Aaaaand...ACTION!

A couple weeks ago I started doing a government funded self management course for people who suffer from chronic health conditions. If you've known me for any period of time you would know that I have fibromyalgia plus have been struggling with PTSD for the past few years which comes with anxiety and depression. I'm not going to be going into that in this post though. What I do want to share is how doing this self management program is impacting my creative life. In this program we learn and practice a variety of strategies that help us positively manage our health conditions.

This post week we covered making an "action plan." According to the several health professionals who wrote this program action planning is probably the most important self-management tool. So what is an action plan? An action plan is an action you can take that is short term, doable and sets you on the road towards achieving a goal. In my program we set goals to enhance our quality of life.

Unsurprisingly, working on creative projects enhances my quality of life. So, while I do set goals that are specific to my physical condition, feeding my mental, emotional and spiritual health is equally important and very much complementary to managing my physical condition. A lot of why I've been creatively dormant for the past year as far as Borg Queen goes is that the goals I wish to accomplish within this project are rather lofty. It's not that I've had a creative block or lost inspiration, it's just that I've been battling the physical effects of my chronic illness which has left me with no energy to work on anything...or so I thought.

 What I've learned is that the secret of an effective action plan is to not try to do everything at once. Inside my head I imagine everything all at once, but the problem is that in the physical world I am not capable of doing everything at once, so I've just had to accept that I'm limited and have to work within those limitations. What I've been learning to do is look at what I can realistically accomplish within the next week and base my action plan on what I can realistically achieve.

 Another crucial point about the action plan is that it should be about something I want to do, not something that will please anyone else. So when making my first action plan in this course I asked myself, "Jenny, what do YOU want to do?" The reply was, "I really want to write the screenplay for 'A Bionic Holiday Ballad.'"

Of course with me being an obsessive workaholic and wanting to get it done as fast as possible, my initial action plan was pretty unrealistic. At first I wanted to get the whole thing written within a week, but that would have required me to write 20 pages a day. It's totally doable if I push myself and don't have any other distractions, but the likelihood of accomplishing it was 50/50. They say you need to be at least 70% sure that you can complete your action plan, so I asked myself, "what is a number of pages you KNOW you can write in a day?"

I settled on 5 pages a day because I wanted to feel like I was succeeding and not having to stress out about it. Man! What a difference it makes to set up a plan that is easily accomplished! It's encouraging. It fosters hope and builds confidence. Everyday I was able to exceed my goal of 5 pages and that made me feel pretty damn good about myself. I was able to get the screenplay done in 10 days! Getting it done in a week would have put unnecessary pressure on myself, and for what? It's not like I'm working for anyone but myself.

 So now that I've written the screenplay I've decided to turn "A Bionic Holiday Ballad" into a musical. I'm gonna be honest that the inspiration to turn this story into a musical is totally coming from my love of "A Muppet Christmas Carol." My version obviously is going to be darker and have a very distinct "Borg Queen" sound to it. My "Bionic Holiday Ballad" action plan for the week is to sift through the screenplay again and determine at which points a song would fit.

Old Jenny would have written an action plan for this week that would have included the aforementioned plan, plus coming up with song titles, plus writing all the lyrics in one week. Old Jenny would have set themselves up for a stressful week and would be motivated to complete their action plan out of a fear of failure.

 Fear can be an effective motivator, but it's not a sustainable one and the cost is too high. Fear is something that has motivated me a lot in my life. It's also cost me my mental and physical health. One of the things I've been practicing over that past year is to not allow myself to take action as the result of fear. I'm learning to take action because I want to, not because I'm afraid of the consequences of inaction.

 The protagonist in "A Bionic Holiday Ballad" is Elanor Sharp a parallel to Ebenezar Scrooge. Scrooge is a character that if you really start examining their motives for their heinous behavior, you start to realize that their primary motivator is fear. Fear is going to be a major theme that is explored in the character of Elanor Sharp and I'm going to incorporate my own experience with being a workaholic motivated by fear into that character. However, getting to know Elanor Sharp is another blog post for another day.

For now I'm just going to work on my action plan for this week and enjoy the process. If you enjoyed reading this blog, and want to stay updated with what's going on with my project, then sign up for the mailing list at the top of the page. I love hearing feedback from you, so feel free to leave a comment or if you have any questions about what I've written just shoot me an email at borgqueenmusic@gmail.com

Caught The Bug

I don't know if you know this about me, but Captain Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation is my childhood hero, so naturally I'm super stoked for his return to the small screen in the upcoming spin off series Star Trek: Picard. Sir Patrick Stewart's brilliant performance is what made the character so beloved and influential to many people of my generation.

Now, with it being 2020 and myself an avid Picard/Sir Patrick fan I follow both accounts on social media. The other day I followed a link to an article in Variety featuring Patrick Stewart. The article kicks off  with  mention of Patrick Stewart's one man theatrical adaption of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. 

Is it a coincidence that I've been formulating my own adaptation of the timeless tale as well? Up until this point, my version was only ideas loosely woven together and I had yet to put pen to paper or more accurately fingers to keys. However, as I continued to read the article, there were some points that began to spark the motivation to start actively working on it that I had been lacking.

The first one was Sir Patrick assertion that A Christmas Carol is more relevant in our present time than ever.

