Xana, Pop Powerhouse Releases Sophomore Album “The Sex Was Good Until It Wasn’t”
Photo Credit: Lindsey Blane
The Sex Was Good Until It Wasn't goes where Xana has never gone before, touching on incredibly personal–and at times traumatic–subject matter. Over fifteen vivid tracks, she puts herself in the driver's seat, taking charge of her own story while offering listeners a place of refuge and freedom. Unbound to a single genre or a particular moment, the album unapologetically builds a heartfelt world that is as explosive and bright as it is profound and dark as well as radically queer, providing the necessary space for all–Xana included–to heal. The artist, who is the sole songwriter on the project, sees this body of work as a refined, fully formed evolution from her past work, in part due to her brutally honest songwriting and the free-flowing trust built with producers Liam Moes and Shane Stephenson.
Thrilled to finally welcome listeners into this new cosmic world, Xana explains,
"It's an album that I've been wanting to write for a long time and I went into it knowing exactly what its purpose would be."
Last month, Xana shared the building, melodic "Monster," a track that recounts the artist's most unsavory moments as it daringly unfolds with a list of some of her regrets and ultimately sees the artist takes responsibility for her actions. Xana says it's one of her favorite songs she's ever written, and explains, "I wrote this song at a time where I was forced to look my mistakes square in the eye and take accountability for the hurt caused by my actions. I had to ask myself questions like “Why do you think your feelings go above the feelings of others? Why are you okay with lying to people who care about you? Why is it impossible for you to apologize? Why are you so defensive and why do you default to throwing punches when you’re hurt?”
The first taste of the project came with the risqué track and video–"Better Kind Of Best Friend"–a building, steamy ode to confidence and queer empowerment that celebrates sexual pleasure and bodily autonomy and now boasts over 1.2M streams across streaming platforms. The song's inclusion on the album adds a new dimension, bringing levity, pleasure and depth to a project that delves into heavy topics, leading Xana to ask, "What’s an album about the horrors of sex without a song about the wonders of sex?" With queerness, and queer sex in particular, rarely spoken about positively publicly if at all, Xana hopes to shed light on the beauty and joy of queer sex. Xana adds, "As a queer person, my relationship with sex all my life has been a challenging road to navigate, and I think it’s really important to remind people that sex isn’t the end all be all and sex is allowed to be–and supposed to be–fun and lighthearted and pleasurable for all parties." Upon release, the track was supported by several leading tastemakers including Exclaim!, GLAAD and Mundane Magazine. Glasse Factory wrote the track "restructures typical pop convention" and called the video, "a sapphic Renaissance utopia..serving autonomy through sexual exploration."
Xana will embark on a U.S. tour to support the new album this summer beginning next month on June 1 in Portland, OR. The tour will make its way down the West Coast stopping in Seattle, WA, San Francisco, CA Los Angeles, CA and more. In mid-June, Xana will make two stops in Texas and two stops in Florida, and will then perform in cities including Nashville, TN, a venue upgrade in Chicago, IL, Summerfest in Milwaukee, WI and Brooklyn, NY with a final stop in Salt Lake City, UT on July 3. Find a full list of dates below and grab tickets here.
The Sex Was Good Until It Wasn’t is out everywhere now
The Sex Was Good Until It Wasn't (LP) Tracklist
01. Lip Service
02. the sex was good!
03. Better Kind of Best Friend
04. Homewrecking Era
05. Monster
06. Sick Joke
07. 15
08. Lavender Daughter
09. FERAL
10. BODY
11. The Kicker
12. Earth Eyes
13. Alibi
14. 4ever
15. January
