Rising Pop Star MINOE Lets Her Demons Sing with Recent Singles “Cherry”, “Cut Me Loose”
By Justice Petersen
Montreal-based pop musician MINOE has recently released a dark and sultry new single, “Cherry”. Fusing darkwave alternative vibes into her signature pop resonance, MINOE is an edgy and loving new star to give your attention to. Gracing Spotify’s new release playlists and even getting noticed by Timbaland on social media, MINOE is soon to take the pop world by storm with her ethereal vocals, unique sound, and empowering songwriting.
Inspired by disco and techno elements, MINOE creates music that, as she says, is perfect to cry at the club to. Writing about heartbreak, broken friendships, and feelings of loneliness over catchy and upbeat compositions, MINOE writes music that is cathartic, healing, and, as they say, for the people.
Her single, “Cherry”, was released on May 26. Written while she was in a bad mental place during the pandemic, “Cherry” is a more sinister and seductive song compared to her previous work as MINOE taps into the darker side of herself.
“I had broken my foot and I gained a lot of weight because I was on bed rest for a long time,” she says. “But a lot of my friends were able to just run around and party and have fun, and I felt so left out and so heartbroken about it…I just felt everyone was kind of leaving me out. So “Cherry” isn’t directed at one person in the song, but it was directed to a lot of female friendships and relationships.”
After feeling major jealousy and disappointment, MINOE realized that she was overwhelmed with these negative emotions but didn’t want to admit it.
“I felt even more mad at myself for having those feelings, which just feeds into it, and it’s like a cycle,” she says. “But [“Cherry”] was an experiment. I was home with my producer and I was like, what if I just allowed that evil little demon voice to grab the mic and just say all of those things that I don’t want to say and don’t want to admit to feeling?”
By giving her demons a chance to sing, MINOE soon created “Cherry”. Just like the intrusive voices in our head, “Cherry” is inviting, enticing, and dangerously healing. When it comes to tapping into this dark part of your psyche, MINOE says it’s the most natural thing she could possibly do.
“I’ve been writing songs since I was seven years old, so that aspect of it is nothing new for me. I have always written songs to cope with whatever is going on,” she says. “It’s not a want. It’s a need. It’s not something I have to put any effort into. I write songs every day. That’s how I feel. It’s really like a diary entry. When you’re writing into a diary, are you tapping into something or are you just releasing?”
Along with the single came a cinematic music video inspired by 1970s aesthetics and modern artists such as Lady Gaga and Kimbra. As MINOE sings in a white padded room, she has her signature fiery orange hair and a white harnessed outfit (inspired directly by Leeloo from “The Fifth Element”). In other shots, she has curled hair, a red leather top, and dark-winged eyeshadow.
These two contrasting angles, one of her in a hospital-like setting and one of her standing in full glam under red light represent the two sides MINOE finds in herself as an artist.
“It’s all about internal battling with myself,” she says. “There are these two versions of myself and one of them is the insecure, scared person who a lot of people have unfortunately witnessed [in] my personal life. And then there’s me and my 70s diva moment person that I become when I’m on stage when I’m in my persona. It’s all about duality.”
Although “Cherry” encompasses and expresses the two sides of MINOE, she says that as she continues to write and perform, these two different personalities are slowly merging into one person.
“I never thought that I would be that person that had the separation. But as I’ve done more with MINOE I think that it has become a little bit separate, but they’re both parts of me. She’s still me. I’m still her. That is very much a facet of my personality,” she says. “As I’m getting better and as I’m feeling more self-confident again and as I’m coming back into myself, I think they’re merging again. I think it just depends on how I’m feeling.”
On June 30, MINOE released another single, “Cut Me Loose”. Channeling dreamy disco influences over her cathartic lyrics, MINOE continues to confess her deepest emotions in hopes that listeners can find peace and healing in her music. Both this single and “Cherry” will be featured on her upcoming debut EP, “The Bleeding Hearts Disco”, to be released at the end of the summer.
MINOE’s music can best be described as dreamy disco-pop love songs. What makes her work edgier than other artists is that she combines brutally raw and desperate lyrics with lighthearted and extremely danceable beats. Also, her music and overall vibe is heavily inspired by music from the 1970s. Listeners can see this from “Cut Me Loose” as well as an earlier single of hers titled “Sonny and Cher”.
“It’s just such an empowering sound for women. And the performances and everything about it – I suppose it’s just camp now. But I feel like it’s the birth of glittery and sparkly and outspoken and loud and iconic,” she says. “And that has carried out for years and years and years. But I think we still look back to the divas of the 70s.”
As a history lover, MINOE adores the definitive era for its influence on modern music today.
“That’s just my favorite era. Disco I think is important because I think disco’s the birthplace of techno. I’m a techno baby. I’m obsessed with techno,” she says. “And if you like techno and if you’ve been in a techno space, you know the sense of community. And I think that has been taken over time from disco as well. Because it’s a place that you go to dance.”
Essentially, this is what MINOE wants fans to gain from her work. She hopes her music can find listeners who will let the music heal their bleeding hearts as they dance under neon lights.
“I just feel so excited and so happy to make stuff that I care about, and I just really hope that people can cry at the club. That’s what I want. Especially the girls and the gays. Just feel it out and hear it,” she says. “Lyrically, I don’t like to over explain my words or what they mean or whatever. Because as much as it’s good in a sense because some people will connect with exactly what my story is, I also want [it] to be up to their interpretation and have them dissect it and feel it in their own way.”
This desire to help others find a sense of belonging in her music stems from the way MINOE began to write music. Coming from a troubled home life and feeling alone for most of her youth, MINOE has been making music for as long as she can remember. She doesn’t remember when or how she started, but what she does know is that music was always an escape.
“It feels like something that was gifted to me that I was able to just have, and it helped me a lot. So now what I want to do with this is help other people who are going through difficult times, whatever that might look like. I have a soft spot for young people who need to create their own families and create their own worlds…That’s the stuff that gets me. If my music was able to reach somebody like that, and they were to feel not alone for a second because someone else is vocal about not having an easy family [or] that could be relied on, I would feel like I’ve done my job on Earth.”
Essentially, MINOE reminds us that we aren’t alone. As she has learned to write down her feelings to process and understand them, she hopes others can learn to do the same. For the ones with heavy hearts who constantly hear the voices of the demons in their head, MINOE reminds us that these thoughts we have are okay and we are never alone in the way we feel.
“I was allowing other people to dictate how I felt about myself. If they weren’t hanging out with me, then I must not be cool. I must not be hot. I must not be sexy. I just started internalizing all of these negative emotions,” she says. “Letting them out and looking at them on paper, [and] hearing them out loud, and even watching [the “Cherry” music video], I’m just so proud of it. I feel that that allowed me to step outside of those feelings and look at them for what they were, which are just feelings. And it just helped me to process them. You shouldn’t let other people dictate how you feel about yourself.”
MINOE’s new singles “Cherry” and “Cut Me Loose” are out now <3
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