...'Stewart believes that makes the piece more timely than ever. He characterizes “A Christmas Carol” as a “profoundly angry attack” on a society that treats marginalized people as subhuman. “Forget about Tiny Tim and all that stuff,” he says. “It’s a political document.” ' 

I personally couldn't agree more, and that's the direction that I will be taking with my version. The setting will be a dystopian future in which human rights have been curtailed back to the level they were at in Victorian London as a result of an oppressive capitalist regime that decimated democracy, equality and labor laws, paving the way for the 1% to rule the masses.

The second thing Sir Patrick said that hit home in the most personal way was, he described the impact acting had on his young life.

“Nothing bad could happen to me for the two and a half hours that we were doing the play, because I became somebody else,”

From a very young age I've loved performing and creating characters and worlds through various mediums for the same reason. Artistic expression is a safe place. It's somewhere I can go to be myself by being someone else. I don't have to be Jenny Kirby the chronically ill, domestic violence and multiple sexual assault survivor who suffers from PTSD. I can shed those afflictions and be the White Witch of Narnia or Elanor Sharp the genius bionics engineer. 

Elanor Sharp incidentally is the main character of my version of A Christmas Carol which currently has the working title of A Bionic Holiday Ballad. This is something I've been wanting to do for a long time, but the magnitude of tackling a project like this has been daunting and too much to take on...until now. Working on this project will be the next phase in my recovery journey. Elanor is a workaholic with a privileged but traumatic childhood. There will be a lot of events that will mirror my own experiences as we take a trip with the Ghost of Holiday Past. 

I'm also going to be layering in some mental health metaphors particularly when it comes to what the ghosts symbolize. The Ghost of Holiday Past will represent depression. Holiday Present is will represent existing in a state of serenity and mindfulness and Holiday Future will represent anxiety.

This project is a huge undertaking that will be ongoing over the next few years, but it will spawn a whole bunch of new music(at least 2 albums) plus some new music videos, artwork and of course a film. While I do believe in coincidences, I'm taking the timing of  the Variety article and the words of Sir Pat Stew as a sign that it's time to allow myself to be infected by the bug again.

Rewiring Childhood

I haven't done anything artistically significant (by my own definition) in a while. Some might argue that working as a concept illustrator on Arrow for the past 2 years and and playing a show this past weekend are artistically significant, but by my impossibly high standards for myself I am doing the bare minimum. I spend most of my time in a state of introspection. I am working on healing my mind, body, soul and spirit. This is no easy task because for years I abused myself and have been subjected to the abuse of others. We all have, to varying degrees of course, but not one of us has come into adulthood unscathed. 

The ways in which we abuse ourselves are fascinating because the root is often not apparent. The origins of our self abuse stems from our childhood. Since many of us don't remember much from our early years, it may be hard to figure out where these destructive thought patterns which feed our destructive behaviors and toxic relationships came from. The point of discovering our dysfunctional origin is not to lay blame and absolve ourselves of responsibility, but rather to challenge those things that were said and done to us so that we can break the grip they still have on our lives today. We are essentially rewiring our brains by doing this.

I'll give you an example. My entire sense of self worth has come from the idea that I am intelligent, creative, artistically talented and capable of doing anything I set my mind to. This has hammered into me by my parents and affirmed by my teachers and peers. Even the kids who didn't like me and were super cruel to me still conceded that I was smart and talented. I may not have had friends, but at least I had a sharp mind and I could wow people with my artistic talents. As a result, I began to equate admiration with affection, but I rarely connected with anyone on a deep personal level. I never felt loved and accepted for who I was at my core. I derived my sense of value from my abilites and how much people admired me for them even if they didn't necessarily know me or even like me. I never learned to let anyone in and what intimacy really is. 

Now it's time to rewire. I'm beginning to see how years of placing my sense of self worth in my abilites isn't sustainable. In this stage of my life having a chronic illness and a host of mental health issues has diminished my ability to be this highly intelligent, extraordinary artist, who's a creative force to be reckoned with. I'm having to learn to derive my worth elsewhere and that's an uncomfortable place to be. I'm having to be compassionate with myself which is something I never learned in my childhood. I have to rewire that thought path in my mind that tells me "I have to exceed my previous achievements to have value." I'm working on changing that thought pattern to "I am enough as I am right now and I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be." 

Nobody ever said anything like that to me as a kid so the thought had never occurred to me. The first time I heard it something along the lines that my worth doesn't come from my talents and abilities, I rejected it. I'm still having a tough time believing it, but I'm determined to change and grow. Change and growth takes time though. I have been making a concentrated effort to not do anything spectacular(by my old standard) yet still affirm that I am just as valuable, loveable and worthy of connection. Rewiring is hard work.

Remembering My Dearly Departed

I'm definitely experiencing grief right now. My Mummo, Meimi Lahti died April 3, 2019. She was 91 and had lived a good long life. While I am very sad that I'll never see her in this physical life again her death is by no means a tragedy. Still, I'm profoundly sad and it will take some time to process the grief and adjust to life without her.

I have to say that I'm definitely dealing with her death in a much healthier way than when my dad died. I've been going through a recovery process and part of that for me is acknowledging my emotions rather than burying them. When my dad died, I didn't even cry despite the fact that we were incredibly close. I didn't want to process his death. It was too much for me to handle at the time. It's taken years to let him go, but last year I finally was able to.

