Stepmom comments on corporate greed in new EP

Stepmom, Oklahoma orchestral dream punk band, will perform Thursday, Oct. 31, at Factory Obscura as part of the opening night of their Profitopia immersive experience and EP release show.

Following Factory Obscura’s annual Halloween Procession parade, Stepmom’s Profitopia immersive installation will open at 7:30 p.m. and the band will perform at 8:30 p.m. Tickets cost $20.

Stepmom’s hour-long set will feature every song off their new EP along with other songs from the band. They will perform on a stage built inside of the immersive experience. 

Profitopia is an immersive art experience that will be at Factory Obscura from Oct. 31 to Dec. 8. Stepmom created the art installation in collaboration with Factory Obscura, said lead singer of Stepmom Lindsey Cox. 

Stepmom is made up of guitarist and lead singer Lindsey Cox, cellist and bassist Cheyenne McCoy, keyboardist Bailey Pelletier and drummer and oboist Amie Reardon. 

The whole EP is commentary on corporate greed and late stage capitalism, said Cox. 

She said it is about how we as a society move through the world. The experience is set in a surreal corporate campus setting where every room correlates with a song on their EP, said Cox.

Stepmom’s Profitopia EP has four tracks: “Welcome to Profitopia,” “Survival Mode,” “Heavy Lifting” and “Self-Destruct.”

“Welcome to Profitopia” correlates with the lobby space, “Survival Mode” correlates with the employee lounge, “Heavy Lifting” correlates with the corporate gym and “Self-Destruct” correlates with the secret lab. 

Cox wants the installation to be like a silent disco and encourages those going to see the installation to bring headphones to listen to each song within its correlating room. She said there will also be listening stations in each room or headphones that can be borrowed there.

Cox said they pitched the idea to Factory Obscura late last year for the Profitopia installation and have been slowly fabricating and building the experience since July. Some items used in the installation were donated by Oklahomans like CRT TVs and microwaves where people can see the items they donated turned into art.

Stepmom, formed in 2019, is known for their hyper-feminine aesthetic. Their shows often feature pink outfits, Barbie dolls, and pink styrofoam TVs. They often have dancers come on stage with TV heads or lampshade heads that are a personification of some of the band’s stage props. 

Cox said the hyper-fem aesthetic of the band came from her rejection of the idea of femininity and the color pink when she was younger. She said she tried to distance herself from femininity when she was younger because she thought it symbolized weakness. She grew to embrace femininity and the color pink and redefined her personal meaning of hyper-femininity to mean empowerment.