Have Some Cake with Iggy T and the Crazymakers

Led by Sarah Todd and David Franz, Iggy T and the Crazymakers will premiere their brand-new single, “Cake” this weekend during Denver’s Digital Pride. “Cake” is part of their first full-length LP, Just Can’t Get Enough, which was released earlier this month. You better dust off that record player!

Hailing of Ojai, California, Iggy T and the Crazymakers are often compared to artists such as St. Paul and the Broken Bones, Amy Winehouse, and the Alabama Shakes because their songs excavate the self and soul. Pulling strong roots in soul, blues, and rock, they blend traditional soul elements with a modern, beat-driven groove. Although several Pride festivals have been canceled this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Todd and Franz still hoped to contribute in some way. That is why they are alloswing “Cake” to be played during digital Pride events free of license charge. “Cake” is an uplifting and empowering bisexual anthem since, according to Todd, the B is generally left out of the conversation due to erasure or misunderstanding.

Iggy T and the Crazymakers will also be working with LGBTQ artists on socially distanced music videos to be released throughout Pride Month, and the band will be holding a remix contest for “Cake.” The winner will be announced June 30.

OUT FRONT had the pleasure of chatting more with Todd about “Cake,” why she wanted to write a song focused on bisexuality, and how to make the B less invisible within the LGBTQ community. Hi, Sarah! Thank you for taking the time to chat with me about Iggy T and the Crazymakers. Can you begin by telling us when and how the band formed?
It was about four years ago, I met David Franz; he is the primary producer on this whole album, and he is 50 percent co-writer on the whole project with me. We met and had an instant, musical connection. We actually met in a pretty cool way. We met at a jam circle. It was dark; we couldn’t see each other, and we literally heard each other before seeing each other.

From across the room I was like hey, guy on electric, what’s your name? And he was like, holy shit, your voice! So, we chatted that night, and from that point forward, he kept talking about music, and I started sharing with him my love of old soul. I also grew up on, like, folk and classic rock, and he started sharing with me his upbringing on blues. So, we are kind of overlapped in the rock kind of way and we started ideating about how we could possibly combine all of those influences into music. The idea was I don’t ever want to get tired of listening to whatever music I make. Just the idea of creating music in alignment with sounds that we don’t get tired of listening to and what would that look and sound like.

So, that is where Iggy T and the Crazymakers was born. We got straight to work. We wrote 25-30 songs, and it was my goal to build a band of brothers because the people I was interacting with that I really wanted to be in the band just all happened to be men. The band started in Venice Beach, California, and we got some great talented players to come.

Basically, I would cook everyone dinner on Tuesday nights, have everybody come over, and we would jam some new tunes. A lot of the songs actually came about in a very organic way where David and I had already written the songs and we would have everybody come to the studio. My goal was also to live track a record which is not that common these days, which just means everybody is in the same studio in their respective booths playing live and we press record.

It really does capture, like, an organic sound. So, that’s how a lot of these songs on the record were captured. Sharing the songs with the band and pushing record while they were in the process of learning them. It seems like that captures a magical, kind of organic and raw interpretation of the song.

Is blues, soul, and old classic the aesthetic you are going for?
I would say it’s the most common feedback that we get. People say Indie, soul, retro, pop. They say there’s some R&B and rock. The goal was to present all of these things with a contemporary, pop production because David’s production style is pretty shiny and pop friendly.

Congrats on the release of your debut LP, Just Can’t Get Enough. Why did you want to release it during Pride Month?
There was a real unique opportunity for us to release the record during Pride Month because we have a song on the record called “Cake.” It was my own little expression of my experience being a bisexual woman, and it was written while I was in a relationship. A heterosexual, heteroromantic relationship. Whatever, I’m not a huge fan of labels.

But because COVID happened, it’s a huge undertaking to release a record in the first place. We tried to find a silver lining, and we were given a lot more time to really hone a release plan, focus, and get a great team together. We got a radio campaign going and they really wanted to showcase “Cake” as the single, and it just kind of magically aligned with Pride Month. When we realized that, it was like yes! This makes so much sense! It is so hard during COVID to make certain decisions about anything, and once this whole thing kind of started coming about, everything fell into place. All the pieces made so much sense.