Because of the profound impact he had on my life and also the way I dealt with his death I want to base one of my upcoming Borg Queen projects on the way I dealt with his loss. I'm not going to go into too much detail, but needless to say it's going to be a massive project and I have a couple things I want to get done first.

If you read my previous post, you'll have heard the song I recorded in Finnish to honor my Mummo's memory. I wanted to do something meaningful and organically inspired for my triumphant return to working on Borg Queen stuff again. As you may know I was on a bit of a hiatus for mental health reasons. What you may not know is that while recording a new song I also put together a documentary of my Mummo's life. I premiered it this past Saturday at her memorial and it was a big hit.

The reason for creating is was multipurpose just like pretty much everything else I created. Firstly, I wanted to use my talents and skills to honor my Mummo's memory. Second of all, I did it for the rest of my family, especially my mom and brother. They helped me make it by narrating their experiences with my Mummo. Finally, I wanted to make something that people could genuinely enjoy watching at the memorial service. Ever been to a memorial and had to sit through a 20 minute slide show of every photo ever taken of the deceased? I know I have, and to be honest after the first 4 minutes it's boring as fuck. I didn't want to subject the guests to another boring slide show so I decided to make a documentary. At the very end I included my eulogy for my Mummo and my new song as part of the sound track. Here it is.

Borg Queen Resurrected

If you follow me and my artistic adventures, you may have noticed that my online activity substantially decreased. I'll be honest, I really hate social media and I only use it to connect with fans. I've had to put Borg Queen on the back burner since November 2018 because I was burnt out and in a really unhealthy place. My primary focus for the past several months has been recovery and establishing healthier habits and a self care routine, but I've also been working as a concept artist on the CW series Arrow. 

Though life is far from perfect and my circumstances haven't changed I've learned healthier ways of coping. Rather than bury myself with work and binge on my various vices I take time every day to swim and meditate. I've learned to ask for help rather than just try to do everything myself. I've stopped trying to fix other people's problems and focus only on improving and regulating myself. It hasn't been easy, and old habits are hard to break, but I've definitely noticed that I'm enjoying more serenity and obsessing less over situations that I have no control over. I'm slowly starting to come back.

A month ago my Mummo(Finnish grandma) died, and instead of stuffing my feelings I've allowed myself to greive and acknowledge the plethora of emotions that goes along with losing a loved one as uncomfortable as it may be at times. I decided that my return to Borg Queen should be gradual and organic and working through my Mummo's death has allowed me to return in exactly that way. 

I recorded a song in Finnish which is my first language. My Mummo despite living in Canada for 50 years never learned to speak English so if I wanted to talk to her it had to be in Finnish. My last moments with her were spent at her bed side singing a song to her in Finnish that I had sung at a Finnish Christmas concert when I was 4. The song was called Suojelusenkeli which means guardian angel. It was written by Finnish poet Immi Hellen in 1884 in a time when it was common for people to die in infancy and childhood. The song is about a child traveling in the dark abyss of the afterlife who is guided home by a guardian angel.

Mommy Issues

Don't get me wrong...I love my mom. She is one of the most caring, self-sacrificing, generous and genuinely ethical humans on the face of this planet. It's a shame that we don't see eye to eye and that we're both incredibly stubborn and steadfast in our beliefs. She's a perfectionist like me. She wants more than anything to do the "right thing" to the point that she suffers from horrific anxiety out of fear that she's making mistakes. Now, her perfectionism stems from the example her mother set for her. My grandmother is also a perfectionist, paralyzed by fear and overly critical of herself and others. Are we seeing a pattern here?

So, the point of this post is not to bash my mom and grandmother because despite their flaws they've given me everything. I wouldn't own a house if it weren't for their generosity. I wouldn't have been able to get my first album off the ground if it weren't for the fact that my mom moved in with me and looked after my kids. Sure, she was critical as fuck about my lack of domestic skills. She was also incredibly vocal about her moral objections to the dark, macabre and sexual nature of the content I create, but she's a 64 year old conservative woman who's never even smoked a cigarette, so what do you expect?

I stopped giving a fuck about what people thought of me in my teens. At this point in my life I'd say I'm a master of giving zero fucks about people's opinions. It doesn't bother me that my mom isn't a fan of my work. It doesn't resonate with her, and that's fine. What my biggest mommy issue is, and this goes back to my childhood is that she misunderstands my intent. I can't even tell you how many times I got in trouble because she thought I was doing something 'bad' when my intent was to do something helpful. Like the time I drew some flowers on a poster she was making, or when I tried painting the backyard patio with crayons.

She had the tendency to attach a moral judgment to everything. I was a closet Madonna fan growing up because my mom naturally disapproved of her brazen sexuality, so when she caught me at 5am fashioning a cone bra out of tin foil she was really upset. She went off about how grieved she was in her heart that I would want to create something so vulgar and want to emulate someone so morally defunct as Madonna. Growing up in her domain meant that all actions were either good or evil and that was a reflection of our souls. Needless to say that I grew up with this image of myself being disapproved of at my very core because I could rarely get things "right" in her eyes.

