Most of my junior year I turned myself all the way down for someone, and look, I get it, he was fucking gorgeous and most girls would have. He had the kind of body that makes you stupid on sight, broad shoulders, abs you could actually see, hung in a way that scrambled my priorities for longer than I’m proud of. A literal god. Until I remembered what a badass goddess I am. The problem with gods is they know it, and knowing it makes them lazy about you. I stopped wearing the shoes that made me feel dangerous. Started editing my opinions mid-thought and laughing softer. The sex was the worst part, honestly. I’d be on my back thinking about what would actually get me there and immediately pivoting to what he needed, because his orgasm was the whole agenda and mine was something I’d stopped demanding. I didn’t even clock how far gone I was until one random Thursday I caught my reflection getting ready and didn’t recognize the girl staring back and thought, who the fuck is that. NYRE’s ‘Me On My Mind’ is for that moment, the one where you see the reduced version of yourself you built for someone else and decide you are completely, irrevocably done with her.
Mike Schlosser built something at the frequency of a woman who just reclaimed her whole personality. It’s got Lady Gaga’s neon-club urgency running through it and lilyisthatyou’s downtown sleek underneath. Dark and relentless, it sounds expensive as hell. The beat moves your ass whether you’re ready or not, and that’s the point.
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She opens the track in full glow-up armor. “I got that platinum bleach / LV sneakers so clean / Gelly nails with the bling.” Every detail deliberate, every inch of her curated for her own pleasure. She’s watching her ex register what he walked away from. Then she lands: “I’m your ex and your crush / Never seen me so lux / You don’t miss me enough.” That last line. She’s already so far past him she’s evaluating his grief from a distance and finding it wholly insufficient. She’s filing it away and moving on with her night. The confidence in that is damn filthy.
Then comes the moment that wrecked me. The pre-chorus hits and she delivers “I feel me forgetting you / Now I feel me / And it feels so good, so good” and I needed a second after that. The move from forgetting him to locating herself again. Anyone who’s handed herself over completely to someone else knows that first morning you wake up and your own desire is loud again, your pleasure is back on your own agenda, your body belongs to you and you alone. She wrote that moment and turned it into the best orgasm you’ve ever had. And that’s before the chorus even starts.
Coming into the chorus, this becomes a full-body experience. “I only got me on my mind / Make it graphic by design / Every second I’m alive / I die for a rush in neon lights / sipping chaos on the side / Only want me on my mind.” NYRE is in a state of absolute self-possession, designing her own pleasure on her own terms. She’s telling you the hedonism is chosen. The whole damn song is her saying her name belongs to herself now.
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Verse two is where she gets mean. She calls him out with “D d d d delusional” stretching it out in this glitchy stutter effect that sounds more dismissive than any scream could, then hits him with “Court ordered therapy you clearly need cuz you couldn’t even act like you weren’t.” The audacity of that line. She’s not even angry anymore, she’s clinical. Then comes “W w w w w what a loser” delivered with the most dismissive energy I’ve heard on a pop record this year, followed by “I’m so so so so good without you now / So good, so good” which lands less like a declaration and more like a shrug. She’s already gone. Then she delivers the line of the year: “Put some respect on my name cuz you used to moan it.” Every woman who’s had a man absolutely unravel inside her and then act like she’s nobody the second it’s over has felt this. NYRE called that shit out loud and I want it on everything I own.
NYRE is the Toronto dark pop artist your algorithm has been gatekeeping from you, and honestly, fuck that, because she deserves to be everywhere. She builds these haunting ethereal soundscapes over moody trap beats that pull you so deep into your own head you forget you were just trying to find something to put on while you got ready. Her whole thing is real storytelling that drags love and heartbreak and self-discovery out of the shadows and makes you sit with it whether you’re ready to or not. She’s been writing songs since she was eight years old, which is goddamn unhinged in the best way, and that obsession shows. Her influences run from Halsey to BTS and the sonic range that creates is wild to witness. She’s got this magnetic stage presence built on an acting background that makes her live sets feel less like concerts and more like confessions. NYRE calls her sound psycho pop and honestly that tracks because this music gets in your chest and stays there, moody and beautiful and a little bit unwell, which is exactly the shit we’re here for.
I found that girl in the mirror eventually. Took a few months, some extremely ill-advised decisions, and one night I went to a show alone and danced until I couldn’t hear my own thoughts. She came back loud. Turns out walking away from a literal god with washboard abs and literal big dick energy but was shrinking you is easy when you realize you’re the goddess they were praying to. ‘Me On My Mind’ is the soundtrack to that exact moment, the one where your name belongs to you again and you’re done being anyone’s smaller, quieter, more convenient version. She is absolutely never giving it back.
