The brilliant Alexis Strum releases her latest single Swim this week and the UK pop talent sat down with us to chat about the track, a recent immersion in the world of San Marino’s Eurovision selection, and getting a second wind at pop stardom from the LGBTQ+ community.
Alexis also recapped the highs of her recent pop banger If You Think I’m Too Much (You Should Go Find Less!), the emotional subject matter of Swim, and delivering top quality Glockenspiel content on her upcoming new album.
You can stream Swim above. Connect with Alexis at the following places: Website / X / Instagram. Connect with Culture Fix on X, Blue Sky, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Spotify and Threads.
Swim feels incredibly personal. Can you tell us more about the moment you wrote it and what was going through your mind?
Absolutely- it was March last year and I had just been told that my mum had a few days to live. I was so out of my mind- detached and sad- and I thought, now is the perfect time to join the gym! I didn’t know what I was doing with myself! I went to the gym and couldn’t be assed so I went for a wee swim instead and noticed an elderly woman next to me having a swimming lesson and thought that that was amazing but instantly started sobbing because I remembered that my mum had never learnt to swim. So the lyrics basically came to me in a swimming pool. Crying in a pool is so weird because you’re wet and you’re emitting tears too. Bizarre. Inspiration is everywhere! A couple of days later I had my first day writing with Jim Lowe and I turned up and said, all bashfully, ‘actually I have something I’ve started’ and shared it with him and he was brilliant- very supportive and helped ease the song out with me. If you can cry in the studio and laugh about it afterwards, you’re good.
You’ve said this song helped get you through a very tough time with your mum’s illness. Has music always been a form of therapy for you?
Goodness, yes! I mean, I also HAVE a real life therapist but music is my way through, round and out. It always has been. Every era of music I’ve done has been about getting the hard feelings out. Every guy that’s ever broken my heart, every situation I’ve found a challenge has worked its way into a Strum Classic!
Your recent single If You Think I’m Too Much (You Should Go Find Less!) was an absolute modern pop classic. Can you delve a little into the background behind the themes of the track?
Why, thank you! So the background to that was I wanted to write something really obnoxious. I was feeling obnoxious and omnipotent. It was shortly after the mum going into a coma situation (she’s still alive, but non-verbal) and my reaction to that was to become really aloof, after the whole crying in the pool ‘Swim‘ emotional hot messery. I also found myself hypersexual in a way and I questioned my sexuality at that point too, if I’m honest. It was like everything came into question and I was turned inside out. Grief is so so so weird. I was seeing someone and they kept asking me how I was and I remember saying to them, ‘I don’t want you to talk’. Quite cnuty really. I was just drowning. Sex was a great way out of that!
Would you say that Swim and If You Think I’m Too Much (You Should Go Find Less!) are reflective of the content of your upcoming album?
Very much so. Lots of 80’s new wave uptempo tracks and then the shadow side of that is the songs like ‘Swim‘ and ‘When The Good Goes Bad‘ – still quite ’80’s Annie meets Ms Bush though. We do love a good Jim Lowe/Alexis Strum weepfest. I’m back producing again after 20 years too which totally rocks. I had to relearn how to use Logic and I’d sold all my gear, so I literally started again from scratch. It has been very humbling and I am terribly impatient with myself.
You took If You Think I’m Too Much (You Should Go Find Less!) to the Most Serene Republic of San Marino as part of their Eurovision selection! Was it a serene experience and what prompted your entry into Una Voce Per San Marino?
OMG it was so frikkin brilliant. I LOVED it. I adore Eurovision – anything camp tbh- and my friend dared me to do it and I am in my ‘try everything once’ era so I thought, if nothing else, it will be good for the ‘gram! Hehe. I met some wonderful humans, with whom I am still in contact. My mum, who is probably the centre of everything I do, was always a really proud, easily embarrassed woman who never put herself out there so I’ve made it my life’s mission to just put myself out there, walk on the coals, be a bit of a loon and a daredevil and I honestly don’t care what anyone thinks of me. It is the most liberating thing to do for yourself. I wish mum had been more like that.
Have you been keeping an eye on the contest? Are there any acts you are particularly enjoying?
Of course! I love Spain and of course, Malta’s entries. Eurovision is so inclusive and I’ve always really loved that about the competition. People are super respectful of you just trying to express yourself. Everyone should be a little bit more ‘Eurovision’!
Do you think the experience would tempt you back into another Eurovision national selection elsewhere?
I’d do it for the UK. No question.
You’ve written tracks which ended up the hands of the likes of Kylie Minogue and Rachel Stevens. Are there any unreleased tracks that you’ve been that you are dying for people to hear?
Funnily enough, there is a song called ‘Life B4 Me’ which I wrote in 2009 which has made it onto this album. I finally got round to getting it produced up and I just couldn’t let it go. My songs are my babies, and I am their pushy mother. I’m like, ‘darlings, have you seen this little one- she’s GORGEOUS’. I love it so hard, particularly as it has me playing Glockenspiel on it. There is so much of me playing Glock on this album. For real. I want to win an award for the Glock content.
The love for Cocoon is still going strong and like many, we were delighted when the album got the proper release it deserved. How did it feel to see the album finally released?
Thank you. I was also delighted if not super shell shocked that I was back doing music again. I think it took a good few months after the whirlwind of going viral and coming back out there for me to really appreciate it. The LGBTQ+ community gave me life. What a wonderful gift, to be given a second chance like that! It did throw me though- I was so busy being a mum and an IT consultant. I had forgotten who I was, or could be. Music has opened up my heart again and to feel that joy and be able to sing and play my guitar is just otherworldly for me.
The response to Swim has been fantastic and we’re eager to hear what is next for you after this!
Thank you! Next up will be a really great single called, ‘Everybody‘ and the full title is ‘Everybody’s Got Somebody But Me‘ which is , I’m afraid, factually true! I don’t have anyone. I think I’m ok with that but the song is kinda making a joke about it all and that’s where my head is at with singledom for the now. I used to feel ‘lesser’ for not having a partner but that is bonkers. Plus, we all know that Kingsley Ben-Adir is just waiting for the right moment to wife me up.