LOS ANGELES, CA- There are songs that leave you humming, and then there are songs that leave you haunted. Susannah Joffe’s latest single, “Call Me Pretty,” does the latter — and then some.
Before even skimming the press release, I hit play. By the time the final, hushed notes faded out, I was too rattled to move on — I had to play it again, this time with the lyrics open, trying to make sense of the gut-punch I’d just experienced. The press release describes the track as “a haunting, self-destructive ballad of yearning”. But what I heard went even deeper — something more dangerous, more feral. This wasn’t just sad love. This was a desperate confession from a narrator seemingly trapped in a cycle of emotional and physical degradation, clinging to the shards of a fantasy that barely masks the reality of abuse.
Listening to it, I felt trapped right alongside the narrator — caught in an endless loop of being used, discarded, and crawling back for more, as if even the briefest scraps of affection could justify the violence. Lines like “Give me a black eye and cover it with stars in red white and blue” and “Lay me naked by your Gibson guitar and play me too” don’t just drip with sadness — they seethe with self-annihilation. By the time we hit the chorus, she sings — “Fuck me in your pickup truck / Pray to god and drive me drunk” — and to me… this isn’t a plea for affection. It’s an ominous surrender, a portrait of someone willing to be broken just to feel wanted.
Joffe’s delivery is almost whisper-like, her voice dry and cracked, peeling away the glamour from the heartbreak and leaving nothing but raw nerve. The production — a dreamlike haze of muted guitars and ghostly synths — only heightens the tension, wrapping the lyrics in a shroud of distorted Americana.
“Call Me Pretty” isn’t an easy listen. It’s not supposed to be. It’s a devastating, uncomfortable piece of songwriting that catches you off guard, shakes you awake, and leaves you staring into the void long after it ends. In a pop landscape that often polishes pain into palatability, Susannah Joffe chooses instead to confront it — brutal, beautiful, and unflinchingly real.
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