EVERY DRAG NAME I ALMOST GAVE MY ALBUM (BUT DIDN’T)

Let’s get something straight (but not too straight): naming an album is harder than naming your firstborn. Mostly because I’m never having kids, but I am dramatic, emotionally volatile, and extremely online. So if I’m going to pour my heart, lungs, secrets, and sensual whisper vocals into 14 chaotic, gorgeous, bilingual bangers, the title better do more than slap; it better backhand the void.

Naturally, before I landed on the final name, I spiraled through an unholy list of contenders. Some were clever. Some were cursed. Some felt like drag queens who show up late and still steal the show. And for a long time, the front-runner was AFTERLIGHT: soft, glowing, dramatic-but-make-it-poetic. A total vibe.

Then I realized something important.

The album I’m making is not just a vibe.
It’s a revelation.
It’s a bite wrapped in a blessing.
It’s HALO WITH TEETH (halo con dientes).

While the album is not “Christian” per say, Christianity is baked into my bones like Arizona sunburn and leftover communion wafers. The iconography, the drama, the suffering, the redemption arc: all of it is stitched into the music like sequins on a battle vest.

HALO WITH TEETH is what happens when a good little altar boy grows up queer, bruised, and fabulous, then decides not to stay quiet anymore.

But before all that clarity came in, before the vision clicked, I had options. Too many options.

Here’s a short list of drag names I almost gave the album instead.

💄 1. Miss Understood

I mean… she’s poetic. She’s messy. She cries on public transit but makes it fashion. Honestly, I am her. But it was giving high school poetry Tumblr, and this album has range.

💄 2. Slutty With a Purpose

Missionary work, but make it sex-positive. This name still slaps. I might reuse it for a fragrance or a memoir. But it felt like trying too hard to make “unhinged” look empowering. Sometimes I’m just unhinged.

💄 3. Emotional Support Glitter

Because sometimes the only thing holding me together is a shimmer highlight and delusion. A little too soft for an album that includes demonic growls, bilingual screaming, and the sound of my inner child throwing a tantrum in a reverb chamber.

💄 4. THEY/THEM-fatale

The gender is ambiguous. The eyeliner is sharp. The pronouns are printed in blood on a velvet napkin. Almost perfect, but I didn’t want my album name to be a Twitter fight waiting to happen.

💄 5. Jesus, But Make It Spicy

Honestly? The most accurate possible summary of my entire vibe. But my SEO consultant said no. And also my mom.

💄 6. Screaming in C Minor

For when you’re crying in the gym bathroom but also harmonizing. This name lasted two months in the Notes app. But ultimately, the album deserved a name that didn’t sound like an unpaid therapy bill.

💄 7. The Trauma Cabaret

It’s giving confessional booth in a nightclub. It’s giving “I dance to survive.” It’s giving “laughing through the pain but with backup dancers.” I still might use this as a tour name. Stay tuned.

💄 8. Gabrosé All Day

Too lighthearted. Too brunch. Too much potential for me to end up on a T-shirt next to a pineapple and a bad font. But let it be known: I would crush a daytime drag brunch residency.

AND THEN… CAME HALO WITH TEETH

This album is holy. And horny. It weeps. It seduces. It forgives. It threatens.
It’s a halo, but not the kind that floats politely over your head.
It’s the kind you clench between your teeth like a weapon.

I didn’t choose this name just for the drama, although let’s be honest, that helped.
I chose it because it tells the truth: even softness can bite.
Even faith has claws.
Even love songs can draw blood.

And maybe, just maybe, it’s the start of something bigger.
HALO WITH TEETH is just the first of many sacred titles to come.
I’ve got a whole cathedral of chaos in me, and this is only the stained-glass entrance.

✨THE TWIST?✨

The real reason I changed the name?

AFTERLIGHT got rejected by Spotify’s algorithm for sounding “too emotionally stable.”
Can’t relate.

Also, HALO WITH TEETH looked better on merch.
So here we are.

✨💀✨

🍒🎰🧃🌈🫦🎲🫦🌈🧃🎰🍒

Naming an album is hard. Tipping? Much easier. Let’s vibe. 🎤

👇

🍒🎰🧃🌈🫦🎲🫦🌈🧃🎰🍒

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