I came from the nonprofit realm, and I want to do things with a cause if I am given a microphone. I want to say something that matters and the pursuit of equality, raising awareness and connecting with other people in this space. It is paramount to me, my mission, and my purpose. So, it is all working out right.

Is “Cake” in reference to “have your cake and eat it too?”
Yes. A bit of tongue-in-cheek. The song says, “Do I have to choose, I was thinking we could talk about it. What do I have to prove, so that I can have my cake and eat it too?” It is also a song that’s kind of touching on the concept of polyamory because for me, and I only speak from my own experiences. I can’t pretend to know what other people’s experiences are, and really the mission of this is that, in the LGBTQ community, if we are not supporting one another in our own unique, individual interpretations of our sexuality, then what are we doing? How do we expect other people outside the LGBTQ community alliances to live and let live and embrace whatever version of sexuality anyone chooses to explore?

So, yes, this was just my own experience in a heterosexual relationship and discussing, what does it look like when my hetero partner, if there’s certain things or possible needs that can’t be met through a hetero partner for me as a bisexual, and what does that conversation sound like, and in that particular relationship? It was just a normal part of our dialogue. David and I really enjoyed writing this song because this can be a very heavy topic in some relationships, but for me, because I am so aware of myself, I can communicate about these things in a non-judgmental and non-threatening way.

That relationship actually worked out great because it was a totally normal conversation to have. This is my sexuality, and these are the needs that I have. What does that look and feel like? Polyamory did not work for me. Again, live and let live. It just wasn’t for me. But to even have this space to share about what bisexuality looks like, feels like in a relationship and communicate about it free of judgement with a sense of acceptance and spaciousness, for me, it relieves the sense of longing to explore outside of that relationship. The space to just be who I am as a bisexual, I think it’s what we all need. To feel seen and heard.

Often times, bisexuality is considered an afterthought in the LGBTQ community. Why do you think that is?
I don’t know the why, but I do know that’s been my experience, the concept of bi-erasure. I find that in the times that I have been questioned, or minimized as a bisexual, some of the things that are stereotypes about being bi-curious or gay til graduation, whatever that might be, I actually think that might be more to do with the person doing the judgment and not me or my choices by way of sexuality.

I think everybody has had experiences that have been traumatic for them. Love can get messy; it doesn’t matter what your gender or sexuality is. So, I don’t know. It has sometimes been a little bit of a heartache because it almost feels like there is no room in the hetero community, and there’s no room in the gay or lesbian community. I have felt just as targeted in the lesbian community as I have in homophobic kind of crowd. I felt a similar kind of threat in the lesbian community for not being lesbian enough.

I just think that doesn’t have to do with me, and I had to detach myself from that. This isn’t across the board; this is just my experience. I do think that this is shifting, and we are reaching a place of really connecting a lot more and really seeing one another in our unique expressions, but it certain does exist and bi-erasure certainly exist. It does kind of feel like a second thought for me in the LGBTQ community, and because of this, I think bisexuals are staying closeted.

This is why you wanted to write and focus on a song about bisexuality?
I would say that my intention of writing and creating any music is to express something that is authentic to me. That could ideally connect myself with anyone outside of my art and help me understand and help other people feel seen and heard. I do think that in the conversations of equality in the projects and campaigns that I support, I don’t often see my sexuality being mentioned as much as other members of the LGBTQ community. So, certainly there was an intention to have a voice and a piece of art that felt uplifting and upbeat about a topic that can be portrayed pretty heavily at times.

I’m sure I have already gotten flack about how I have communicated about it and how it could potentially feed bisexual stereotypes, but this is just my way of expressing it. It’s my experience in one relationship. It hasn’t been the same in any relationship. These things are so nuanced, and for me to be able to have a playful, tongue-in-cheek conversation via music about a topic that I think a lot of people can relate to, I think I should have permission to do that.

My friend Sara was relating this to how people have taken back different harmful slurs like “dyke” or “f*ggot,” and I would say this feels even more approachable than those harmful slurs. There are just stories people tell themselves about bisexuality and what that looks like in harmful ways in relationships. Meanwhile, I’m just kind of like, I fall in love with humans. I feel like I do get to have my cake and eat it too because I fall in love with people, free of gender.

