Please introduce yourself and share a bit about your background.

Sockpuppet is totally a whole band, and not the fanciful invention of a single person recording on their own from a basement recording studio. While not a whole lot is known about the other members of Sockpuppet, there has consistently always been one person, who goes by "fluffy" (which they insist is an adjective, not a name), who appears to be the person writing, recording, producing, mixing, and mastering all of the songs. But who knows who plays all the different instruments!

Tell us a bit about yourself.

The Sockpuppet studio is currently in a basement in a small town near Seattle.

What's your musical origin story?

I started playing piano at the age of 5, and then later took violin and cello lessons. Somewhere along the line, I started playing guitar, drums, and a bunch of other instruments. In the early 80s, I started using computers to compose music and began releasing some of my experiments online in the 90s. At the end of the year 2000, I discovered Song Fight! (which had only just been getting started), and I've been annoying everyone there ever since.

What were the driving forces or pivotal moments that inspired you to pursue music?

Some of my earliest memories were at the age of 3 or 4 and involved music; I was obsessed with a book called "Tubby the Tuba" (and even insisted on having that be my Halloween costume one year), and I was also enchanted by my dad playing piano and wanted to make noises myself. After going down a path of being pressured towards classical music for many years, I eventually discovered that I liked other genres even more, and then ended up having a long and unhappy career as a software engineer with music as a passionate hobby on the side. Eventually, I burned out on that and decided I wanted to make music as my main thing, so here we are.

How would you describe your style of music?

Everything I can get my hands on.

How is your personality reflected in your work?

My ADHD is on full display here.

Describe your creative process when you write new music.

I have ADHD.

What is the name of your latest releases?

My upcoming release will be a pair of albums, "Transitions" and "Deadnames." The former is my earliest Song Fight! music, recomposed and rerecorded with 25-ish years of experience behind it. The latter is the original versions of the songs on "Transitions" and a few others which were part of the journey, remastered and cleaned up a little but otherwise unchanged.

"Notions" was a side project that emerged out of a few songs that didn't quite fit into "Transitions" but which I felt were overdue for a release.

What was the inspiration for that release?

Song Fight! has an annual tradition of a live show, and usually that becomes my cadence for reflecting on how I've developed as a musician. 2020 through 2023 were conducted online for some mysterious reason, and I used the opportunity to really experiment with how my songs were performed, and some of the results of that were the kernel for "Transitions."

From the name, you can probably guess that there's a lot of subject matter relating to the transgender experience, especially through the lens of being openly trans online in the early 2000s, when things were even more hostile than they are today.

What challenges or unexpected moments did you encounter during the writing/recording process?

Updating some of the songs was kind of painful, especially due to the raw emotions that were on display.

What strategies do you find most effective for promoting your music?

Lately I've been performing live in VRChat a lot, which has been great for finding a new audience and making connections outside of my usual circles.

How do you engage with your fans online and offline?

I blog, I post to Mastodon, and I spend way too much time on Discord. And of course VRChat.

What upcoming promotional activities or releases are you most excited about?

When "Transitions" comes out I'll be doing a release party in VRChat!

How can folks contact you?

You can find me at:

• Website: beesbuzz.biz
• Band site: sockpuppet.us
• Mastodon: @fluffy@plush.city

Additional Information

• My pronouns are she/her or they/them
• I run Novembeat, an annual daily music challenge