The August 2005 issue of GayCalgary magazine featured our first interview with Bif Naked. 19 years later, and the singer still stand stall. Marriages, a divorce, a pandemic, beating cancer, moving from BC to Ontario, and many other ups and downs in that time, and released her first album in 15 years, Champion in June.
We reconnected with Bif recently from her home via zoom, when she saw the cover photo from 2005 she disagreed that she still looks the same.
"Not at all. Oh my gosh, not at all. I wish I still looked like that. Those were the days. Those were the days. I always same makeup, same hair dye. When we were all young people in Winnipeg back in the early nineties, I mean we learned how to do our makeup from all our friends who were baby drag queens, and I think there's a lot to that. Coming up to the nineties and late eighties, our little community of kids and weirdos in our little community. We all loved Culture Club and Duran Duran and Sisters of Mercy, and we came up to the clubs and did our thing and spread our wings and our communities have always been intertwined and it's been amazing to see everyone grow up and become adults and go through our trials and tribulations and see the world change and grow with us in so many different ways. It's been incredible, especially as Prairie kids. It's been very interesting Sociopolitically to grow up as prairie kids and to become adults in this world."
When she last performed in Calgary, Naked sported a "Protect Trans Kids" shirt. She has always been an outspoken member of and supporter of the LGBTQ+ community and reflected on both the progress and backwards momentum we’ve faced.
"Oh boy. Do we have enough time? There’s so much going on in the world in Alberta specifically. I don't live in Alberta; I know that there are a lot of great people in your province that are doing great work. Obviously, the twins, Tegan and Sarah are doing an amazing, amazing job at bringing awareness to a lot of things going on in Alberta specifically. But globally, throughout the world, things sometimes seem to be going backwards and it's disheartening and it's painful. Our neighbors to the south, I don't know what is going to happen. We have organizations here in Canada, Rainbow Railroad, Rainbow Refugee, and we think about them in terms of helping our friends and brothers and sisters in places like Uganda and in the Middle East where they have terrible, terrible laws. They have anti homosexuality laws, and it is something that we can't even understand. We can't even fathom it. It's frustrating to try and how do we even lend our voice to help people who really truly are fleeing their lives?
It's beyond getting bashed. It's beyond fleeing job discrimination. It's beyond fighting for pronoun usage. It is fighting for their lives and us trying to enable them safe passage into what we consider a free country," she said, before turning her thoughts to the USA and Canada.
"That is starting to become the case in many states in America. And it's like we're left kind of feeling incredulous, scratching our heads. That cannot be true, that cannot be happening. This is where we go to Vegas. This is where we perform at the Hard Rock Hotel. This can't be the same place. I moved from British Columbia to Ontario right before the Pandemic and a lot of my friends, because BC is relatively vibrant queer community, as soon as I moved to Ontario, Doug Ford got elected and a lot of my friends were cackling like, ha, you deserve that because you left BC. So come home and stop messing around, come back home. Which at this point the government here is just kind of bad, but it kind of seems like Albert is getting worse. It's just like what's happening to this country? We’re into pride season, there's a lot of fantastic celebrations that we'd love to have and that need to happen because we still need to celebrate, celebrate being together. It's not about celebrating our wins anymore because there's still so many struggles that we're having. And July of course is disability pride month. And so, there's a whole other can of worms. There's a whole other facet of the community that we need to be conscious of and really gather and rally around to that aspect of our other community members that need us. We need to be there for one another. And yes, it's for someone like me, it's easy for me because I'm on a stage. I can wear a Protect Trans Kids shirt. I have another shirt that says Protect trans families because now we're looking at reproductive rights and it's just layer upon layer upon layer of rights that are being clawed back and it is 2024 and it's like how is it possible that we're going backwards? We need to keep talking and we need to keep getting louder. And there's lots of things going on in the world that are horrendous, that are outrageous, that are happening right now, but these things are happening right here at home, and we really do need to stick together and the community needs to come together more than ever, not fall apart, not get polarized. We need to stick together and that's something that I really want to help spread that message and share it. A lot of my audience is queer, is all of us weirdos, all of us in the community and a lot of my audience is not. And so, if I can help give them some understanding, bring them in, give them some perspective, then that's what I want to do."
In 2009 Naked released her last studio album The Promise. She released an acoustic greatest hits album but otherwise didn’t release new music until 2020 when the first single from the album, Jim, was released. For Naked, she didn’t feel that the Pandemic was a time that the world needed a new Bif Naked record.
"I felt our bodies needed to be in the social justice work. It did not need to be in touring for music. It did not need to be in a new record. There are bigger things afoot and so we just tinkered with the music. We released the second single the following year, which is Broke into your Car. I've always had a great love obviously of dance music, and so it was fun to do that as the second single and then Roller Dome came out the following year, and so to finally get this record out feels like such a victory."
