Photos by GGC Photography

Lenny’s warm indie pop vocals and unapologetically direct but poetic lyrics shine bright on “Taurus Sun,” the first single off her debut EP, Personal Celebrity, out today, August 4th. As a fellow Taurus sun, astrology queer, and indie pop fan, I knew I had to dive deeper.

Self-indulgence, laziness, and stubbornness—those are the stereotypical Taurus characteristics, right? They’re not really what Lenny’s single is about.

“Taurus Sun” is all about change, or rather, the lack of it. Lenny, who was raised in British Columbia and is actually a Taurus sun, says it’s about “accepting what you can’t change in a relationship, in another person, and in yourself.” It’s also a song which muses on the likelihood that her own Taurean traits of bullheadedness and resistance to change could actually just be her own socialization into putting the needs of others before her own.

The song starts out with a catchy upbeat drum pattern (from drummer Sebastian Balk-Forcione), fuzzy bass lines, and then a synth (from Ben Rowley on keys) that chimes brilliantly behind Lenny’s charming vibrato when the chorus takes over. It definitely has moments of folk-y, Lady Lamb-ish vocal runs, fun guitar riffs, and experimental keys. 

Thematically, “Taurus Sun” simultaneously calls out a changeless boyfriend and takes a jab at her own self-destructively patient and reliable Taurean patterns. Lenny calls it an “audacious” single that tackles part of her journey in “unlearning heteronormative, patriarchal norms.” In what is probably the most transparent lyrical moment of the song, she sings,

“I stay when I shouldn’t stick around ‘cause I’m a Taurus sun, / checkered in badges of tiresome. / We broke bread and hoped it was enough / because you’re worth it and I’m a Taurus sun.”

When all’s said and done, whether you’re a Taurus sun or not, Lenny’s advice is to “walk away from something if staying means compromising your sense of self” and to “trust your intuition — in the end, you know yourself more than anyone else.” In fact, that’s essentially what her debut EP is all about, with “Taurus Sun” serving as a great single to kick it off.

To get to know the singer, songwriter, clarinetist and guitarist even better ahead of Personal Celebrity’s release, we asked Lenny questions inspired by the twelve signs of the zodiac. Stream the EP and read our interview below.

♉️ Taurus: Let’s start with something simple: What’s your favorite tour/roadtrip snack? 

Tim Hortons coffee and then, like, M&Ms.

AP: Taureans love excess, so I have a couple extra Taurus-inspired questions: What’s one thing people can always depend on you for?

The thing is, I’m a Taurus sun, but I have a lot of Cancer in my chart. So I’m actually totally, very emotional, kind of baby/mom-vibes. I do the emotional, caring thing. So I’d say that I’m very dependable in terms of emotional support and advice.

AP: What’s one thing you’re too stubborn to give up?

Probably so many things. The thing about being stubborn is, you never think you’re being stubborn. You always think there’s a reason why. But I have all of my journals from growing up, like allllll of them—from age six to now. And most of them are at my mom’s house. And I just went back to BC a few weeks ago to visit my parents and my mom was like, “Okay, time to minimize the stuff,” and I picked up what I thought were all my journals. As I grabbed the pile, I looked down and there’s like this huge collection of all my journals. What am I going to do with it? I feel like every time I open a journal, from when I was 13, it’s like… Oh, yeah, sounds like me, but more stupid. Basically.

♊️ Gemini: If you couldn’t pursue music, what’s an equally fulfilling interest/passion you have?

I also have a side business, as well. It’s called Positive Space, and we make merch on vintage clothing for artists. I really love that and that’s been kind of my other passion for the last couple years since 2019. So that’s been something that’s been really cool. It’s cool to offer artists a sustainable alternative for merch. And I know artists sometimes make it themselves, but with us we work with professional printer. It’s really great because I’m obsessed with vintage shopping—not just vintage, though—just thrifting. That’s a passion. So maybe that, or, just being outside. I love being outside. I’m from a small town in BC, where I just grew up in nature all the time. So, I guess one of those two things.

♋️ Cancer: When you write music, do you hide away, or is it a more open process?

I definitely hide away, 100%. I have to be sure. I’m almost always by myself, for sure. I haven’t written music with other people. I would love to; I think that’s the next thing I want to do after this EP is to start doing some songwriting collaborations with other people. Most of my songwriting has just been either in bed about to fall asleep, and then I think of all these lyrics, or sitting with my guitar in my room. It’s definitely not something that I love to share with people until it’s far enough along or it sounds like an actual song.

♌️ Leo: If you could look out into an audience (virtually or IRL) and see one other artist, who would you be most excited to see?

These days? Well, the last two years, I’m really, really, really into Adrienne Lenker. She’s just… Her songwriting… I can’t. I listen to it over and over and over all the time. I love her lyrics. And just the way she chooses her guitar pieces. She’s sort of my idol right now… Not sort of. Majorly.

♍️ Virgo: What are you reading right now?

I actually just finished Miranda July’s book. It’s called No One Belongs Here More Than You. It’s a short story collection. It’s such a wild, kooky book like Miranda July. She’s just such a genius and she’s out of this world in terms of her comedy and her writing. It was so fun to read. I tore through that book.

♎️ Libra: How are you balancing your time as a musician and living through a pandemic?

For most of the pandemic up until a few months ago, really, it’s been like everything just came to a halt. I wrote a lot of half songs. So I was writing half songs and playing the odd virtual show, but it’s just not the same. There’s something about a global pandemic that really kills my creative vibes. It’s interesting because it seems like some people are taking all this extra time at home to work on their creative side. And I’m just like, yeah, okay. I’m at home, but it all just dried up. Like it just disappeared.

