“I’ve Never Wanted To Be Something So Badly”An Interview with Summer Arachnid

By Grace Robins-Somerville. Photo by Konstantina

“I’ve Never Wanted To Be Something So Badly”

An Interview with Summer Arachnid 

When Summer Arachnid repeats her debut album’s titular question on the closing track, you get the sense that she herself might not be ready for the answer. Released on her 18th birthday, halfway through her senior year of high school, “Overgrown” eschews the typical sentimentality of the graduation canon. You’ll find no grand, yearbook-ready statements here, no perfectly posed slideshow set to the schmaltzy declarations of Green Day or Vitamin C. The coming-of-age milestones peppered throughout Who Will I Be This Time Next Year? don’t manifest as movie moments or instantly life-changing realizations, they’re the kind that burn slowly in the back of your mind for weeks, months, even years before you realize what they mean to you. It’s the kind of album I wish existed when I was a teenager. I’m not exaggerating when I say that if 17-year-old me had found a Summer Arachnid song on my Tumblr dashboard or an 8tracks playlist or premiering on the now-defunct Rookie Mag, it probably would’ve changed my life. 

An overwhelming sense of restlessness seeps through dark, fuzzy instrumental arrangements and deadpan vocal delivery. Summer’s curious, observational lyricism fixates on spaces that struggle to contain their anxious inhabitants– weeds overtake gardens, sunsets bleed past the horizon, senioritis-ridden teens clamor to break free from suffocating schools and childhood homes that can barely hold them back anymore. In the face of this all-encompassing desperation to move onto the next phase, there’s the equal opposite force of the future’s uncertainty. WWIBTTNY? navigates the tension between claustrophobic yet comforting familiarity, and what lurks in the exciting yet treacherous unknown. 

Summer’s been releasing music for just over a year, but her heavy hooks, gritty sound, and down-to-earth musings on the peculiarities of everyday life have already garnered her a devoted cult fanbase. Through fate or TikTok’s algorithm or a little bit of both, the first song she ever wrote earned her a cosign from the melon man himself, Anthony Fantano. But it was more than just beginner’s luck– she’s proven her consistent innovation and songwriting prowess with each new single. WWIBTTNY? feels like a culmination of all the skills Summer’s been building on, establishing her as one of the most exciting, underrated artists in the current wave of shoegaze and grunge.

I took to the DMs to talk with Summer about the inspirations behind her debut record, the current state of DIY, and what comes next

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You’ve been independently recording and releasing music for about two years now– putting out a solo EP, a split with Autumn Rhythm, and a string of singles before dropping your debut album –can you talk a little bit about how that process started out and how it’s evolved over time?

So the first thing I ever recorded was the first version of “Smile, Darling” that’s on Bandcamp. I had written that a while prior. I think the push to record that came from a random burst of motivation after finding the band Pretty Sick and finding out that the lead singer, Sabrina Fuentes, went to my school. That was the moment I was like, “Wait, I can do this.” I recorded “Smile, Darling” in one night with my Scarlett interface and my built-in mic on my Mac in Garageband. That first demo sounds like shit, but of course Anthony Fantano came across it on TikTok. Then, I didn’t record anything for a few months until I took an online production course. I learned the basics of Ableton and recorded the instrumental for “Junk Drawer” as an assignment for that. From The Bottom Of The Lake and Stopwatch / Tempest were made with a free trial of Ableton, then I switched to Logic when that ran out and that’s what I’ve been using since. Anyways for releasing, I promoted the shit out of FTBOTL on TikTok because I was/am kinda big on Car Seat Headrest TikTok and that worked in my favor. TikTok was my go-to promotion strategy for a while, but for the new album I relied more on Twitter, Instagram, and Spotify. I’ve met a lot of cool people through TikTok, and now we follow each other on Instagram and Twitter too, so the people that care about my music are gonna see it and tell their friends even if I don’t promote it on TikTok. 

As a platform for promoting musicians, TikTok can get pretty divisive. It seems to be this double-edged sword where it can greatly grow an artist’s platform, but in some cases it can limit or pigeonhole them. Do you consider yourself a “TikTok artist?”

I don’t think I’m big enough to be a “TikTok artist,” but if you asked me a year ago I might’ve said yes. TikTok was a good way for me to start to grow a fanbase, but I’m glad to be branching out a bit. I don’t necessarily wanna be “the girl from TikTok.” It’s much more fulfilling to have people discover my music on their own. I’ve had more than one occasion where my friends have been like, “my friend has no idea who you are or that I know you, but they’re a fan of your music.” 

