Vancouver-raised and LA-based musician EKKSTACY is chuckling while talking about “Christian Death,” his favorite song he’s ever written. Named after the ’80s LA rock band, the track from his 2022 LP Misery is a self-destructive anthem with pinballing drums and anxiously buzzing guitars. “I just wanna die / I just wanna kill myself,” Stacy brattily shouts on the chorus. “It’s the best lyric ever. It’s the best song ever,” he beams in a distressed gray hoodie. He’s covered in faded tattoos and fiddles with an emptied espresso martini coupe. The Misfits skull covering his right hand deviously flashes a grin.
“I guess I’m obsessed with it,” Stacy explains when I ask why death is such a common motif in his music (he’s discussed at length how a terrifying brush with death was the main catalyst for fully committing to music). “I probably realized what death really was when I was, like, six, and I’ve been terrified of it since. I think I have an actual phobia.” Will he ever get sick of writing about death? “No,” he says, straight-faced, before letting out another big laugh. “I’m terrified of dying as a concept overall, but more scared of dying in a way that I can’t control—like getting sick, or a plane crash. Like, I’ve wanted to kill myself, all of us have. And that’s where those songs come from. It’s a weird middle ground here where I’m obsessed with it. But in a cool way, and not a cringe way.”
Although the 22-year-old seems to believe he’s already written his magnum opus, he’ll be releasing a self-titled third album this week that continues to draw inspiration from mortality. “But for this record, for fun, let’s see…” he says as he pulls out his phone, brings up the new album’s tracklist, and proceeds to note each song’s subject. “‘I Don’t Have One of Those’—that’s about missing home. ‘Love of My Life’—girl, but I do mention killing myself. ‘I Guess We Made It This Far’ is a cool, reminiscent song about being a kid. ‘All Right’—no death. ‘Goo Lagoon’—death, but it’s hidden…” He continues down the list of 13 tracks. Six are about girls, two mention death, and the rest vary.
That new sense of diversity in subject matter heard on EKKSTACY marks clear growth for the cool-toned crooner. The new album even has a bit of humor and lightness. “It’s less serious than Misery for sure,” he says. “I’ve changed a lot. I’m a lot less serious. When I was younger I was so serious.” One of the project’s stand-outs, “Goo Lagoon,” takes its name from SpongeBob Squarepants with an inspired intro. “That shit’s funny. That song is literally about me dying on a beach—just, like, alcohol poisoning. I’ve been surfing so much so I made a song about me getting wasted on a beach and dying,” he laughs. “The original version has the actual SpongeBob sample, but we couldn't clear it. It was gonna be, like, 50 grand, and I was like obviously fucking not pay that for a stupid fucking sample.”
“I probably realized what death really was when I was, like, six, and I’ve been terrified of it since. I think I have an actual phobia.”
EKKSTACY’s music finds a balance of danger and youthful mischievousness, mocking death while leaning into romantic melancholia (“How about we try, I have to see / Before we die, how you are with me,” goes one line on “Shutting Me Out”). For this project, he worked with regular collaborator Mangetsu while also bringing JELEEL!/Dora Jar producer Apob into the mix. The result is a shifting mural of surf rock’s buoyancy, garage rock’s irreverence, SoundCloud rap’s hazy melancholy, and early punk’s conciseness. The centerpiece is Stacy’s mercurial vocals, ever ready to howl about loneliness or bark about getting fucked up. His music’s raw impulsivity is quintessential to its aura.
EKKSTACY’s music doesn’t only border on danger with its subjects and tone, but also with how it’s made. “I have to be wasted to make music,” he quickly states when I ask about creative rituals. “It used to be the opposite. Now, I just have to be blasted. And I listen to a lot of other people’s music before I make music, too,” he notes before breaking down his routine even further: “I wake up and I’ll walk around my neighborhood, listen to stuff, and get hyped. Go to my pool and just drink for a couple hours in the backyard. Meanwhile, I’m listening to other people’s music the whole time. Once I'm wired, then I’ll go record until I stay up or blackout. Which is why I can’t make music everyday, because then I’ll get sick. That’s the ritual.”
Stacy is a music nerd in the best way. Throughout our conversation he brings up a wide variety of artists he admires: Beach House, $uicideboy$, Sunami. Whereas some songwriters claim a purist approach when making music, EKKSTACY is adamantly the opposite. “That’s the point: No one is making music off of just their idea. It’s impossible. I like to be influenced. It makes you like [your music] more,” he says. “That shit’s stupid to me, but to each their own. I think they’re lying. I used to say that shit,” he adds, laughing. “I was lying.
“It’s weird because recently everyone I look up to has been following me,” Stacy continues. “My favorite band Instagrammed me: ‘Thanks for shouting me out in the GQ article.’” He’s referring to Current Joys, the solo project of Surf Curse’s Nick Rattigan. “It’s fucked because without him I wouldn’t be able to make music. I mean, maybe he does know that. Every artist you can pretty much break apart—I think what saves artists is their vocals. If your vocals sound like someone else’s, you’re fucked. I’ve taken pieces of stuff and put it into my own little thing and your voice helps to make it unique in what you say.”
“No one is making music off of just their idea. It’s impossible. I like to be influenced. It makes you like your music more,”
Notorious for hating on his music in old interviews, Stacy seems more sure of himself now. “I was obviously more insecure about everything. I still don’t think I’m the greatest, but I have my own thing now. I understand myself more.” That self-assuredness is largely due to the people in his inner circle—manager Andrew Mishko, Gilbert Trejo, and photographer Jason Nocito. “He kind of changed my entire shit,” he says of the latter. “He doesn’t give a fuck—he knows he’s sick. He takes his photos and he knows what he’s good at. He’s got cool style. He has sick tattoos. He gets tattooed the same way I get tattooed. He has some Eurotrash shit.”
Stacy’s found his voice since writing his first song in late 2018 at 16 years old (he gets excited again thinking about the first lyric he wrote: “Driving me insane, I want to die”). Now, he’s just fucking with it. “It’s funny because after this album was done, I started getting obsessed with albums that are super cohesive.” Stacy describes this record as an “anti-album,” a project with “no structure” and “no goal.” He’s already working on what’s coming next. “Recently I’ve been able to make songs from different motivation. I can be upset about something and I can make music about it. Before, the only emotion I really had to pull from was sadness or loneliness. It’s weird. I’m changing.” FL
EKKSTACY
