SZA is tired of not being a bug. While they spend their days crawling, she's stuck dealing with toxic breakups, the mounting pressure to follow up on her two career-defining albums, and having a song like “Kill Bill” — which she started as a joke — garner more acclaim and success than “Nobody Gets Me,” the song she always wanted to write. The musician dished on this frustration on the latest episode of her podcast. HotWhere she threw hot wings and answered questions while disguised as an insect.
“I have a hard time enjoying anything if I’m not suffering for it, so that’s why I wear this mask,” Sza said, acknowledging the prosthetics that cover her face with large, alien-like eyes and antennae protruding from her hair. She was as serious as she could be given the not-so-serious circumstances of her appearance and the premise of the show itself. “I feel like ‘Nobody Gets Me’ is my goal of, ‘Oh, I can write a song, I can write XY&Z.’ And then they’re like, ‘But that other song that took you 3 seconds to write is like a joke to your sound engineer,’” she continued. “I don’t know. Suffering adds value in every way.”
Even SZA isn't a fan of spicy food — she was willing to put up with the increasingly spicy selection of wings just because of her competitive edge. It also gave her the opportunity to grill host Sean Evans about the origins of Hot“Especially what he gets from watching his guests suffer. “What’s your moon sign? I know you’re a Taurus,” she said, delving into his chart. “We’re getting to the bottom of this. I have to do this. There’s something behind why you’re doing this.” SZA quickly flipped the script on Evans and began grilling him about whether doing a show like Hot It prevents him from finding exciting romantic relationships.
The questions Sza asks make her think more deeply about her own relationships, especially with music and her audience. “It’s never honest enough for me,” she explains. “I never know what’s going on. I’m like, ‘I thought you liked this?’ And then they’re like, ‘No, stupid. We hate this. We want more of this.’ It’s so confusing. I’m just like, ‘What? Does my boyfriend like me?’ It’s abusive but also very satisfying and validating.” She admits to being in a toxic relationship with music, but adds, “Toxic music is the most fun, so I enjoy it.”
In her insect costume, Sza doesn’t feel the weight of her public life as a musician. “It gives me a lot of peace of mind,” she says. “Being human is so hard, being in your own skin and everything. For no other reason than I’m tired of not being an insect. It’s like, ‘What the hell.’ Wouldn’t you want to be an insect if you could be anything else?”
