Born McKenzie Ellis, the singer, performer, and visual artist has gracefully navigated personal despair since beginning her work as Mothica as a teenager. With potent songs detailing everything from surviving a suicide attempt at age 15 (“forever fifteen”), to going public about an abusive youth pastor in her most popular track (“Buzzkill”), she has seen her audience grow globally via tours with icons like Coheed & Cambria, Halestorm, and many others, while tallying hundreds of millions of streams (2020’s “VICES” charted on Billboard and reached #2 on iTunes’ Pop chart). After getting sober, releasing three albums, relapsing and getting sober again, Mothica is now back and bolder than ever on Somewhere In Between, opening up her heart with intention. 

For the past decade, Mothica has attracted listeners with albums Blue Hour [2020], NOCTURNAL [2022], and Kissing Death [2024], the latter a visual album with 12 accompanying music videos. Leveraging art school roots, her experience as an illustrator and graphic designer, and an unstoppable D.I.Y. drive, she handcrafted an inimitable world, powering everything from merchandise design, to prop building, to creative direction on all of her videos and photoshoots. “In my brain, Mothica is one big art project,” Ellis explains. “I can wear all of these hats, and wigs, and do everything from writing the songs, to overseeing the merch designs, building the abstract world the music lives in.”

In 2024, a pivotal decision instigated the sonic evolution that followed: she had fallen back into a pill addiction fueled by her intense phobia of airplane travel. While touring Europe, she realized she needed to get clean and go back to basics before her next record. “I made the terrifying decision to cancel my first-ever headline tour and went to rehab,” she recalls. “A lot of intense emotions I had been numbing came up. I thought about quitting music because the anxieties around traveling and the industry is what lead me back to substance abuse. I was mad at myself for letting it go that far. Finally, I thought, ‘Why don’t I channel these feelings into some angry music?’ I’ve always wanted to combine pop songwriting with grittier, heavier guitars.”

On the anthemic new single, “Save Your Roses,” Mothica contrasts catchy, energetic production with dark, complex lyrics. “I wanted to write a song that on the surface sounds like it’s about a lover I’m pining after, but the subject is actually substances,” she shares. “The verses are about how intoxicating it is to lose yourself in drugs, and mirrors my experience with sobriety. The lyric in the chorus ‘Don’t save your roses for my grave’ is inspired by a conversation I had with a fan after one of my shows in Paris. The fan said ‘I believe we should give people their flowers while they’re here.’ That image stuck with me, that we often tell people how much they mean to us only after they’re gone.”

In sharing Somewhere In Between with the world, Mothica aims to provide solidarity with others in times of deep suffering. “I know what it’s like to feel like nobody in the world understands you. To be afraid to ask for help. I just want everyone to feel welcome here.”

PHOTO CREDIT:

Max Durante 

@max.dur