SAGE SUEDE is Ready to “Drop The Beat”

16th April 2024 Bryce Quartz

Austin, Texas based musician SAGE SUEDE delivers a brand new album and speaks with us on it along with much more!

SAGE SUEDE is the preeminent pioneer of electronic music fusions in Austin, Texas. He produces music, art directs, and writes music in many languages. He has achieved worldwide notoriety through music and modeling. His debut album “Thicc Juicy Bass” was recorded and produced by SAGE at home and he collaborated with a Canadian design studio to create 3D music videos that were featured in a local art gallery.

In 2021, Sage Suede released his second album titled “Foolin Around,” a visual album that features Devin Alfather and music videos of sword twirling, fire swallowing & colorful smoke grenades. He then spent 2022 coming in hot with a wave of new singles. His track “Tits Out At The Park” about a relationship with a stripper has been adapted into a 2-part music video series featuring dancer Evita in Venezuela. In June of 2022, he dropped the Reggaeton / Dance Pop album Savage Summer, including collabs with Honey-B-Sweet in Australia and BAD NINJA.

Two months later, SAGE released a 3 pack EP of his single “Weed Cookies” with Italian producer Claudio Ferrone as well as a four pack EP of his single “You Go Girl” with features from Dazmin D’leon in LA & Girlxhighlight in Lagos. Shortly after, his album “Renegade” dropped with alternative hip hop & dance fusions. In 2023, SAGE performed with Dazmin at Globe Hall and at Package Menswear, released three live albums, and a new album titled “Dirty Blonde.” To top off the year, he released a sensually charged Christmas cover of “Santa Baby” with a sexy Daddy Bear Santa and a handsome muscle bear on the cover art.

Fast forward to now and SAGE has just released his latest album titled “Drop The Beat” which already has several music videos live on YouTube for some of the tracks. Check out a few of them here, and read our interview with SAGE below!

Bryce Quartz: Hey SAGE, thanks for taking the time to speak with me today! How are you feeling after just recently performing at the Viper Room and the North American Music Merchants event in California?

SAGE SUEDE: My glasses were stolen before the show at The Viper Room, but it felt like a spiritual offering; The Viper Room was on Buzzfeed Haunted and there is this rockstar energy in the lounge that is tangible while performing. To describe the energy in one word, I would say “orange.” It isn’t an energy that I have felt in other performance spaces and does feel supernatural.

NAMM was a lot of fun and I performed with Dazmin D’leon and Jyme. North American Music Merchants was in Anaheim and I was sponsored by Q Up Arts. I also did brand endorsements for Blackpanthersystem and Music Sketch App.

Bryce Quartz: It sounds like it was quite a crazy time! Can you tell our readers a little bit about what they might see for a Sage Suede live set?

SAGE SUEDE: I produce and songwrite, so on stage I focus on the visuals. I like to involve a dancer when I can, like Devin Alfather, or other musical collaborators. I’ve always been solo without any support from the Fed’s trust fund for corporations, so I organize on my own.

Bryce Quartz: You recently released two new singles titled “Vampire” and “Saiko Choto (サイコチョート)”, can you tell our readers a little bit about these two tracks and how you went about creating them?

SAGE SUEDE: I’ve been having problems with stalkers in my apartment complex and tried to switch to thinking in other languages like Japanese, while they kept stalking me in my apartment…

Saiko Choto is basically about an obsessed fan that doesn’t give me space to live, but it also references gothic harajuku, because that’s cool. I think that Saiko Choto might have hooked up with someone that lied about being me and that led to all this drama, but I told them I will go on Maury, if they need me to prove that I am not the father.

I broke my lease to move to a new place and get away from all the people they lied to about me. There are lots of chicks claiming that we hooked up for their street cred here and it is too much drama for me. People have been yelling sexual violence at me and my car for three years because of their antics but they don’t use my stage name. I’ve meta verified, because the stalking is so bad and now people know my name off-stage is Andrew Crown.

Vampire is a track about body positivity during menstruation. I’m bisexual and have realized that I like that kind of blood, so I made a song about it for women. Most women don’t feel appreciated for their menses, but I think it’s hot and some of their boyfriends or husbands will learn from it too.

