Erin Hoagg’s Rare DM project is the type of visceral, clubby darkwave outfit that you might expect to see—and possibly have seen—opening for someone like Drab Majesty or Model/Actriz. Her second full-length collection of post-bloghouse electronic tunes Attention is set to arrive on May 29, and before that date we’re getting another sample of the LP via the gloomy and fairly confrontational “Mean Girled.” Paired with a minimal electronic beat is Hoagg’s breathy voice lamenting “trying to be the nice guy” to someone she’s “not even fuckin’.”
“I hate worrying about people I don’t even care about,” the artist shares. “This song was inspired by rumination against my will, driven by what I have been told is my (ever-present and very inconvenient) ‘strong sense of justice.’ The term ‘poisoning the well’ (or attempting to poison the well) is a type of informal fallacy, with violent roots dating back to the Black Death/Middle Ages and the wartime tactic of poisoning a town’s water supply to destroy an invading army’s health. Far from life or death (despite how it can feel sometimes), my own experiences with being ‘mean girled’ as an adult have been an unwelcome lesson that people committed to misunderstanding you will continue to do so.”
The ominously lit video for the track came about from “two ferry rides and a dream,” as Hoagg explains. “Calvin Stark shot this with me right after my cut-and-color appointment with my hair bender, Sean Michael Bennett. Being on a boat felt appropriate for this single—when I wrote this song I felt like a sailor lost at sea. Though no one can poison the well that is the East River. It's already been done!”
Check out the video below, and pre-order Attention here.
