All Saints' Day isn't dreary, it's a celebrated day. Food is laid out by the grave sides, and people pay their respects—in the Philippines it is a day of remembrance, and for Poarch, it was one of the only places she felt at home.

"That time in my life was when I felt the safest as a child. I was surrounded by other family members, so if there were other people around, my parents wouldn't be cruel to me."

The safest place she had as a child wasn't a house, it wasn't a place with a ceiling or walls, it was eyes on her.

It's a record that carries the gravity of years of abuse and mental-health struggles, finally breaking through into release.

"It wouldn't be me if it wasn't somewhat dark. I just love having the contrast of a little bit of darkness with sweetness and surrealism."

You'd recognize her from a mile away—whimsy-goth styling, angelic features, and surreally decorated visuals. Darkness is Poarch's secret recipe, but when it's married to a dash of sweetness and surrealism, it's imaginative like you've never seen before.

She describes the record as being in "the realm of dark, but whimsical, ethereal, and modern." The weight in that contrast and the culmination of those aesthetics is the visual and sonic storytelling that shapes her body of work.

Bella Poarch is the space in-between that contrast.

Duality feels like the creative direction, and she holds it together like glue; taking two things that don't go together, and finding the harmony between them. It's part boundary-pushing, part shock factor.

Being raised in Pangasinan was something tmrw immediately recognized, Poarch shared her family roots with her earliest memories of singing in competitions and writing songs in her room.

"I was singing in competitions in the Philippines from age seven to high school, and from the moment I left, even in the military."

She shared a moment with our creative director who is also Filipino. That unspoken acknowledgement of being raised in the Philippines, and Southeast Asians in the creative industry, allowed Poarch to ease into her seat a little more, take a breath and open up.

"I named the album Picnic at the Cemetery because of our family tradition," Poarch says, "but also about how I became the person I am today, and how much I feel I've grown when it comes to dealing with my traumas that I push down."

Revisiting her dark moments and channeling them into the album feels cathartic—like finally being able to cry after pushing it down so long, a release necessary to move forward. It's a piece for reconciliation that calls attention to mental health.

"I have depression and PTSD. My music speaks a lot about mental health and how important it is to be open and take care of each other."

Poarch's energy shifted and she became very vulnerable and open, someone who you could tell had been through years of battling her mind. Now, speaking from a place where she is able to revisit the darker themes, it seems Poarch has alchemized these feelings through the album.

"I recently put out the song Ribcage, and it talks about my struggle with depression." She tells tmrw, "In my first year of writing the album, I came into the studio and I was really depressed. I told my producers, 'Hey guys, I think I should cancel this session because I really don't feel like writing today.'" She continues, "I don't want to do anything. I'm really down… I'm just going through a tough time," and they responded, "You should write about it."

"So that's how Ribcage was born. It talks about my struggle with depression and how some days it's really hard for me to get out of bed."

"It's about reminding yourself to take a break, and it's okay to feel how you're feeling, but you'll make it out of that— it's tough sometimes."

Ribcage feels like a ballad of dread, almost a rite of passage, that encapsulates the feeling of chronic depression. Poarch described it as drowning. A melancholic anthem weaving in soft, sweet vocals, reminiscent of early 2000s alt-pop, it puts you right there with her. Poarch knows that feeling—she lived it. What felt too delicate to share at the time became her biggest creative breakthrough.

"Ribcage was honestly the first song I ever wrote that made me feel like, 'Damn! I should start writing more about how I truly feel,' because we were able to create something beautiful and vulnerable."

"I started producing a year and a half ago, so it's still very new to me, and I find it so cool because I get to experiment with the composition of the songs."

tmrw asked Poarch why this feeling wouldn't aid in conjuring inspiration of some kind, but tactfully do the exact opposite.

"It's just a vulnerability thing. I felt I couldn't write about it." She says, "Maybe it's also from shame, but I'm still learning to put myself out there and be my authentic self."

"During that time, I wrote what people wanted to hear. It was either very positive or vindictive, but I wanted the songs to be relatable, and that wasn't something I was feeling at that moment—I would never just write for myself."

