Remembering SOPHIE: The sound of the LGBTQ+ community
BY GRACE JENNINGS
“You’ve got nothing to hide.… I accept you” – SOPHIE.
SOPHIE was a ground-breaking transgender musician, producer, songwriter, and DJ who broke the boundaries of the music industry. In the early hours on 20th January, SOPHIE tragically passed away. SOPHIE had climbed up to watch the full moon in Athens, accidentally falling. SOPHIE was only 34 years old.
Following the requests made by the artist’s representatives, I will not be using pronouns to describe this beautiful human being. Instead, I shall refer to the artist simply as SOPHIE.
It is hard to put into words the impact which SOPHIE’s music has had on my life.
When my friend first introduced me to SOPHIE’s music, I had just moved to Bristol for university. Like so many eager freshers who had graced the dance floors of Lakota before me, I discovered Drum and Bass. I believed that I had found the epitome of musical taste (so naïve).
SOPHIE’s sound did not fit this scene. In fact, SOPHIE’s sound did not fit any scene I had ever been in. At first, I found SOPHIE confusing. I was trying to fit in, but this music certainly was not. In SOPHIE’s 2018 album ‘Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides’ the artist dichotomising dark and hard industrial techno beats with bright and chirpy bubble gum pop vocals.
In the beginning, I found this sound challenging. It was describable. Every SOPHIE track is a fantastical rejection of musical categorisation at every turn. I began to realise that this is what makes it so brilliant. It may sound cliché, but SOPHIE transported me to a Whole New World. I’ve never looked back.
© Kasia Zacharko
We live in a world where, as soon as we are born, we are forced into binaries. We are given a sex, from which we are given a gender. People have perceptions on us based on where we come from (yes, I am Irish, no I don’t like potatoes).
We are pre-judged by someone we have never met through one swipe of our Instagram profile. Still for so many, the prospect of embracing one’s own sexuality is remains terrifying. SOPHIE’s mind-expanding music offered me, and so many others a chance to escape this culture. In this new world, binaries are impossible. Judgement is not in the language. Sexuality is something to explore and cherish. In the artist’s own words, SOPHIE expressed her rebellion against false binaries, stating: “People do think in binaries, and when you confuse what those are, they’re like, this is wrong. But this is what I’m here to do.”.
SOPHIE. Image credit: Frazer Harrison/Getty
I spoke with others and asked them to express what SOPHIE meant for them.
London-based Drag Queen and DJ Mr Ms Mars told me how the loss was ‘indescribable’. For her, SOPHIE was more than a music producer. SOPHIE was ‘a sonic architect and sculptor - a unique visionary’.
For producer and singer James Rose, ‘SOPHIE pushed the edge of genre and texture, allowing producers like myself, to be freer in how we produce and create music’.
As well as being a staple of the underground scene, and an icon of liberation for the transgender men and women everywhere, SOPHIE’s innovative production shines through the mainstream music scene on the tracks of other artists.
Do you stan Charli XCX? Thank SOPHIE. Do you dance with Madonna, Lady Gaga, Vince Staples, Kim Petras, MO, or Cashmere Cat? Then you are partying with SOPHIE. SOPHIE was one of the most influential producers of our time. SOPHIE’s shoes were huge, unique, and special. I am not sure anyone will be capable of filling them.
As the great Lady Gaga once said, ‘talented, brilliant, incredible, amazing, show stopping, spectacular, never the same, totally unique, completely not ever been done before, unafraid to reference or not reference’.
This was the beautiful SOPHIE who will be treasured, remembered, and continue to inspire.
I hope that all of those who have read this will be inspired to listen to SOPHIE’s artistry. Perhaps start with ‘It’s Okay to Cry’. It has got me through some lockdown lows. I also love, love, LOVE ‘Bipp’, ‘Lemonade’, ‘Ponyboy’, ‘Immaterial’, ‘Just Like We Never Said Goodbye’, ‘Hard’, ‘Sweat’… You get the point: every single one.
This year’s FUZE is in aid of two charities: ArtRefuge and Black South West Network.