Is it true that she disapproves of who I am on a very intrinsic level? Probably not, but it's a belief of mine that's been fostered since childhood. I don't blame her, but I wish things were different. I wish I could have been honest with her about what was going on in my life without fear of having a moral judgment attached to everything. I know that she wishes that we could have been closer too. I pulled away and I still do because I fear that she can't accept me. I feel like the truth of who I am would cause her too much stress and grief. I fear that she can reconcile the fact that despite my liberal views and unapologetic sexuality I still have morals...strong ones. I still have a strong connection to faith in something much greater than myself. I still aspire to using my talents and resources to make the world around me a better place. I wish she could just see the condition of my heart.

Lately she's really been making an effort to reach out to me. She's finally acknowledged that even though she doesn't "get" my art, she's glad that I've found an audience that appreciates it for what it is. She's been asking me for a while now to come visit her and spend some time together. Part of me really wants to, but I'm afraid to. We've never bonded, and I feel like at this point it's too late to find any common ground. I'm so used to keeping her at arms length. 

Something that I've really struggled with lately is the thought that one day she'll die, and I didn't make the effort to repair my relationship with her. The potential of this happening sooner rather than later is now becoming a reality. She ended up getting a blood clot in her leg last month and now the doctor thinks that she could have cancer. I'm terrified, not because she could die. Death is inevitable. If she died now, I would be consumed with guilt that I didn't try to make things better between us.

It's mother's day and I wish I had a better relationship with my mom. I wish I had a better relationship with myself as a mom. I wish I had a more positive view of other moms. Everything about motherhood leaves a bitter taste in my mouth because I have mommy issues. It's like the women who can't have a good relationship with a man because of their daddy issues. I have a tough time with mom stuff and getting close with other women.

My new EP has a song on it called 'Vampires.' It's about being a woman, being a mom and my general resentment of those roles within society. While 'Vampires' focuses more on the sociological role of women, I know that a lot of my resentment towards being a woman is rooted in my childhood and my relationship with my mom. 



I don't like to leave my blog posts on a sour note, so I am resolving to make the best effort that I can to reciprocate my mom's effort of reaching out to me. Like I said before, I don't blame her for anything. I'm the one who is responsible for how I choose to have a relationship with her, so I'm not going to push her away anymore because I feel like she doesn't get me. She doesn't have to get me. She gave me a life and that's enough.

For more information on my art and music project and to get 4 songs of mine as a free download visit my official website www.borg-queen-music.com

I Got To Be A 'Video Chick'

I'm a 90's teen and a huge entertainment staple back then was the music video. I love music videos and as a musician and visual artist they are my favorite medium for communicating artistic content. Growing up watching music videos in the I was enamored by the visuals which often included a 'video chick.'  Generally speaking these women were placed in the videos to be eye candy and it worked because who doesn't like looking at a beautiful woman? If Instagram has taught us anything, it's that people still like to stare at meticulously crafted visuals featuring hot women.

I recently had the pleasure of getting to work on the Edges Of Seven music video 'Cave Wall.' At first I was just going to do some behind the scenes stuff like wardrobe, props and scenic art, but then I was asked to be in it as well. I jumped at the chance because for starters I'm a HUGE fan of Edges Of Seven and it's secretly been one of my bucket list items as a performer to be in a music video that wasn't my own.

The character I play is a parody of an Instagram model. Being a long time wannabe video vixen, I found the concept to be deliciously ironic and couldn't wait to ham it up on camera. The eyes moving around in the creepy masks are mine too. So without further delay...HERE IT IS!!!

Burning Out

If you read this blog before, you'll have noticed that my posts have a mental health and psychology angle. As a content creator, I believe I have a responsibility to use my talents and influence for a positive purpose. Mental health is near and dear to my heart because it's something I've struggled with my entire life. I try to be as transparent as possible with my struggles and triumphs because I believe that the best art is honest, raw and unapologetic in nature. That being said, I have to confess something...I'm burning out big time.

The past 3 years has been a time of tremendous growth for me as an artist. I left behind a secure decently paid job as an interior designer to pursue a career as an independent artist. I've been burning the candle at both ends the entire time working 80 hours a week not just on my music and art, but also film projects and other creative gigs to help pay the bills(plus I'm a mom). My investment has paid off in many ways as I've been able to fund the completion of two albums and 3 high production value music videos. My fan base and visibility is constantly growing and I'm so grateful for all of the support I've received. However, my forward momentum has come at a very steep price...my health.

Because I have fibromyalgia my physical health is very fragile. Admittedly, I don't take care good enough care of myself for someone who has a chronic illness and even if I didn't have a medical condition I push myself too hard. If I'm to be perfectly honest, my obsessive need to be productive is a mental illness in an of itself. It's something I now have to address because I've reached my breaking point. I'm literally writing this post from bed because I'm completely incapacitated.

My life has become unmanageable and I need help. Thankfully I do see a therapist weekly for other issues and last week I finally admitted my desperate need to address my workaholism. I had to admit to that it has been a form of self-medication and a coping mechanism to keep me from falling apart during the breakdown of life as I know it. The thing about my drive and need to be productive is that it isn't negative if kept it check. My therapist likened my work addiction to a compulsive over-eating disorder. When some is a compulsive over eater the treatment isn't to abstain from eating entirely. We agreed that my drive to create and be productive is necessary for my mental well-being, but the trick is to strictly regulate my workload, and make sure that I engage in a proper physical self-care routine.

