Emily Mac pulls the hard punches in “Kills Me To Love You,” loaded (pun intended) and fire. With darkly satisfying explosive-sensitive percussion and hard-hitting lyrics, “Kills Me To Love You” is wickedly empowering with sinister guitars crawling in the background, not without a hint from Mac’s haunting blues phantom.

Her words are sharp, like swords piercing through pages of lies. “Kills Me To Love You” is disillusioned, channeling the inner bad girl, pointing a middle finger at the ex. From punchy beats, dirty guitar licks, to sexy sassy punk allure, “Kills Me To Love You” unleashes two mountains of burden. Though flamboyant and black in color, the vulnerable lines in the track hit harder than ever: “I died in your arms,” “It kills me to love you.”

The imagery of dying is fully accompanied by gunfire in the sounds. There’s violence and darkness in “Kills Me To Love You,” but it’s not there on its own. Instead, it originated from a trauma that one seeks to put behind. In a way, “Kills Me To Love You” is bleak, much like the way how early blues documented the truth in the barebones of a song. Perhaps there’s no proper way to vocalize the dark places that one journeys to after having endured something traumatizing, but “Kills Me To Love You” understands it. The track gets there through vivid sonic symbolism that hits where it hurts, so that it may heal.

Mac offers a much-needed catharsis and closure to an unfortunate end. Sometimes, when the hurt is deep, forgiveness isn’t enough. There’s a need for resolution, a need for justice and fairness, a need to tell one’s story. “Kills Me To Love You” punches through the anger and hurt. And with Mac’s eerily haunting blues in the mix of hard rock, she gives listeners a moment alone, punching a hole through these dark thoughts.

Punk Head: I love how you explored darker themes such as toxic relationships and heartbreak in "Kills Me to Love You." The intimacy and the lyrics hit me quite hard. What was the creative progress like?

Emily Mac: It means a lot to me that my lyrics connected with you. Writing and recording “Kills Me To Love You” was intense, I was working through the trauma that past relationships had left on me and realizing that my desire for love had led me down some dark paths. Being a very empathic person it’s easy for me to take other people’s energies on as my own. So with this song, I gave that darkness back and took my power back. I feel like no matter what hard stuff you go through in life you can always walk away and start over.

PH: Hitting 50K stream with your first 2 singles is quite an achievement. How do you feel about this initial success?

Mac: It makes me so happy to see that so many people around the world are listening to and connecting with my music. It’s wild ‘cause when I was recording this album we were still in a partial pandemic lockdown and the world felt super small. I look forward to reaching even more people with my music and getting to meet them at my live shows.

PH: Can you tell us more about you as an artist?

Mac: When I’m the best version of myself, I’m channeling my experiences into art. The world is both beautiful and broken and a lot of things don’t make sense to me… but what does is music, connection: humanity. Sometimes I find it hard to express everything I want to say in my day-to-day life so I put it in a song. Rock is the perfect outlet for my emotions because it's raw and rebellious at its heart.

PH: Who are your biggest inspirations?

Mac: There are many. Some of my classic rock inspirations are Heart, The Rolling Stones and Stevie Nicks. I’m also really inspired by Dorothy, The Rival Sons and Beware of Darkness.

PH: What would like to say to your fans out there?

Mac: You are not alone, everything about you is ok; the dark parts, the weird parts and the sassy sexy parts. Be your free wild self and on the days that life feels hard turn up the volume on your rock music and let it lift you up.