Thread by @latimes

With #HolyFvck, Demi Lovato (@ddlovato) is embracing her shadow side: “You can’t have light without dark. The dichotomy was really important to me, and I had to take my anger out of the shadows in order to heal.” lat.ms/3QSpblV

The new album is “a thundering, hard-rock horror maze through Lovato’s psyche as a superstar in recovery — not just from drugs and alcohol but also from the sexual and spiritual repression that had long eaten away at her sense of self,” writes @HexPositive lat.ms/3QSpblV

Lovato addressed the obstacles they’ve faced in a previous album and docuseries, which detailed a near-fatal overdose. In 2018, Lovato suffered a heart attack, multiple strokes and brain damage that left her legally blind. lat.ms/3QSpblV

Against the advice of her friends, including Elton John, Lovato opted to become “California sober.”

She recalls thinking when she wound up back at a treatment center last year: “I always take it too far. This is the last time. I’m not doing this again.” lat.ms/3QSpblV

“Back when I worked on Disney Channel, I knew I could go this hard,” says Lovato. “But it wasn’t until recently that I felt like I could accomplish this sound. I’ve had a lot of anger since coming out of treatment.” lat.ms/3QSpblV

#HolyFvck is rich with Biblical references & subversions of the choir girl Lovato used to be while attending church in her teens — until, she says, she was pushed out of the choir after dating, then dumping a pastor’s son. “And he cheated on me!” she says. lat.ms/3QSpblV

“But now I’m blacklisted from performing because of something someone else did? It was the first time I felt betrayed by the church,” says Lovato. “I don’t believe in organized religion anymore. My God is the universe. It’s so much bigger than me, or us.” lat.ms/3QSpblV

The battle between Lovato’s sexual agency and her Baptist upbringing coalesce into an emotional maelstrom. Amid the industrial goth-rock churn of “Heaven,” Lovato sings of choosing pleasure over piety.

“It’s actually based on a Bible verse,” she explains. lat.ms/3QSpblV

“Matthew 5:30 says, ‘If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off; [for] it’s better to lose one part of your body than your entire body to hell,’” she says. “That was a Bible verse I heard since I was young — too young to know what masturbation was.” lat.ms/3QSpblV

Lovato describes her sexuality as pansexual & her gender identity as nonbinary. She’s adopted both “she” & “they” pronouns to reflect her fluidity; the line, she says, is drawn at the “constricting leotards & stilettos” she used to wear while performing. lat.ms/3QSpblV

Lovato spent some of the pandemic swiping between girls and guys on dating apps.

“I found that dating women was harder for me, because many were just exploring or confused about their sexuality,” she says. lat.ms/3QSpblV

“I’ve reached a point where I’m tired of spoon-feeding myself to the media about my journey with sobriety,” she says. “‘This is where I’m at. This is where I went for a month. These are my pronouns and this is who I am.’ F— it.” lat.ms/3QSpblV

“With all due respect, I’m not going to answer questions that I don’t want you to know,” add Lovato. “And I think that’s an empowering place to be, when I’ve shared everything with everyone my whole life.” lat.ms/3QSpblV

“Everyone has their own mess,” says Lovato. “I just happened to be really public about mine, because my life has been under a microscope since I was a teenager.” lat.ms/3QSpblV

Read @HexPositive’s profile of Lovato to learn more about the artist’s new album. lat.ms/3QSpblV