By Kevin Ferrisi –

Connecticut drag artist Glass Staine dropped a teaser for her new album today, following the launch of her first album, Raw, in 2018. Returning with a completely new sound that she describes as “fresh and sickening,” the new album, Supernova, takes you on a journey of an aspiring pop star who reaches optimum fame and quickly finds out that it is the fame itself that leads to her own demise, ultimately death. Written and produced by Glass Staine herself, she wanted the album to be authentically her.

You might know Glass Staine as Mx. KYNK 2022 or as an online competition superstar, having participated in numerous online competitions. Perhaps you have seen her on the judges’ panel at the Mx. Toxic competition, or from one of the many shows you can catch her at throughout the state. Glass Staine has built a reputation as one of Connecticut’s leading alternative drag queens and would describe herself as a superstar in turmoil.

Growing up, Glass could never find what she was good at until she discovered and started getting into drag, creating bigger and better looks. Glass has been doing drag makeup since 2015 and started performing in 2017. You quickly get a sense of what Glass is all about when she explains her thrill for surprising people: “I love shocking people and I love kind of people’s reaction to maybe being a little bit scared of me,” she goes on to say, “like it makes me happy that people are maybe a little bit put off with some of my performances and my looks.”

ConnecticutDrag.com caught up with Glass Staine to talk about her upcoming album Supernova to spill the tea ahead of the album announcement.

How did you decide on the name Supernova for your second album?

“Supernova was the perfect title for the album, carrying a double meaning for me, because it goes perfectly with the theme of the album which takes you on a journey of a dying star which is the scientific explanation for a supernova. But the term ‘supernova’ could also be an alternative for the word superstar. The definition of supernova is the explosion of a very large star, and I would describe my album as just that.”

What details could you tell us about the new album without giving too much away?

“The album has a very strong storyline and follows a progression. The album starts off very fun, and about the mid-way mark, the album takes a turn and becomes more dark. The album follows this character, which is ‘Glass Staine’, it’s not me but it is me, and in this fantasy universe she is a mega celebrity, in the public eye and she is rich and famous. Right off the bat, the album comes off swinging with this entire persona. The first track on the album entitled ‘Bleach Blonde’ perfectly illustrates everything the album will say. As the album progresses the character becomes absorbed in the world of fame and does really dangerous things and becomes more delusional and becomes out of touch with reality until it reaches a breaking point in one song and from then the album is completely different. It kind of follows how being famous and being in the public eye can destroy someone mentally.

In a way, to a lesser degree, I relate it to doing drag. Like when you are on stage, you are the star. You are the icon, but behind the scenes, it’s hard work and mentally draining sometimes. Let’s be real, almost every drag queen wants to be famous so I picture Supernova as if Glass Staine were not a drag queen, and just a regular woman, but wanted to be a star and became a star and what that would look like.”

What can we expect from this album that is different from your music in the past, specifically the first album you dropped in 2018 entitled Raw?

“It is entirely different. Raw and Supernova could not be more different. I made the Raw album or that EP during a different point in my drag career. I’ve always been an alternative drag artist since I started from day one, and Raw kind of came out during a time when I really identified as an alternative queen. At the time, I was really into Crystal Castles, which is actually where I got my drag name from, from my favorite band. So, I was really into Witch House and industrial music and like screamo and shit like that. So that all kind of went into that album, and I feel like I’m just in such a different place now than in 2018.

Supernova is my version of pop. I really wanted to create a pop album because, at my core, even though I am alternative, I am such a pop girly. I was raised on pop, I was raised on Madonna and Cyndi Lauper, like pop that my mom listened to in the car, and that is all I knew. It was pop music and the other types of music that I know, I found myself later, but I was really raised on pop. So, I kind of looked at Supernova through the lens of like, how would Glass Staine do pop music? I didn’t overthink it either. I wasn’t like, ‘is this Glass Staine enough’ it’s just how I naturally would imagine creating pop music. It is very pop, very dirty, grimy, sexy and hot. It is also very dark. With Raw I was in my emo era, having difficulty creating music because I talked about serious things. With Supernova, I am rich and famous, I’m topless on a beach, and I’m fucking sexy. They are very different.”

Were there any musical artists that you drew inspiration from when creating your new album?

“The sound is definitely influenced by the type of music I am into right now, like COBRAH or dirty EDM inspired pop, or like Kim Petras’ album Slut Pop. But I never intentionally wanted to recreate a specific sound or song. I was more inspired by certain imagery of pop stars. I was really inspired by a lot of Gwen Stefani’s old visuals and her aesthetic back then, like ‘Wind It Up’ or ‘Luxurious’ or ‘The Sweet Escape’. I was also really inspired by the feel of Lady Gaga’s first album, The Fame.”

Were there emotions or past life experiences that surfaced when you sat down to write the album? Were you confronted with any emotions while writing the album that you needed to work through?

“I definitely wanted to have more fun writing this album than I did with Raw and I feel like Raw was a lot to write because Raw was very personal and stuff that either I actually experienced or people I knew experienced, or things that I’ve witnessed. Raw was like, I’m talking about my OCD and my depression and my fucking alcoholic mom, shit like that. Supernova was a lot more fun to write because I could just be cunty and fierce. I mean, the later tracks on the new album definitely do get intense, but it also is not really me. The story that this album, or the person that this album is telling a story about, isn’t really me, it’s like someone known as Glass Staine. It’s not personal. Even the stuff that I’m talking about, I talk a lot about getting work done and plastic surgery and like I don’t have any, I don’t have any work done. It’s a character and it’s elevated, it’s literally a pop star fantasy.”

Did you write and produce each song?

“I wrote everything. The last EP album that I came out with, Raw (2018), I wrote everything. I always write my own music. I never want to hire someone to write. I want everything that I do to be authentically me. I wrote the album and produced the majority of the album, but even the songs I didn’t entirely produce myself I have some production level on it, whether that be adding instruments or rearranging the song or chopping it up. I’ve touched every single beat on there.

For Raw, I did not make a single beat on there. I wrote everything but I didn’t produce anything. I literally just wrote the lyrics. I went into my friend’s studio, and I recorded my vocals, he mixed. He made all the instrumentals. He makes everything. With Supernova, I am doing literally everything. I got the knowledge to do that from watching people, and I just learned and practiced.”

What is your creative process like?

“I have to have good audio. That is number one for me. I always have my headphones. I’m never just listening to shit off of my phone. I either have my Dr. Dre Beats on or I’m in my car with the volume turned all the way out. I have to be able to hear everything very clearly and make sure that all the levels are correct and everything, for producing. In terms of writing music, honestly, shit just comes to me sometimes or I’ll listen to the beat and think of the words I have the instrumental for, or sometimes I have the lyrics first or like a melody that I can write lyrics to. I guess my creative process is kind of chaotic.”

What is one message you would give to your fans about this album?

“This is going to be fucking sickening. I have genuinely been working on this album since Raw came out, so it’s been since 2018. The first single that I’m going to be putting out in late February, is a leftover from Raw actually. It is very heavily reworked and rewritten a zillion times and this is something that I have genuinely put fucking everything into and it’s taking a long time to write. It’s taking a long time to produce. I didn’t know how to produce before this.”

Wrap Up

The album is set to drop March 30th and will be available for download. You can also catch Glass Staine at the album release party on the same day at the Chez Est in Hartford, CT, where you can catch live performances from the album. The first track on the album entitled ‘Bleach Blonde’ will also be the first single dropped in late February, ahead of the full album release.