Do you consider yourself a part of any particular local scene? You’re from New Jersey and you’ve collaborated with a few tri-state area artists (the aforementioned split with Autumn Rhythm, plus you were featured on the garden airplane-trap EP). How have those more local communities influenced the way you create and share music?

There’s definitely a local scene, but I’m on the very very outskirts of it. I’ve only ever played two shows, and that would’ve never happened if I hadn’t met Joey, my drummer and the mastermind behind Autumn Rhythm and garden airplane-trap, online. I can’t really play shows that often, so I’m pretty removed from the scene. I’m hoping to change that in college.

Yeah that makes sense, and it kinda leads into the next question. You mention finding your somewhat-local collaborators on the internet. In your experience, what’s the interplay between social media and local scenes like as a contemporary DIY musician? Is there a sort of symbiotic relationship between the two, an antagonistic relationship, or a bit of both?

It’s a whole lot of liking people’s Instagram stories. I think social media is great if you don’t let it take over your life and rot your brain. Instagram is great for finding local people and that’s just where word gets spread the most. I enlisted Joey to be my drummer via Instagram dms, but I think we met through TikTok first.

Since we’re talking about sharing music online, I was hoping we could pivot slightly to a different platform: Bandcamp. Many of your influences got their start on Bandcamp– I’m thinking of ones like Car Seat Headrest, Alex G and Mitski –how has that particular streaming platform lent itself to your creative and promotional process? Do you consider yourself to be a “Bandcamp artist?” Or in our current post-Twin Fantasy era, has that categorization become obsolete?

I think Bandcamp is great if you have generous friends or fans that wanna buy your music. I don’t think anyone really uses it as their primary source of music. The Bandcamp artist has just become whatever the more general internet DIY scene is. If people want to support you, they’ll buy your music on Bandcamp, but then they’ll then go listen to it on Spotify. We could go on the whole “Spotify is evil’ tirade, but that won’t change the fact that if your music isn’t on there, easily accessible, and able to be added to playlists, it won’t reach a wider audience. I have about 2800 monthly listeners right now, but I wouldn’t be able to reach those numbers on Bandcamp. I wish more people used Bandcamp, but I’m still gonna do my thing of buying my friends’ music, then using Spotify to actually listen to it.

Yeah, I think you’re right in that when people say “Bandcamp artist” these days it’s used almost interchangeably with “DIY.”

Yeah. It’s the whole quasi-local Instagram-TikTok-Twitter-DIY-Bandcamp whatever small artist grouping.

To circle back to the topic of local scenes, you’ve cited NJ legends My Chemical Romance as an influence, as well as a lot of the Meet Me In The Bathroom-era NYC bands like The Strokes, The Moldy Peaches, and Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and you’ve got a few locality-based lyrical references (I laughed out loud when I heard the MTA “stand clear of the closing doors” sample in “The Second Coming Of Jesus Christ Himself”). How do you think growing up/making music in and around New York and New Jersey, inspired by those hyperlocal artists has influenced your work?

Everyone wants to be MCR, everyone wants to be the Strokes. There’s a lot of great bands from NYC and it’s quite intimidating. It’s inspiring, but I kinda feel like I’m in this giant shadow cast by every band I look up to. Funnily enough, I read Meet Me In The Bathroom a few weeks before the movie came out, and I think it changed my brain chemistry. I’ve never wanted to be something, to be in a band like the bands mentioned in that book, so badly. It was a push for me to get off my ass and finish the album.

It seems like you’ve come away from it with a motivation to maintain that sheer, unadulterated love of making music. I can hear the influence but it definitely feels like inspiration rather than imitation, which is cool, because you’re making something entirely new. What kinds of comparisons have you gotten in terms of other artists? Have there been any bands that someone says you sound like that you’ve either never heard or where you’re just like “I don’t think I sound like them at all?”

Ooh okay, I like this question. Definitely gotten the obligatory Car Seat Headrest comparisons, but also a lot of people mentioned Mitski when I put out the first EP and it’s probably because I wrote “Self-Pity In Drop D” after listening to “First Love/Late Spring” on repeat, and you can definitely tell because the bass lines are very similar. I’ve been compared to Pretty Sick and Hello Mary, which makes sense. I think I’ve gotten some Smashing Pumpkins and Strokes comparisons too. I don’t wanna try to copy them because I know I can’t, but my inspirations definitely shine through.

