PREMIERE | Debbie Dopamine, 'Pets'
In the tub with Debbie Dopamine’s Katie Ortiz; photographed by Cori Schimko.
Venturing into the vortex of vulnerability and psychic explorations of the self can be a daunting task. From the latent shadows that surface and materialize in the strangest of ways, the specters of traumas both generational and those that emerge from the subterranean wardrobes of the unconscious are all components of ourselves. The gestalt of the tissues that make up our beings are the picture books of the family and friends we have lost, the memories we cherish, the moments we wish to forget, the embarrassments, the indelible incidents and events that left the biggest impacts (even if we didn't think much of it at the time). We are always working out all the complexities that comprise our own unique identities. From the messiness we find healing and catharsis on our own individual terms, from soul searching, therapy sessions, heart to hearts and everything in between to arrive at higher echelons of elation and grace. We are all mercurial beings, forever figuring it all out and rediscovering what existence is all about in this fragile little thing called life.
Enter Debbie Dopamine with an early listen to the anticipated new record Pets. Sprung from the vast vision boards of bandleader Katie Ortiz, alongside the talents of Dylan LaPointe and Zach Rescignano; Debbie Dopamine is all about going deep down into the cisterns of the psyche to unlock that latch of euphoric release from all the jumbled piles of stuff that holds us back. Ortiz upholds the banner of being yourself by virtue of digging up all the fractured and muddy facets that play a part in informing the intricate expanses of everything connected to your personality and spirit. From the grief that never fully healed, to the family pets that you wish would have lived longer, working through the pangs of regret of wishing you could have been a better caretaker and more — Debbie Dopamine is a living testament to finding that wellspring of self-acceptance through the chaos of misgivings, misfortunes and everything you wish could have been different. Pets points toward the joy of self-discovery, forgiveness and being kinder to yourself and others in an imperfect world of fleeting impermanence and ongoing, unfurling narratives.
“Get Better” plunges the listener into the abyss of the inner monologues and dialogues that consume the conscious / unconscious like parallel trajectories collapsing into one another in a most unceremonious way. This ain’t your mom’s Lilith Fair grunge pop outing, Katie Ortiz crumbles up the angst like old high school notebook letters from loved ones that are no longer with us in a heavy electric aesthetic that exemplifies life in the post-2020 paradigm. “Eat Cake” indulges in a degree of Marie Antoinette abandon with little to no filter that uncorks pent up frustrations in a sparkling méthode champenoise explosive ode to creating your own transcendent heaven in a life that feels like an oppressive hell of shame/blame spiral cycles. The tear jerking “Rhododendrons” saudade ballad laments the titular Pets of Ortiz’s youth that were buried in the backyard, imagining the new generations of animals discovering their remains whilst wishing different outcomes from the things that cannot be revised or reversed.
Found sound samples and emotive chord strums populate the succinct “Interlude” with a sense of melancholic romanticism, guiding the sentimental streams into the spun summer sun splashed “Swimming Pool”. Debbie Dopamine embarks upon a spirited break from the entropy and inertia that holds you back and holds you down, making a break for a sense of self-fulfillment from scaling secondary school buildings and moving out of the solemn states of perpetual mourning toward an ecstatic place of actualization as witnessed with Katie’s recitations of I am doing well. The trio concludes with the candy coated catharsis of cool on “Sour” that shines in a therapeutic burst of unrelenting exhilaration. Honing in on the antinomy of the sweet / sour double helix metaphor for life, Debbie Dopamine is the boost of serotonin that we all need right now. The pratfalls of our collective conundrums are put on full display, an unflinching tour de force of the upbringings we cannot change with a road map to moving forward & upward toward healthier and happier stratospheres that we never knew were possible.
Katie Ortiz presents an inside look at the new album, creative process, praxis and much more:
On Debbie Dopamine and writing/arranging Pets
Debbie has been a figment of my imagination for years. She is the part of me that embraces a gloomy reality and a cynical outlook. She drags me down, but she does it so good. She’s your depressive episode personified in the internet age, sweet and sharply sour, wrapped in a dirty-bubblegum aesthetic.
