna?
MIXI: I'm pretty good actually. It feels really good to really see music we've had in the can for a while. Feels really good to finally unveil some of the stuff that we've been working on. It feels good to have a team that really cares about us behind us. And so right now, ask me, a year from now, who knows? But for now, I'm super happy. I can't complain. For the rest of the year, we’re getting on the road with Sebastian Bach in the spring.