For the next little while I'm going to be taking a mental and physical health break to get my life back on track. I want to make it clear that I'm not quitting or giving up, but I do need to take a bit of time to just focus on getting healthy again. After I release my new EP Blood Sweat Tears April 30th, I won't be working on any new material until I've achieved a better work-life balance. I had planned to start working on 2 films that would feature my music plus a new album, but that will have to be put on hold...for now.

I might play the odd show here an there, so if you'd like to stay in touch be notified about when and where I'll be performing you can sign up for my mailing list here https://www.borg-queen-music.com/mailing-list-signup 

If YOU Had A Billion Dollars?

A wise man once said, "where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." I wanted to learn more about the audience who supports me as an artist. I wanted to delve deep inside their hearts and discover their core values, so I asked them a question through Facebook and email:

"If someone gave you a billion dollars, how would you allocate the funds?"

I figured the way they allocated their treasure would indicate what they valued the most in life and reveal the contents of their hearts.

After reading all of the responses I noticed that what people valued most fell into 5 basic categories.

1. Self
2. Family and Loved Ones(close relationships)
3. Community
4. Purpose and Passion
5. The Greater Good

Self

These people aren't necessarily selfish just because they would take care of themselves first. The people who put themselves first, are realistic and practical. They understand the importance of taking care of themselves so that they can help those around them. Most of the respondents said that after taking care of themselves they'd help others.

Relationships

The people who gave their money to help loved ones are relationship oriented and value their family above everything else. By family, I don't necessarily mean relatives, but those closest to them. Relationship oriented people are incredibly loyal. They possess tremendous amount of gratitude for the people in their lives and as a result want to give back. These people are the best friends you could ever have.

Community

This one was interesting to me and I asked some of the people to elaborate. The need to belong and the sense of identity and pride that people gain from being part of a community is the core value here. These people are relationship oriented but on a broader scale. They love supporting those within their community even though they may not have a super close relationship with the individual. These people are generally take charge types and are great leaders and organizers.

 Debra's answer intrigued me and I wanted to know more about her "tribe."

 Douglas' answer warmed my heart and when you read that he's a white guy born in Mexico it goes to show that culture is way more about community than ethnicity.

 Just a bit of context on the next one...Raven is a huge supporter of independent artists  like myself, Ray Grieco of Genius of Nefarious and Tommy T of Diverje. He also runs my Borg Queen Facebook Group and several other groups within the industrial music community.

Purpose and Passion

As an artist this is one I can identify with very strongly. It's probably easier for a creative person to find purpose within their artistic craft than most occupations. People generally don't get into an art career for the money, they do it because they are passionate and feel like they can serve a higher purpose with their art. A couple people who are great examples of this are actor-screenwriter Kristof Le Jeune and screenwriter-propmaster Ken Hawryliw. I've had the great pleasure of working with and getting to know both these guys.

Ken Hawryliw someone who has an established career in the arts and has worked as a writer and in the props department for film and notable TV shows like Arrow, Battlestar Galactica and The X-Files.

The Greater Good

The people in this category are idealists. They look at big picture issues and tend to have a great sense of social responsibility. They also for better or worse subscribe themselves to a more rigid moral code. These are the people who spread ideas and push for social change. They are philosophers by nature and seek to change the world. I fall into this category for sure.

So what would you do with your billion dollars?

The reality is that nobody who responded has anywhere near a billion dollars, or do they? The truth is that each and everyone of us has something worth way more than a billion dollars. We have the capacity to love ourselves, our family and friends,our community, our passion and humanity in general. Not one of these categories is more important than the other. We as a society need people who place value in all of these categories. 

SELF: We need practical people who see the importance in taking care of themselves so they can help others. 

CLOSE RELATIONSHIPS: Everyone can benefit from having a generous, compassionate, appreciative person as their most loyal friend. 

COMMUNITY: We need the community oriented individuals who take action and make things happen. 

PASSION AND PURPOSE: We need people who are passionate and have discovered their purpose to inspire us to become a better version of ourselves. 

THE GREATER GOOD: We need the idealists to remind us that we are part of a bigger picture, and give us hope that we can build a better tomorrow.

What about actual currency?

If you did have a few spare dollars and wanted to get involved in my passion and purpose, I'd love to have you join me on Pledge Music. A $5 pledge gets you a pre-order of my upcoming EP plus exclusive EP updates and previews only available to pledgers.

JOIN ME ON PLEDGE MUSIC!

Silver Linings Within A Tarnished Existence

August sucked. As I walked down the dismal hallway of victim services for the second time within the past year I could feel myself falling to pieces and asking myself, "Am I fucking cursed or is violence against women, just so prevalent and normalized within our society?" I'm not going to go into detail about what happened, but suffice it to say that my August was spent talking to cops, Crown Counsel, victim services, doctors and counselors.

So what's the silver lining you may ask? Well, despite how horrific 2016 was in my personal life and the fact that I've spent all of 2017 in therapy dealing with the shit that happened in 2016, the silver lining is... My artistic life has been amazing! Sure, I have days that the pain is so unbearable that I don't want to be alive, but I've managed to be able to escape the agony by focusing on my artistic pursuits. Art has literally saved my life.

