Stitched Up Heart: The Unveiling of To The Wolves

Interview by Ken Morton - Photos by Jack Lue

Los Angeles heavy rockers Stitched Up Heart are charging toward the release of their new album To The Wolves, and amping it up each step of the way. Heavier is indeed the name of the game on To The Wolves. As the band explores darker territories than ever before, Stitched Up Heart has crafted something that is anthemic, soulful, and unapologetic. To The Wolves arrives September 1st via Century Media Records. As we await the unveiling of To The Wolves, Highwire Daze caught up with lead vocalist Mixi to find out more about the band’s almighty magnum opus, their upcoming tour with Escape The Fate, her passion for kitten rescue, and more!

Let’s talk about the new album, To The Wolves. Is there any overall story or concept first of all behind that title? Oh yes. It’s interesting because this entire vision for this record, I really focused on the whole thing as a concept. I was the most focused as it had been ever in our history of writing and a lot of it is around the dark fantasy kind of elements of vampires and werewolves and underworld and movies that we really gravitate to as far as the visual aesthetic and the theme for it.

And To The Wolves obviously you might know that I do have two little pomskies that I think are killer wolves. They may be 13 pounds, but they’re still vicious, and I was a little obsessed when I was coming up with the album title and I love these dogs so much that I just I’ll let you know what this one’s To The Wolves.

What was it like working with Craig Mabbitt and Thrasher of Escape The Fate, on the titled track, To The Wolves. I absolutely adore Escape the Fate. We have the same management team, so we’ve been getting to know them a little bit since we joined with them and they’re the nicest people, they’re just super humble, super cool. They’ve been doing it for a very long time and Craig going above and beyond to sing on it and to get on the music video and then take us out on tour and Thrasher. If you’ve watched some of what Thrasher has been doing, he’s worked on the last Machine Gun Kelly record, he just did a song with Gwen Stefani. The guy is blowing up and to be able to have him squeeze in some time for us little guys, I was really super grateful for all the work that they helped putting into this.

You have a new single that just came out, Possess Me. What was the inspiration behind that song?

Possess Me, was one of the first tracks that we wrote for this record. We went out to Nashville with Mitchell Marlow, who we did some of the work with. He co-produced our Never Alone album and Mitch and I were really on the same page and I wanted to get kind of spiritual and dark, but not a light spiritual way.

Almost like picking from the darkness of our spirituality, the bad, not as much as the good because I feel like I’ve tapped into that lyrically. When we were writing it, the lyrics, I am a very visual person and I envisioned this incubus/succubus kind of character seducing me. I wanted it to be very passionate and intimate but also aggressive and vicious.

And so I visualize this happening, which was really exciting to do, if you’re a creative or if you’re a visual person to write the lyrics and words and to explain a story in a song, just about this demon creature being really hot. (laughs) And I just I wanted it to be sexy and seductive and pull out that part of me, which is that dark side, what we like to call bad. What society likes to call the bad side, but it was very much a fun one to do and Merritt had a lot of play in all the noises and weird programming. And the heavy breakdown, the heaviest breakdown we’ve ever done. I kept saying, “I want heavy breakdowns guys. I want heavy breakdowns.’’

We were always too scared to go that far, and the next song will be even further in the heavy direction. Not all of them will be insanely heavy, but we really, really pushed the boundaries, and I was like, just give me the heaviest breakdown you can, and we just went for it, and it was super fun.

What are you looking forward to the most about this upcoming Escape the Fate tour?

There is so many good bands on this bill. I think I’m going to probably stick and watch every single show, every single night, side stage. I’ll be there. I know that Escape the Fate has some really cool production that they’ve never gone this big on and so I’m really excited for that and just to kind of... they’re a streaming band so we friended on Twitch as well and they play Call of Duty and stuff like that, which is going to be super fun.

Hopefully, we’ll get some gaming time in and some streaming time in and oh yeah, the shows will be cool. But yes. It’s been a while since we’ve been out on a tour. A year ago, we did a run to Florida and back for Welcome to Rockville, but it was only a two-week, little, “short gas money tour”, but this is going to be the first tour since we were out in the UK with Fozzy, and then Butcher Babies was the tour before that.

So we haven’t been out in a while on a legit tour. So we’re really excited to just do the full US to some places we haven’t played in 5-6 years. It’s crazy how time flies but yes, a lot of places that we missed and people that we can’t wait to see.

Do you plan to perform To The Wolves with Craig on the tour?

I don’t want to bug him about it. He’s already done so much. So I’m totally down to singing the parts. They’re not super hard in the second first, but yes, we’re the second on the bill and they’re headlining. So last thing I’m going to do is annoy the headliner with like, can you come and sing on my song? So, I’m kind of too shy to ask, but if he asks me, I would totally be down. Obviously.

How did you become involved with fostering kittens and how can other people become involved with that?

There are kittens everywhere! There are rescues everywhere. In 2015, I stopped drinking after a tour. I was so burnt, I was like you know what, I’m not going to drink anymore and then I was just looking for stuff to do because I was so used to just going into Hollywood and hanging out with everybody and drinking. And what do you do and that isn’t your life honestly. in my 20s and stuff like that.

So, I looked online, and I found kitten bottle feeding class and then a kitten shower, where they introduce you to the rescue and Best Friends Animal Society and kitten rescue. And I was like, that sounds fun. I’m down. So I’ll feed the babies bottles instead of me. (Laughs).

There’s so many local rescues. Just look it up whatever town you’re in especially in the summertime. There’s probably a plethora of kittens that need help and they come in constantly where I’m at - California. It’s really warm so, almost all year round is kitten season. There’s not enough resources, and people to be able to take care of them. So, super passionate about that. I have two kittens at the moment in my bathroom downstairs - they are eating food on their own and they’ll be up for adoption in a month. It’s number 91 and 92 for me.

You did several photo shoots with photographer Jack Lue and one of them you did was at The Rain Room. What was that experience like shooting photography in the rain?

So cool! I’ve always wanted to do a rain shoot. It just look so cool, and it was everything I ever dreamed it to be! I embraced it. It was like that idea of dancing in the rain. It was like that, but doing it with the camera and just really having fun with it and hoping my makeup didn’t smear all over the place before he got a few good shots in. It was awesome!

I love shooting with Jack. We got another shoot coming up actually. I told him I’m always down. I love being creative. He’s so fast. He’s so clever with his locations and things like that. Things I would never think to do, and it always comes out just beautifully so, I’m always down to shoot with Jack https://www.instagram.com/stitchedupheart/

What has kept you so passionate about Stitched Up Heart since 2010 and throughout changes in band members. I have no idea why. I must be crazy. (Laughter). They say you got to be crazy to do this gig. I just can’t live without it, and it built it. I’ve watched this little baby project grow from the ground up and seeing it go from nothing and watching it as you evolve and it’s really weird because when you make those milestones when you hit them for that 30 minutes on stage that you get to play opening up for like Godsmack or Halestorm or In This Moment, and it might be a short period of time but it makes every little, every tear, every blood, sweat, all the things, all the hours of driving, all the lack of finances and bills that are really hard to pay sometimes and all of the vulnerability.

You put yourself out there, and judgment, and everybody deciding that’s what they want for you and not what you’re just trying to create art. All of that, that creates mental health issues with us musicians for that 30 minutes on stage. It’s a really good question. I have no idea, but I can’t stop. Maybe I’m a masochist, maybe I enjoy the pain. But it’s all worth it when you get to experience some of these things I would never have experienced if I didn’t just keep hanging on and keep moving forward with this band.