Hyperpop princess TAMAGOTCHI MASSACRE has finally arrived with her debut album, i guess i’m a woman now… today. Born from gender dysphoria, feelings of hopelessness, and an obsession with all things cute, the album finds TAMAGOTCHI MASSACRE – aka 20-year-old experimental artist Cleo Mckenzie – diving deep into transfeminine suffering, dismantling cisnormative conceptions of womanhood and exploring a sense of post-binary femininity. Listen to it now below.
McKenzie has been medically transitioning for a little over two years. In that time, it seems as though the burden of her everyday life has only gotten heavier and heavier. Slipping in and out of disordered eating, becoming a victim of public harassment, obsessing over her appearance, and struggling with her sexuality, McKenzie realized that the cisnormative ideal of womanhood which she once longed to embody was slowly killing her. Her favorite dresses, which once instilled a sense of liberation and excitement, began to feel like drab prison uniforms. The makeup she once dawned as a form of self-expression became a shield against transphobic violence. The future, which once appeared bright and colorful, slowly became muted and distorted. Through cutting edge production, innovative songwriting, and visionary artistic direction, McKenzie channels these painful experiences into her music, weaving a heartbreaking tapestry of contemporary trans womanhood.
i guess i’m a woman now… is a bittersweet revelation. It casts aside the hopeful naïveté of early transition in order to confront the harsh societal expectations of womanhood. The ellipsis in the title stands in for an implied question: “i guess i’m a woman now… so now what?”
The album answers this question with an explosion of autotuned confessions and eclectic hyperpop production. “hermit crab,” inspired by the fuzzy timbre of Jane Remover’s frailty, spurns rigid gender roles in favor of pure self expression. Enveloped by a swirling world of bit- crushed guitars and arcade drums, McKenzie sings “I’ll cut my hair and change my pronouns to whatever / I left my shell to find I slightly bigger one.” The song explodes into a wall of distortion as McKenzie repeats a monotonous, glitchy refrain “It’s never enough-nough-nough” Originally a nihilistic remark on the futility of passing, this chorus becomes a transgressive rejection of binary gender, McKenzie refusing to adhere to a cisnormative standard of femininity that she will never fit into.
“im 2 years on hormones and im still sad i want a refund,” a lo-fi ballad that opens the record, serves as the thematic ribbon that ties the project together. Draped in a warm blanket of saturation, McKenzie delivers a line that lies at the heart of the album, “through all of this pink I still can’t seem to stave off all the blue.” On “cloud emoji,” an innovative track that blends elements of hyperpop with Bossa Nova, McKenzie questions her capacity to be loved, “Am I even enough of a woman?”
Ultimately, i guess i’m a woman now… simultaneously acknowledges and embraces the pain of womanhood. On the final track, “mirrorsong*” McKenzie learns to appreciate the challenges of femininity: “Drinking bright pink ethanol / Love the hurt ‘cause after all / Womanhood is pain.” The album’s thesis is one of placid acceptance: womanhood is not a utopian escape from pain, nor is it a condemnation to suffering. Instead, it is a wellspring of passion in a desert of patriarchal alienation. One’s choice to embody womanhood in the face of hardship is precisely what makes womanhood so meaningful.