I don't want this post to be a downer so here's a list of all of the really awesome things that happened in my artistic life this year.

1. I released my first album

This was HUGE for me! I was also pleasantly surprised as to how many CD's of it I sold. You hear that no one buys physical media anymore, but I can tell you that I sold 25× more physical copies than I did digital ones. You can purchase both here on my website

Click to purchase your copy

2. I played my first live show as 'Borg Queen'

It was for Kink Fetish Night in Vancouver and what a blast! It was a ton of prep work and loads of rehearsals, but super fun. Here's a short video of the highlights.

3. I released a new music video

I released the video for my song 'We're All Whores.' After 2 months of pitching it to Canadian bloggers who mostly rejected it and gave negative feedback, I prepared myself for it to be a total flop. Instead it ended up being a hit in Mexico and my fan base tripled in one month because everyone kept sharing it on Facebook. You can get the song for free plus 3 others from my album by signing up here for my mailing list. In addition to free music you'll also get emailed secret exclusive previews of upcoming music videos, plus discount codes for items in my store.

4. I recorded a new EP

I wrote and recorded a new EP that I plan to release in March of 2018 called Blood, Sweat, Tears. There's still work to be done on it, but I plan on getting my fans involved in the completion process. Stay tuned.

5. I started working on a new music video

I decided to make a music video for Little Miss Liquid Courage. It's currently in pre-production. Here's a preview of the storyboard video. Everyone who signs up to my mailing list gets access to exclusive content including the full version of the storyboard video. You can sign up for my mailing list here and get your exclusive access here

6. I've worked on 3 short films this year

In May I had the chance to do some scenic art and set decorating for a short film called 'Bounce.' That job led to another project called 'Monkey Slayer' that I landed and acting role in and finally I'm doing some art direction and set design for a short film called 'Triggered.' Cinematic art is a passion of mine, so I m really grateful for the opportunities that have come my way.

7. I got accepted into the IATSE art department

For those of you who don't know, IATSE is the film technicians union. This is a HUGE milestone, as working as an art director on a major production is on my bucket list. If you're curious, you can check out my art department portfolio here 

8. I'm making props for a major TV series

I'm currently making props for 'Arrow.' Enough said.

9. I'll be releasing another music video this year

'Hedonist' will be released within the next few months. As far as music videos go, this one is my opus and I'm beyond excited for the release. Here's a teaser for the intro. Wanna see the full video? Sign up for my mailing list here and when it's done being edited you'll get the secret sneak preview.

So there we have it...9 great things that happened to me artistically this year. There's the silver lining, and if I'm to be perfectly candid here...the reason my heart is still beating.

I Don't Want To Be Marilyn Manson

I want to address the elephant in my room professionally speaking. I'm talking about the comparisons I get to Marilyn Manson. First of all, I want to say that I like Marilyn Manson. He's a solid artist with incredibly catchy songs that appeal to me sonically and conceptually. That being said, I wouldn't cite him as one of my influences. I've only ever owned one Marilyn Manson album and that's Mechanical Animals.

Anyone who knows me personally, knows that my biggest influence is Trent Reznor. I love that guy! His music has touched my life on the deepest most personal levels and his example as someone who has suffered through depression and addiction and made it through has inspired me personally to do the same. I quit drinking and started writing music because of Trent Reznor's example of an artist who can still make amazing art without allowing their demons to rule their life. He is hands down the biggest inspiration to me as an artist and a human being.

Let's get back to Manson though as this blog post is about how I get annoyed(but also kinda flattered) with the incredibly frequent comparison. I want to make one thing abundantly clear and that is in no way have I ever tried to emulate, copy or rip him off. It came to me as a pretty big surprise when I started getting the comparison, over and over and over again. I never saw myself like that and no artist likes to be accused of ripping someone else off. We fancy ourselves as unique, and that uniqueness is very important to us so at first I found it really offensive, but given how prolific of an artist he is, in a weird way it's also flattering.

The comparison can work both for and against me though. On one hand it's kinda good from a marketing standpoint because if I pitch myself as a "female Marilyn Manson" it automatically gives people a reference point. I hate doing it, but as a musician people ask all the time, "who are you comparable to?" I cringe every time I say it, but due to the fact that so many people have given me the Manson comparison, I often end up saying "I'm kinda like a female Marilyn Manson." I hate making a statement like this because while it gives a point of reference it puts me in a box artistically. I don't want to be measured up against another artist.

The comparison started after I released my music video for Lapdance Romance. Looking at the video now, I can see how people see similarities, but it really was not my intent. When I first asked my friend Arcelia Ocana to direct the video she asked me for some references. The two music videos I gave her for inspiration were "Mr. Brightside" by The Killers and "The Perfect Drug" by Nine Inch Nails. 

LAPDANCE ROMANCE

I really loved the burlesque club idea from Mr. Brightside and it was a concept relavent to the theme of the song which is about a stripper and her customer falling in love. Incidentally Mr. Brightside was inspired by the movie Moulin Rouge. So as we can see the core concept from Lapdance Romance, Mr. Brightside and Moulin Rouge is all essentially telling the same story. In the case of Lapdance Romance, it's my own true story.