Picnic at the Cemetery comes from a similar creative universe that's a little more inside out. Perhaps a service-based mentality, questioning, "What do I need to give to people?" Instead of asking, "What do I need to get out of it?" Was the final switch that needed to flip in order to translate her inner-world into those studio sessions.

"The process of making the album was insane because I took two years writing It. The first year I was writing the album, I wasn't satisfied with the other songs. I wrote 20 plus songs before I wrote Ribcage. When I went back to the other songs I wrote for the album, I wanted to make sure I felt the same as I did listening to Ribcage."

Only one other song made her feel that pull, then everything else was scrapped. Two songs were kept and she started again from scratch.

"That's also when I realized, 'Wait, I really love that I'm able to help out with production as well,'" There's vocal scratches in there, which were my idea.

Gaining control over her own music by producing herself provided her with the feeling of freedom, and lent the opportunity to bring so much needed release into this body of work.

As a visually-led creative, she was drawing in studio sessions and coming up with music video ideas before the songs had even taken shape.

"I'm a very visual person. When I write songs, a music video is already in my head. I have characters for each song I design for the album."

Even the characters on the cover art for Picnic at the Cemetery weren't part of the original concept on the album. Track number five titled "Big Head," which was also written in the same month as Ribcage, was what pulled her visual and aural direction together.

Before she learned to produce herself she was left with empty space after every song written, and she began to build the album visually—starting with a character named Bon Bon.

"I was sitting there on the couch, I had my iPad, and I thought, 'Let me doodle something,' so I drew this character named Bon Bon, and I showed my team saying, 'This is what the song sounds like. It's Bon Bon… This used to be my imaginary friend.' Then the producer said, 'Damn, that's sick—you should do that more!' And that's when I started creating characters for each song."

Her love for art and drawing came from the times Poarch felt safer in her head than she did in the real world.

"I maladaptive-daydream a ton, and I used it as a coping mechanism growing up."

"When I was a kid, being in my head was a safe space for me. When I was going through a lot of abuse, I would be somewhere else, and it kept me from thinking about the trauma."

"In school, I wouldn't have a lot of friends because I was bullied, so I had imaginary friends."

That's where all the characters are rooted from. That's why they're important.

The worldbuilding of this album was actually just Poarch rebuilding herself, and the world that existed inside of her all along.

Having to detach so young cut Poarch off from accessing parts of herself for years. Contextually, she creatively wields that same ability like a sword—something you can't put on a moodboard.

That's why you feel something listening to it.

After years of putting out music, Poarch decided she gets to say who's allowed to be in the room with her. A decision she has more than likely earned after years of being misunderstood.

"I work with a lot of my friends—two years ago I started only having sessions with people that I'm close with, and honestly that helped me be more honest and vulnerable with my lyrics."

Picnic at the Cemetery is a very nurtured project. The people around her fiercely protect this body of work, which is what allows her to stay authentic inside it.

"The album is very diverse. The sound of each song is going to be different from one another, especially the songs I produce."

"Most of the songs are still pop, but some of them are experimental for sure. Your first time, you should listen with headphones and don't put it on shuffle. Go in order from the first to the 12th track."

And finally, we asked her what she truly hopes those who listen take home from it.

"I want people to feel everything when they listen to the album. Feel however you want to feel. When I listen to the album, I still do because it is very healing for me. I just do it once a week at least, from top to bottom."

"It makes me feel like when I was in the Philippines at the cemetery having a picnic with my relatives, and my brother, while still having that feeling of 'I'm gonna be okay.'"

That feeling is a primal sense of safety for Poarch—It's the most honest record she's ever made, but honesty is the whole point of it. Sometimes it takes one artist to say that difficult thing out loud in order for people to not feel stuck in it.

The whole process was a huge release, and taught her to truly listen within.

"I'm very grateful that I'm in a much better place now. All of my friends are so supportive, and my team is amazing. I'm very grateful. Without them, this album would not exist."

The darkness is honest, the optimism is what pulls you through it. Both doing a dance back and forth throughout the record. Family, heritage—and the one place a Pangasinan girl is able to breathe again, are all encapsulated into this twelve track piece with the closing message of "it's going to be okay."

Picnic at the Cemetery will be released September 18th on all streaming platforms.