The album’s title track is remixed by Adam Percy and she is working on other remixes of songs like The March of the Freaks. Her joy in the record is evident when she speaks about it.
"I could not be happier with this record. It's just means so much to me. And you know what? I'm glad that we had that gap. I'm glad that we waited because now with streaming people are able to put out music whenever they want to, there's really no structure to it anymore."
The album is more dance and ballad heavy than previous albums.
"I always try and make records that I think reflect how we feel musically. And I try to put a little bit of everything that I like on a record, and I think this record really reflects where we are at. The rock version of Champion was a bit Angus Young and Def Leppard. And then to be able to have the dance mixes were a bit more what I enjoyed. Sweetpea is very, very heartwarming love song really does reflect how I'm so emotional all the time. I'm a very emotional girl. The older I get, the more emotional I get. I think everybody might feel the same way. Stay In Your Lane is definitely a thrash song, which is a nod to our roots. Raging Inside is kind of like Evanescence, vocally. Never No Never for me is a very ultimate heartache breakup song, which for me is perfect timing. I have to say it's the cry in your car song. I have one on every record, of course I do. And yeah, it's a very eclectic album sonically and emotionally."
With 6 albums it can be challenging to decide on songs to include in concerts. Songs like I Died from 2000’s Another 5 Songs and a Poem or Funeral for a Good Girl from 2005’s Superbeautifulmonster are fan favourites that don’t get performed much due to other songs popularity.
"I wish we could do a three hour set and sometimes when we do the acoustic tours, definitely we do three hour shows because I talk so much with the audience and I ask questions and then they talk and then we literally will play like 40 songs and then it's like after midnight and then the venue is like flicking the lights on and off going get out of our venue. We've got shows already being booked into 2025 that coincide with the documentary that we've been filming. We anticipate that we'll probably be performing a lot of songs that are unheard of. So, who knows, maybe on that tour we'll be able todo some of those rare songs."
Bif Naked has a sold out show at Dickens August 8th, and she still leaves everything on stage. The ability to still hit notes like the scream in I Love Myself Today is impressive.
"We always finish with I Love Myself Today. I love doing that as a finale and hopefully by then if you're not warmed up by the last song, you just have to belt it out. I remember there was one tour that we had really been doing shows for probably 15 months straight. And I would say that I had no voice. I don't know, for 10 weeks I had no voice all day long. All day long. I sounded like Brenda Vaccaro, if you remember the actress who did the tampon commercials. I had no voice all day. Suddenly at 9:00 PM at night I had this muscle memory, and I could never explain it, just my voice just worked at night. I think that with some songs, you've sung them so many times that your body just knows how to do it."
Somehow Bif Naked always seems to be positive and able to put on a performance even when life is shitty. Even during her cancer treatments, she would entertain other patients in the hospital because that is her personality.
"There are some days where you do not have it in you because real life sometimes is kind of icky and you don't have it. When I was a cancer patient, I was not a cancer patient as Beth Torbert. I was Bif Naked as a cancer patient. I was Bif Naked in the chemo wards. I was not in the chemo ward as a woman cancer patient. I had a top hat and cane, and I had to be on. It was always that way. And I think if it wasn't like that, I wouldn't have been able to do it. Sometimes I think when you don't feel you can do it, you have a responsibility to other people and that keeps you going even if you don't feel like it. And I think that being a performer actually helped me to stay out of a rut more often than not. I'm grateful for that, it’s been very useful many times and still continues to this day. Even becoming an older woman, my generation of girls, generation X girls and guys, we have to laugh at ourselves. We’re in our fifties now and we're still on skateboards and we're still in battle vests and we have to laugh at ourselves. I look at Tina Turner and she was in a miniskirt and heels on stage in her late seventies and eighties and I have to just believe that she didn't care what anyone said. She just rocked out. That is my goal and that is my role model. I'm not going to worry about anything else. I'm not going to worry about anybody else. That's my role model and I'm sticking to it."
30+ years into her career, Bif Naked has seen and done it all. While performing on stage whether for a few hundred people or tens of thousands, in the end it’s the connection to others that has made Bif Naked’s life and career.
She sees the impact of being accepting on her fans.
"I met someone in my autograph line that really touched my heart. They bought a book, and she said it was the second book she bought, and she wanted me to sign it in her new name. Because the other book was signed in her dead name. It makes me so emotional. I felt so honored, and we hugged, and I just thought, these are the important things in life. If I can do that for someone and if they feel safe enough and that we can share that honesty together and I can sign that for her, I can die happy, not just as an artist, but as a person. That's really what anyone can hope for as a legacy just in general, whether you're a dishwasher or a singer or a nurse or anything to have that connection with another person or with lots of people, then you're doing it right. You're doing life the right way."
Related Articles
Contributor Jason Clevett |
Person Bif Naked |
Topic Celebrity Interview | Celebrity Video Interview |