MR. BRIGHTSIDE

When it comes to how "The Perfect Drug" influenced Lapdance Romance it was on a more artistic level. I wanted to go with an Victorian era inspired aesthetic with a palette that matched the painting Lapdance Romance and the painting for Lapdance Romance has an absinthe glass as one of the key visuals and lyrically uses absinthe intoxication as a metaphor for falling in love. The Perfect Drug was an excellent reference video for art direction.

THE PERFECT DRUG

So if you actually watched all 3 videos you can probably see where I was coming from and how Lapdance Romance was influenced by both "The Perfect Drug" and "Mr. Brightside." If anything I'm ripping off Nine Inch Nails and The Killers, not Marilyn Manson.

Let's move on to the other similarities shall we? We're both artists within the "goth" genre. We're both influenced by Trent Reznor. We both have music videos with a very bold and stylized aesthetic that incorporate the central concepts of the song through visual metaphor. We both paint. Yes, there are similarites, but similarities can be drawn between most artists within a similar genre. Hence, why we have musical genres and subcultures.

The differences between myself and Mr. Manson are far more staggering. First of all, when it comes to the music videos, Marilyn Manson isn't sitting at his day job as an interior designer storyboarding his own music video and then designing the sets, sourcing set dec and props, making the costumes, building and decorating the sets and then shooting the videos in his living room while his kids run around eating up all the food he bought with his own money to feed the cast and crew. 

Second of all, Marilyn Manson unlike myself is a major label artist with "people" who do all that behind the scenes shit for him. Because he is a major label artist he doesn't get his hands dirty in the actual production of the video like I do. He's not the art director of his videos like I am. He's not sitting at his laptop editing his own vocal tracks at 3 am. He's not funding his projects by giving lap dances or working a day job either. As an independent artist I have a much greater degree of creative control over my music & videos because I fund everything with my own money and I'm literally involved in every aspect of the audio & video production process.

Thirdly, we differ on a philosophical level when it comes to our beliefs. He's a huge fan of Anton LeVey and an honorary bishop in the Church of Satan. He has been described as the "highest profile Satanist ever" with strong anti-Christian views. I on the other hand, while not being a religious individual am a theist and see merit in the teachings and philosophies of Jesus Christ. I'm not anti-religion or pro-religion. Religion in my view is benign and can be used as a tool to do great good or tremendous evil. It ultimately is up to the individual and the actions they choose to commit in the name of said religion. Both of our philosophical views are very obviously reflected in our lyrics. On a side note though Marilyn Manson has some really intelligent and insightful lyrics. He's up there as far as my favorite lyricists go. 

Lastly, our sound is different. Just listen to him and listen to me. We may fit withing the same genre, but we sound quite different.

I could go on and on, but I think you get the idea. As an artist and a person, I just want to be the best version of myself that I can be. I don't want to be Marilyn Manson. Hell, I don't even want to be Trent Reznor! I just want to be Jenny Kirby making art through the project Borg Queen. Besides, Jenny's a lot prettier than both those guys ;)

Little Miss Liquid Courage: Preproduction Introduction

I was on the fence about doing another music video from my album Sex, Drugs and Shiny Brass Poles for a couple reasons. The first reason is the huge time and financial commitment involved and secondly I'm really eager to get back to work on my next EP, Blood Sweat Tears. However I feel like I'm leaving something incomplete if I don't make a music video for Little Miss Liquid Courage. It was part of the original plan to make 4 music videos for Sex, Drugs and Shiny Brass Poles and I've decided to stick to the plan.

Context Is Everything

Little Miss Liquid Courage is somewhat of an oddity both visually and sonically. I wrote the song ironically to be a pop song because the big idea behind it is "selling out" and conforming to the mainstream. Within the context of the lyrics it's specifically about the pressure as a woman to conform to mainstream beauty standards. When I was a stripper in my early 20's there was tremendous pressure to look as close as possible to a Barbie doll. The closer you resembled Barbie, the more money the booking agents could demand from the clubs. I personally was told to "soften" my look. What this meant was, dye your hair blond, get a tan, lose weight, cover your tattoos, take out your piercings, get fake tits and stop dancing to punk and metal. At first I was like, "no fucking way" but after 4 weeks of not having any work I caved and took out my piercings, dyed my hair blond, got a spray tan and began dieting. I hated myself for it. I remember being up on stage rather drunk and dancing to J Lo in a pink sequined costume laughing at myself for being a ridiculous parody of a stripper. Little Miss Liquid Courage is the inner monologue I was having at that moment in time.

Telling The Story Through Color

LITTLE MISS LIQUID COURAGE
Art prints are available through my website. Click image to purchase

Color plays a huge role in telling the story. I'm completely out of my comfort zone as far as the palette goes. I gravitate towards blue, greens, reds and purples, but for this video which is visually based on the painting the palette is literally my two most hated colors...pink and yellow. As you can see in the painting below the predominant colors are pink, yellow, red and black.

In the video there are three sequences and sets each using a different symbolic color scheme. The narrative sequence which is non-conformist me singing the song is black and red. I don't know if you've noticed, but my Borg Queen brand colors are black and red.

The play room sequence where the nurses determine whether or not my character is girly enough is predominantly yellow and white. I used yellow a symbol of conformity because in my childhood I went to a private school which was religiously and socially oppressive to the point where I had a nervous breakdown at 12 and had to leave. The uniforms were yellow and I use white to symbolize the innocence of childhood and the sterility of a clinical environment in which my character is being observed.