*Music video for Broment* *at Strut in OC. Filmed at the grand opening of Birdcage Lounge.*

Bryce Quartz: You also released a Christmas single titled “Santa Baby” with a sexy Santa daddy bear on the cover and a leather daddy too this past December, and we love to see it! Can you tell us a little bit about this track and what inspired the furry cover art?

SAGE SUEDE: I did an ATXBlade photoshoot with Mister Lonestar Leather 2022- Jay and Anthony joined us from Houston. I’ve worked with Jay in the past and we always take sexy pics together; sometimes we bring a handle of vodka and just take swigs.

*Cover of Corn Chip Thot single and eponymous biographical book. Photo cred:* *The Rope Provocative*

Anthony brought the Santa leather hat and also put me in a white fox fur that some of my friends say resembles Sesshōmaru from Inuyasha. I’d never worn that much fur or leather before, but we got cute looks and they made me feel like I was daddy.

I’m a fan of Eartha Kitt and wanted to cover Santa Baby, because I like her vocal delivery. Eartha has a great voice and we’re both cat people. I can relate to how she left The USA to find artistic freedom in France for a period of time, as I do this with online press in other languages.

It feels stifling… I’ve thought about moving abroad, since I have been stalked with no federal support for my work, but ironically my stalkers want to be more American and they are starting to have a change of heart. Most do not speak much English and this seems to be where a majority of the conflict is with them misunderstanding queer sexuality in my lyrics.

Bryce Quartz: Your content on Twitter and Instagram along with your music and music videos are very sex positive. Can you tell us a little bit about what it’s like being a sexual icon on social media and in music? What kind of feedback do you receive from your followers?

SAGE SUEDE: I’m not sure if it is something that you choose, or if it’s something that other people choose for you. The first time I did a fashion show, it was because my friend had been asking me as a favor and I wasn’t into fashion yet, but they needed me to model. Daniel Preda was there and he let me borrow his shoes, but he made sure that I took off my socks because they were ratchet.

I feel like I chose to be an influencer, because people wouldn’t stop looking at me like an object and when they are observing you with that interest it often spirals into other emotions like resentment and violence.

*SAGE SUEDE in the thong from the music vid for Broment. Photo cred:* ATXBlade

I thought that by being unapologetically myself, it would help others to understand me and it does, but people will also ignore what you are doing just to be petty or satanic about nothing. In the long run, you lose some control of your image online and some of those offensive manifestations are meant to be flattery, because they are just too kinky for you.

Most of my fans wouldn’t mind seeing me naked. Other followers are more into the fashion, the art and my psychothriller novels that I have dropped recently on Amazon.

*Psychothriller SAGE wrote about being stalked. He took daily homophobia and wrote about their true desire to dominate him in a kinky novelette.* *“This is my gayest book about me getting fucked over and over again.*“

Bryce Quartz: Are there any other influencers or artists that inspire what you create and what you post?

SAGE SUEDE: Lately, I am inspired by a lot of punk fashion. I don’t like to conform to anyone or anything and feel like I disregard the concept of a typical fan by making music that doesn’t conform to anyone’s listening habits and changes wildly between releases.

There was this Nirvana interview in the 90s where Kurt said they used to make “shitty electronic demos” and I feel like that’s a similar vibe to what I put out in an electropunk style. I could use more guitars probably because I’m feeling more of the rock vibe lately, but I was burnt out on it as a kid, so I like to distort all kinds of instruments instead.

Bryce Quartz: Can you give our readers any advice on being confident in the body you’re in?

SAGE SUEDE: At the end of the day, you aren’t influential, unless you are creating something enviable and that’s what people want you to be, even if they are trolling you for being different from them. People will attack you for looking good as much and even more often than for looking bad. If someone is trolling you without sharing feedback, then it is probably more about how they perceive themselves, than it is about you.

People often yell their insecurities at me and I have learned that it is almost never about anything in my life at all, just a self-perceived insufficiency. It’s better not to react, but to do things for yourself to feel happy with who you are.