You mentioned earlier that Sabrina from Pretty Sick went to your school. I knew that she’d gone to Catholic school, but I had no idea it was the same one as yours, and Frank Iero from MCR is also famously a Catholic school alum. If I’m not mistaken, you reference your Catholic education on WWIBTTNY. What kind of influence has that religious and educational background had on your work as a musician?

I’ve gone to catholic school my entire life, Pre-K to now, but I’m not actually religious, and neither is my family. It’s actually kinda funny. I think it’s led to a lot of angst and drama and unavoidable biblical allegories everywhere I go. I think queerness and Catholic school just make for good art.

Yeah, so much of that Catholic imagery has always been ripe for reclamation, whether it’s MCR or Sufjan or Gaga.

I don’t listen to Lady Gaga that much unless it’s with friends, but I admire her so much. She’s just so cool. One of my teachers went to high school with her.

Speaking of school, you’re releasing this album shortly before your high school graduation, and thematically, a lot of it seems to deal with feelings of restlessness and outgrowing one’s surroundings and this nervous fixation on what comes next. Even the title evokes a sense of uncertainty and uneasiness about the future. Does it feel like a graduation album to you? What kind of statement– if any –do you feel like you’re making on this chapter of your life as it’s about to close?

It’s definitely a statement, but I’m not sure what. Maybe I’ll listen to it in a few years and understand. As soon as I got into music I set a goal for myself to release an album before I turned 18, but my procrastination meant it came out on my birthday. I had the title in the back of my head for a while, and most if not all of the songs are about that to some degree. My inspiration comes from my life, so the album is just about what it’s like to be a senior in Catholic high school who’s just itching to get out.

Do you have an idea of what comes next, or what you want to come next? (Also, sorry, I’m sure that as a high school senior you’re sick of hearing that question or a variation of it at this point, so don’t feel like there’s a right or wrong way to answer it).

Well for music stuff, I think I’m a little burnt out from the last few weeks of making the album, so I think I’ll just catch up on the books, movies, and tv shows I’ve been putting off. Whenever I get really obsessed with something I’m working on music-wise, I don’t let myself watch or read anything because I feel like I’m wasting my time, which is kinda weird. For college stuff, I’m committed to the University of Vermont and I’m really excited to see what the Burlington music scene has going on.

Congrats! Vermont’s awesome, you’re gonna love it. What things are you planning to watch/read?

I was out sick from school for a few days and binged all of “The White Lotus.” I’m also reading Fight Club right now. I also just bought The Secret History because I’ve had multiple people ask if I’ve read it because I’m going to Vermont and I feel like I’m legally obligated to read it.

Okay, we’re gonna finish off with a rapid-fire round: Favorite song you’ve written and why?

I think “Lavender” because I wrote it just a few days after FTBOTL came out, it went through a whole lot of changes, and I just love how it turned out. It’s fun to play too.

Favorite albums/songs/music-related experiences of 2022?

Ants From Up There by Black Country, New Road; Makes Me Sick, Makes Me Smile by Pretty Sick, playing a few shows with Joey; Meet Me In The Bathroom; seeing Car Seat Headrest, Phoebe Bridgers, Green Day, and MCR in concert; and just having more people listen to my music were huge.

Which new releases are you most looking forward to in 2023?

I’m looking forward to Hello Mary, Paramore, Fall Out Boy, and the possible teased Car Seat Headrest album.

Dream collab/tour?

To see or to be a part of? I just thought of a Car Seat Headrest x LCD Soundsystem tour, that could be fun. I want one of those websites that generate music festivals based on your last.fm/Spotify to be real and near my house.

Is the line about Google street view in “Overgrown” a Geoguessr reference?

I love Geoguessr, but I don’t think I knew about it when I wrote that line. It’s actually about when I was looking at colleges and how when I wasn’t falling down Reddit rabbit holes, I would look at the campuses and nearby areas on Google Maps.

And finally: is there a Lightbulbs 1?

There was kinda, but not really. Joey asked me to write and record a song for the tri-state compilation, and so I did, but I didn’t like the recording. I wanted to up the tempo and it was just easier to start a new file. When I put it on my private Soundcloud, the file name was Lightbulbs 2 so I just kept it. It’s dumb, but people ask about it, so it’s something.

Grace is a writer from Brooklyn. She is currently working towards an MFA in Creative Nonfiction at the University Of North Carolina Wilmington. She spends her free time stalking her own Last.fm account.