The operating room where the nurses transform me into a Barbie through a variety of barbaric surgical procedures is pink. Pink is a pretty obvious symbolic color and in this case is used to represent female gender stereotypes.

Here's a little preview of the storyboard video I put together. Normally storyboards don't have color, but what can I say, I'm a bit of an oddity even when it comes to artists. I always like to get feedback so feel free to shoot me an email an let me know your thoughts. Hit me up at borgqueenmusic@gmail.com

If you would like to support this project financially, you can always grab yourself a copy of the album or some merch at my online store https://www.borg-queen-music.com/store

Art Direction: Telling The Story Of 'We're All Whores'

Life is art and art is my life. Cinematic art has been a passion of mine since childhood. I remember

watching Tim Burton movies as a child and getting lost in those meticulously crafted worlds. I’ve always had an appreciation for films and TV shows with a highly stylized aesthetic. After watching the movie What Dreams May Come I knew that I wanted to become an art director.

As a child of the 90’s who grew up watching Much Music I loved watching music videos. Back then music videos were a legitimate art form, and it became a dream of mine to make music videos. As a

multidisciplinary artist, music videos have been an excellent way for me to utilize and hone every

aspect of my craft. 

Because the music videos are essentially my paintings brought to life, I use the painting as a starting point when it comes to art direction. The painting determines everything from the color pallete used in the video to which visuals I will incorporate. Every visual element is deliberate and symbolic.

'We're All Whores'
Prints can be purchased for $20US at my store www.borg-queen-music.com/paintings

The Concept

'We're All Whores' is a satirical statement about how everyone is a commodity, and we're all for sale therefore "we're all whores in our own unique way." Because we exist in a society where money is essential to our survival we are all subject to greed and want. Greed has perverted every industry and profession and that's what the concept of the music video is all about. 

Characters

In the painting there are 3 professional fields represented--medical, oil and the justice system. The professions are depicted as "corrupted" versions of their respective industries. When you watch the video notice the transformation of the doctor, oil rig worker and judge into the whore versions of themselves. The professions are literally seduced by power and greed personified as androgynous steampunk machine-like characters by myself and Charlie Monroe.

The Doctor

The doctor, depicted on the left in the painting transforms into a serpent-like pharmaceutical whore with a syringe for an arm in the video. The serpent imagery is an allusion the use of the Rod of Asclepius(snake wrapped around a staff) as the common symbol for the medical field. As the "pharmawhore" he is dressed in fetish wear to show that medical field is being "perverted" by money from the pharmaceutical industry.

The Oil Rig Worker

The center figure in the painting represents the oil industry. A well muscled male torso is chained to an oil derrick with money and oil spewing out of it's amputated limbs to show that the greedy oil companies exploit the ideal of the American Dream instilled in the working man for profit. In the video "greed" and "power" make the oil rig worker is squirted with crude oil and coins are tossed on to his naked body as he is chained like a sexual submissive to an oil rig derrick. He is transformed from the stereotypical image of hardworking manly man into a bitch with a glitter beard. 

The use of coins vs. bills was intentional because in Alberta the hub of the Canadian oil industry it is common practice to throw dollar coins known as Loonies at strippers and a good chunk of that money being thrown is made in the oil patch. The oil being squirted on to the "oil rig whore" is coming out of the cone bra of my character which I designed to resemble and oil derrick to symbolize that the oil industry workers are suckling at the teat of "Big Oil."

The Judge

The figure on the right in the painting represents the justice system. In the video the character is a judge that transforms into the whore version of Lady Justice. The scales of justice are traditionally depicted as being balanced, but in both the video and painting one side is being weighed down with money showing that justice can be bought and the side with more money wins. Lady justice wears a blindfold because justice is blind and impartial, but our "whorish lady justice"'s are wide open and she's lovin' every minute of her degradation by my character who tosses coins on to one side of the scale and throws them at her face.

  

Color and Design

You'll probably notice that the dominating colors in the painting and video are green, gold and black. Green represents money. Gold represents power. Black represents greed. There are also two sets of characters played by myself and Charlie Monroe. The green feathered dancers were part of the sequence called the "Shiny Pretty Whores" and the scenes with androgynous steampunk characters we referred to as "Greed and Power."

Shiny Pretty Whores

The "shiny pretty whores" scenes are about the allure of money. Our green costumes were designed with the idea that we would portray money as attractive and shiny so we covered everything in a ridiculous amount of glitter and rhinestones. We went for a very hyper feminine organic look that incorporated feathers, and flowers because bright feathers and flowers are nature's way of commencing with the reproductive process. We dressed up a bunch of guys in our lingerie and danced around with them to show that we're all equally whores because of money.

Greed and Power

We wanted a stark stylistic contrast between the two scenes, so with "greed and power" everything was angular, mechanical and androgynous. The costumes were black and gold and our characters are mechanical to represent the capitalist machine that our society is governed by philosophically speaking. We're wearing top hats and codpieces with extremely white skin to represent the dominance of the white male in North American politics and business.

In Conclusion

You've probably already watched the video, but I encourage you to watch it again and take notice of all the deliberate little details that tell the story of our society of whores that have sold out in every way and made money the figurehead of our collective religion.