Pets was my exploration of something vulnerable, raw, and it constantly teeters on the edge of a breakdown. These songs are equal parts tender and haunting, angry and abrasive. Some of them are scraps and pieces from years of writing without an appropriate outlet for this kind of music. Some, like “Eat Cake” are the result of writing from a desperate stream of consciousness in an unbearably dull time.
Zach and I started workshopping and playing them together out of necessity in 2020. We were stuck at home unable to practice with our various bands or get any kind of catharsis or release through performing. It started as just that, an expression and we slowly realized that we had something really special going. These songs had moments of aching fragility and cutting bleakness unlike either of us were exploring in our other projects. We knew we wanted to bring someone else in who was sensitive to that. I thought of Dylan because of his dynamic range with his other band, Tetchy. He was the perfect fit from the get-go, helping us tease out these nuances in the music. The three of us collaborated a great deal in the arrangement and development of these songs. I may have written them, but our collective fingerprints are all over them.
This project has enabled me to do something I’ve always wanted, which is to delve into those scarier, softer feelings. I think part of it was coming to the realization that I don’t want to always project this image of being strong, or confident, or even acting like I know what I’m doing. Debbie has been all about going deep, moving towards the things that scare me. The little voice in my head that tells me I know I’m not good enough, or that I want to be unhappy. Instead of ignoring it, I asked why. I asked how. And this is what came out. It feels incredibly vulnerable to make art out of those answers, but it felt like the art I needed to make at that moment.
Reflections with Katie Ortiz; photographed by Cori Schimko.
I also indirectly explored grief on this release in a way I really haven't allowed myself to before. I lost someone when I was 18, and I alternated between being totally consumed by that loss and simultaneously wanting desperately to refuse to let it define or shape me in any significant way. Which is, you know, impossible. It’s even more complicated when the relationship itself leaves a lot of deep cuts. I think for a long time I wanted so badly for it to be straightforward, for there to be closure, but I don’t know if I even believe in such a thing. I think part of making these songs was returning to tear that wound open again and again and also finding new bruises in new places and also realizing the ways in which it spreads and seeps into and changes every memory that makes up who I am. And that’s not even necessarily a bad thing.
On the two singles
“Get Better” is straight from the most cynical, darkest, self-indulgently bummed out part of my personality. It hits hard, leaves you dizzy and feels strangely satisfying. There’s a relief in sinking into becoming your worst self, deciding not to try to maintain some illusion or mask of who you’d rather be instead. Just give into it, let it drag you down. It’s kind of always humming in the back of my brain, reminding me that it’s an option, though probably not a viable one. And I think it’s a relatable depressive spiral, gloriously gloomy and not at all sorry.
“Eat Cake” carries more of a melancholy tone, but it comes from the same place: an urge to lock yourself away. When I’m feeling depressed, the whole world feels unsafe. I stay inside. And I am reminded over and over again that my worst monsters are the ones that live inside my own head. But again, there’s something liberating about going deeper into yourself rather than pushing that part of you down. The mind is a disorienting, magical playground to lock yourself inside.
On the name of Pets:
When I started building this project, I had been thinking a lot about all my childhood pets, and how badly some of them were cared for. I’ve always loved animals and my parents let me keep hamsters, guinea pigs, or tiny lizards along with our family dogs and cats. But I didn’t know how to take care of them. I just loved them so intensely, which wasn’t enough. And one by one, I buried them under the rhododendrons in our backyard. Then years later, as an adult, I start having these morbid images, of the new pets of the new families that moved into that house after us digging the bones of mine up. It was this bizarre, macabre idea that I became briefly obsessed with and kept me up at night. I think that goes back to the whole closure thing. I blamed myself for every fragile life, even if they weren’t in my control to begin with, even if as a literal child it shouldn’t have been solely up to me to take proper care of them. Even laid to rest under the dirt, there’s no sense of permanence or safety there. This whole thought process felt so ridiculously tragic and wonderfully strange, and I just found myself lost in it again and again.
We explored a lot of that in “Rhododendrons”, but the general sentiment is all over the other songs. Aching to hold your some innocent version of your younger self while aggressively hating who you are now.
Debbie Dopamine’s Pets will be available everywhere July 29.
Pets cover art courtesy of Dylan LaPointe.