Diandra Interviews Pom Pom Squad: Confident, Cautious, And Candid

I LOVED Pom Pom Squad’s interview because Mia Berrin is confident. She knows what she wants and goes straight for it, which is why her transformation as Pom Pom Squad feels so badass. She feels ripped out of an 80’s pop-punk fantasy; encouraging her listeners to own their heart’s breaks and breakthroughs. Thus, I am unsurprised by her fierce responses to my interview Q’s, and her ability to step into the music industry, which IS SO ROUGH, and, somehow, feel tougher that it. 

Diandra: With a family so musically inclined, what has been their influence and advice on your career?

Mia: Mostly to be cautious. I think growing up around the music industry, it did give me the sense, from a pretty early age, that music could actually be a career. Weirdly enough though, I didn’t think of myself as a musician until I was about seventeen or eighteen. Now that I’m around the industry a lot more, I think the most important piece of advice that’s stuck with me is to trust your gut. Always.

Diandra: You spoke about being a depressive child, and most artists do suffer from depression or have a penchant for sadness. Do you feel part of being an artist is to get emotional and analyze what is feeling?

Mia: I think so, but I think there is a misconception about suffering being the glamorous means to making “truly great art,” which is severely untrue. My depression has been more of an obstacle for me in my writing than an asset. Writing Ow was, in some ways, an exercise in putting a name and a sound to the feeling of spiraling. Being able to name it has helped me have power over it, and having power over it has made me a better writer and artist. 
Cherry Blossom

Diandra: With that in mind, how has being Pom Pom Squad showed you how to feel about life, love, and yourself?

Mia: Nearly everything I have as an adult, that brings me joy, is because of Pom Pom Squad. It has brought me my best friends, my best self, the healthiest version of my life… having something to protect is great leverage over an illness that often tries to convince you there is no reason for living. I often write to teach myself something. In the case of “Ow” I was teaching myself about externalizing invisible pain. Now, I’m teaching myself how to express love, and how to convince myself that I am deserving of it.

I Interrupt this interview to say REREAD THOSE RESPONSES! THEY ARE SO POWERFUL! Continue……

Diandra: Is there a particular song of yours that made you discover something about yourself you had not fully realized?

Mia: I think “Heavy Heavy” was an important song for me. When I wrote the lyrics, I sent them to my best friend because I thought they were too simple to use. I tend to be very heady about songwriting, but at the end of the day, the song says exactly what it needs to say. I came up with the riff when I was catatonic, taking a bath in my parents house, on a trip home. I started feeling that sinking thing that has become all too familiar to me and the riff just started swirling around in my head. I immediately got out of the bath to try to find it on guitar. It seemed like the perfect sound to capture this meta-feeling – being angry at yourself for how sad you feel. I think ultimately what that song taught me was that the “million dollar word” isn’t always the one that tells the story best.
Honeysuckle

Diandra: What is the most nerve-wracking truth about being an artist “on the rise” or trying to make a living off their art?

Mia:I realized recently from being a musician and working in music that most of the “buzzy” artists I idolized growing up, probably, weren’t making any money. The cost of having power over your work is having to be really scrappy in order to make it. For all of the incredible, hardworking, collaborative, generous people there are in indie rock, there are also people who prey on the underdog mentality of DIY and use it as an opportunity to slight people. I’ve learned that as weird or hard or uncomfortable as it may be, it’s incredibly important to set boundaries and it’s ok to ask for more than what someone is offering. 

Diandra: What have your past relationships taught you about who you are as a person, and how did those lessons manifest into one of your love songs?

Mia: My past relationships taught me many very ugly lessons, which is why I never really wrote a love song until recently – that’s a song I’m really excited about. I’ve learned a lot about love while I was writing “Ow”, mostly from my bandmates. I met Shelby and Maria on the day of my last breakup, which feels cosmic. In our earliest practices together, they imbued these songs with so much love and care – it was the first time I’ve had collaborators who got more out of my music than just getting to play. We built something really beautiful on that record that has fueled many love songs to come 😉 

Diandra: You have spoken about the complexity of being multi-racial in a world so racially divided. How do you feel such complexity shows in your music?

Mia: I think it comes through in my music in that it’s a lens I’m unable to remove. My mixed-race-ness has always been the context by which my existence has been framed, which makes it hard to detach from the music I write. Something that, for me, has become a facet of my identity is the ability to navigate extremes and in-betweens, which is something that I feel like I play with a lot sonically. I used to jokingly say my genre was “loud-quiet-loud-quiet” music. I think the complexity comes from the fact that my relationship with myself is complex. 
Heavy Heavy [Official Music Video]

Diandra: If Sundays are a day of renewal, what is your dream Sunday?

Mia: Playing music all days with no goals or expectations of myself, and laying in bed with my girlfriend and my cat in a beautiful cozy house.  

Diandra: As a woman that sees music as a way to define and discover herself, who can you say you are, today, as a person and artist?

Mia: I think my therapist asked me this same questions a few years ago haha. My name is Mia Berrin, I’m a person who gets to do what I love (and be lucky enough to have people care about). Today, I’m a person who believes in what I do and is excited about the future of it. 

Name a movie or book you would love to turn into a song and why? If you want, come up with a verse. 

Mia: It’s funny that you ask this… I wrote a song about my favorite book/movie when I was sixteen that I’m putting out in April – here’s one of the verses…

“In a crowded high school dance/in a cloud of peach alcohol/I let myself get drunk on the idea that you loved me/cause in here I’m suffocating, but out there I feel so small/ what a wonder to be anything at all”

LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! For More Information On This BADASS WOMAN, a.k.a Pom Pom Squad Click Here.