cumgirl8 met in a sex chat 8000 years ago in another metaverse. Made up of Lida Fox (bass), Veronika Vilim (guitar), Chase Lombardo (drums), and Avishag Rodrigues (guitar), the band started as an art collective in 2019 before coming together to create a boundary-less sound, drawing from the likes of ESG, Cocteau Twins, Suicide, CSS, B-52s, The Shangri-Las, Chris & Cosey, Madonna, and many more.
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As reflected in their name, cumgirl8’s work pushes against the status quo by satirizing themes in popular culture surrounding femme objectification, social media sensationalism, and capitalism. They create a universe within their art that stretches into the tangible, the four-piece creating a fashion line (cg8) with runway shows that have received multiple praises from Vogue Magazine. They also paired their first music release with a graphic zine, illustrated by Air Hoover. It narrates the genesis of the band as a group of post-human superheroes that exist inside the internet and transform the power of orgasms into enlightenment.
During quarantine, the band continued spreading their ideals by launching a lo-fi internet talk show ‘The 1-900’ interviewing artists like Junglepussy, Dani Miller, US congressional candidate Paperboy Love Prince, the hosts of Girls on Porn podcast, among others. Their main medium though is music. The quartet’s commitment to constantly evolving their sound has so far resulted in two EP’s: cumgirl8 (2020), RIPcumgirl8 (2021) and last year’s standalone single “dumb bitch.”
The band’s new EP and 4AD debut phantasea pharm takes both the conceptual and musical elements of their project to a whole new level. Inspired by an obsession with Ella Fitzgerald’s “Old McDonald,” ahead of a show in Charlottesville, Virginia, the band decided to pay homage. Vilim dressed up in a cow leotard with pig accessories, Lombardo in a g-string and apron that read “The Grillfather,” Rodrigues became a lawn mower on the grass through a hodge-podge of green pieces, and Fox took on the role of a sexy chicken. “We went on stage that night and told everyone we were a ‘Fantasy Farm.’” They knew then that would become the basis of their new EP.
Across the six tracks that make up phantasea pharm, the band is as raw and daring as ever, perfectly encapsulated in the EP’s first single “cicciolina” named after famed Hungarian-Italian porn-star turned politician Ilona Staller, aka Cicciolina.
“Cicciolina advocated for human rights and the eradication of nuclear weapons. Cicciolina said "make sex not war" and used her divine power of femininity to troll the status quo while disrupting it from the inside. We feel her ideals are foundational to the cumgirl8 philosophy of subversive change, peace, and strength in vulnerability. Cicciolina is cumgirl1.”
Second single “gothgirl1” is a fiery and erotic song about desire, whose chorus cheekily repeats the phrase “i’ll devour you.” The track was written during the band’s stay at Barbizon, “a magical artist hotel nestled deep inside a mushroom forest.” Other tracks on the EP include: “dead pixels,” a Cocteau Twins-inspired love song written after visiting the 4AD office for the first time, and “cursed angel,” a whimsical dance with insanity.
Some of the tracks on phantasea pharm were born on stage. One of these is “picture party” featuring fellow New York-based drag performer, singer and performance artist Christeene. “We were playing a party and as soon as we started, everyone had their phones out, taking pictures more than they were dancing. It started as a bit of an audience taunt that evolved into a story about getting buckwild.”
Final track on the EP, “pritney LLC” is an ode to cumgirl8’s manager, a pink Pomeranian named Pritney. “She’s the life of every party,” cumgirl8 say, describing the iconic Pritney who is lovingly accused as “a party slut” throughout the song - “she’s the token messy girl, but nobody cares because she’s so cute and sweet.”
As much as the music itself, cumgirl8’s incendiary live performances are brilliantly chaotic and emblematic of the spirit of New York performance art. Self-styled with clothes they often make themselves – from the aforementioned farm animals to giant babies – their onstage aesthetics have also found favor in the fashion world, resulting in various features and cover stories from the likes of Lampoon and Purple Magazine.