There are some people who believe bisexuality doesn’t exist at all. How can we increase bi-visibility and normalize bi folks in the queer community?
Good question. I think this is a great place to start. I think that via art, especially when I look around my LGBTQ community, I think that there is a real love of music. There’s a real connection with people who are willing to stand up and share from a place that is non-aggressive, and I’m not over here being aggressive, I’m just talking about my experience and hoping somebody can say thank you for raising that point. I totally relate to that.

I think having these conversations in more of a public format, getting some advocates and some alliance inside of the community, however we treat one another in the LGBTQ community, we will only branch out from there. It’s like, how do we treat ourselves? That’s how other people are going to treat us, and for me, having been secretive about my bisexuality for as long as I was, I am so in my power with that.

Why would we hide that? All this does for me is free me from being quiet about something that I feel so passionate about and advocate for. Through that, I think we can really normalize the conversation. This is just the beginning of a conversation, and I know that other artists are doing the same. This may be the beginning of a sense of change of how that inserts itself into dialogue and becomes more normalized and accepted by the broader community.

It’s definitely a weird place to be at when at times you‘re like this invisible in-between. It’s not awesome all the time, but when I separate myself from that and remind myself that it has nothing to do with me, I find myself in a great place of freedom and empowerment. A real place of gratitude that I have been born with. The capacity to fall in love with such a broad range of people. That feels like an amazing gift.

“Cake” will be played during Denver’s Digital PrideFest, right?
Yes! It’s premiering at Denver Pride. How cool is that?

That’s amazing! And you are putting together a music video for “Cake?”
Yes, we are putting together a socially distanced music video for “Cake” for the Pride release. We decided on a brush challenge video, and we got some folks who are doing some drag brush challenge videos, so it’s going to be awesome. There’s some amazing video content going on out there right now, so we will be very fortunate to collaborate with anyone who is willing to share their gift.

What does Pride personally mean to you?
Pride to me is coming together authentically, freedom to be ourselves and everything that I associate with the concept of Pride is the promotion of love. Living and letting live. It feels like the most non-aggressive advocacy for just a sense of freedom to be.

What do you hope people will take away not only from “Cake,” but all of Just Can’t Get Enough?
I think there are a few themes that come up on the record for me which are, you know, some politically charged songs that are extremely relevant right now. Not just with regard to equality, but also social justice. The song “I Don’t Know Your Pain” is an all-encompassing song about justice with regards to women’s rights and race relations, which is obviously super relevant right now.

The song “Fire” is a similar tone of, don’t let your soul get sold; don’t let your fire go cold. Then, of course, there’s love songs, songs about self-reclamation and connecting with others. My hope is, as people listen to the album, they can see a little bit of themselves in there somewhere. That there will be something for everyone, and that they can feel seen and heard. Feel something. That is my goal with creating anything. That it can bridge the gap between me and people that I would otherwise not be able to connect with.What’s next for you? Do you have any other upcoming projects we should be on the lookout for?
I do. I will be releasing some new Iggy T solo stuff in the coming months, and I also just launched a very cool, kind of indie-pop, electro project called Rüü, and that’s my fun little side project I’m doing right now. It’s like my little play thing.

And, as far as the Crazymakers is concerned, I don’t know if you’ve heard this before, but one of the inclinations of artists so commonly is that when they finish a project, it’s like, OK, we’re done with that, let’s look forward to do something else now. It is so important during this phase to just be in the present moment and work hard to share this record. Settle into the feeling of, we just did that. It’s been under construction for four years, so be present in this moment without saying OK, what are we going to do next? Just to sit here for a moment in the stillness with the goal of connecting with as many people through this record that we made possible. That’s what’s next for us. Just let this be and kind of roll with the changing times of what COVID has done for what a record release looks like.

This is such an interesting time for music and collab performance, or lack thereof, so we are very lucky. We have a couple remixes being made for “Cake,” which is exciting for me because I really want to get some of those dance club remixes going on. That’s a genre of music I can get down with, and I will keep pursuing some of these other side projects that I have.

For more information and to stay up to date, visit iggytandthecrazymakers.com or follow them on social media. Songs can be found on Spotify, Apple Music, and Soundcloud.

Photos by Bill Kennedy