Some people get their inspiration from within, and some people get their inspiration from the outside world, and I was told recently that I’m the latter. That made so much sense to me. My lyric ideas always come after an experience. It’s never from my own little fishbowl. It’s always from my interaction with the outside world.

But lately, being able to release this EP is giving me life. I’m finally getting back into the world. That feels so good. Now I’m just trying to be patient with myself because it’s hard. You can’t just go from zero to 100—because I really was at zero for a little while. So it’s strange doing this EP release having not performed any live shows in a year and a half. Because I’m just like, yeah… I’m a musician. For sure. Right? Yeah. Like I made this EP and I used to play all the time. That’s still me. Right? Half trying to convince myself. But, this EP, it’s been a nice re-entry. That’s for sure.

♏️ Scorpio: What do you find yourself writing music about the most?

I think it’s almost always about relationships; myself and relationships; analyzing a current relationship or a past relationship; trying to understand myself and the other person in it. And I try writing songs from different perspectives. I try writing songs from other person’s [perspective]. I often end up writing songs about people in my family. I end up writing a lot of songs—I haven’t actually finished anything yet—but like, a lot of songs about my grandmother and people that I’ve never met in my family. I guess just trying to maybe understand my lineage a little bit. But it’s always relationships in some form or another, whether it’s to myself or someone else.

♐️ Sagittarius: Where were each of your music videos filmed? 

“Birthday” was filmed… Where was that? It was this beautiful property. A friend of a friend, one of the people that was working on the video, knew someone who had this property on a lake outside of Montreal, an hour outside of the city. It’s this gorgeous place. Oh my gosh, it was so nice.

“Taurus Sun” was filmed in and around my house, you know, like a classic COVID music video. All the indoor shots are just in this apartment, then on the street outside my apartment, and then like, a couple neighborhoods over in a parking lot. It was a different experience, but it was so much fun, though. Oh my gosh, what a blast. My friend, Nicky Fournier, did a great job in it, too.

♑️ Capricorn: What’s one area of life/one skill that you’re absolutely confident in?

I guess it’s a skill… I’m really good at dramatic charades. It’s so much fun, I have the best time doing it. I grew up playing it with my family because my parents lived in Australia for like 20 years, and I was actually born there. But anyway, we have this old dramatic charades board game that’s Australian and from the 80s. So all of the things are like 80s Australian pop culture references that you would never know. So I grew up having to act out these things having no idea what they were. So my acting and guessing skills, in that sense, developed at a young age. I love that game now.

♒️ Aquarius: Tell us about something you’ve come to care more about in the last year in quarantine?

It’s not that exciting, but stability at home is something that has become really important to me. I mean, obviously, because I was at home. But I think just having the outside world be so much more unstable and scary made me feel like my home is so important to me. It’s changed a lot of my priorities in terms of what I’m wanting now, because I’ve been thinking more about what kind of home I want to live in. And I got a cat! I always thought I was too unstable to have a cat. I’m never at home. I would always be bouncing from one thing to another. And so now I have a cat. And I’m a person that has to be at home. I mean, my roommate takes care of my cat a lot when I’m away, which is nice. But yeah, probably my relationship to being at home. That’s like literally the most boring answer.

But I do feel like my practical side has really come out a lot. When I talk to people about my five year goals now, compared to five years ago or three years ago, I feel like they’re very different now. I’m just so much more practical, which makes me feel a little boring. But, to be fair, I did spend my 20s rather unstable, just moving around and traveling and doing random shit all the time. So I think because I just turned 30, that’s probably also a big part of it, too. I’m like, okay, I’m kind of tired now.

♓️ Pisces: In the tour of your dreams, what cities/venues do you play?

I feel like that’s hard to answer because I’ve never been on tour, and all I want to do is just go on tour. I don’t even care where I play. I’m just so excited to travel with a band and play. I don’t even care. Just another place in another city, basically. Preferably a place with a stage and decent sound people. But I don’t have any big venue dreams, other than wanting to play somewhere right now. I’ll take literally anywhere.

♈️ Aries is the first sign in the Zodiac, so tell us what you’re excited about with the release of your first EP?

Oh, boy, so many things. We recorded a lot of it a little while ago because of the pandemic and stuff. But I’m just excited for my musical identity, so far, to change from being a very solo artist to having more of a full band vibe. I mean, “Birthday” was a track that I made with my producer, Gino Visconti. So it was just the two of us. But this EP was with a band. So it has that indie rock band style. There’s a song where it’s just me and there’s a song that’s really stripped down. But I feel like it’s my entry into being more collaborative with my music, and working with different people. 

I still love doing the solo acoustic thing, but I think it’s me branching out and exploring more sides to my music. So I’m really excited to have that out in the world, especially because we’ve been holding on to it for a long time. We had a few tiny, tiny things to finish up to be able to get it ready for release. And we were sitting on it for a while. So I’m excited to finally actually have it out there and add to my ~repertoire~. And also so I can record more. 

I think it feels a lot bigger to me than it would have without the pandemic. I was expecting to release music, I was just out in the world all the time, and I was always performing. But now it’s from nothing to this five song EP that I worked really hard on. It’s a wild contrast.

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You can stream and buy Lenny’s debut EP, Personal Celebrity, including single “Taurus Sun” now via Bandcamp—or better yet, buy it on the next Bandcamp Friday, August 6th.