Punk rocker Bif Naked is performing at Lake Country's Creekside Theatre Feb. 17, 2022.

Image Credit: SUBMITTED/Eric Alper

Bif Naked says there's no topic that's off the table for her songs.

The Platinum-selling Canadian rock star, author, songwriter, manager, producer, human and animal rights activist, Bif Naked is hoping to release her fourth full-length album this year, titled CHAMPION, a name dear to her heart.

Bif Naked, also known as Beth Torbert, is performing an acoustic show at Lake Country’s Creekside Theatre Feb. 17. Tickets are currently sold out but more information can be found on the theatre’s website.

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All artists have been negatively affected by the pandemic with the cancellations of shows and Naked has kept herself busy in the studio these past two years, adding songs to her upcoming album.

“In one way the pandemic has enabled us to work in the studio so that’s been really fantastic in a way but unfortunately we still have to get out there and buy bananas and vegetables to eat, so it’s hard,” she said.

“Records are not a revenue source any longer… so for us the only way to get paid really well and truly to sustain a living is to physically put our bodies on a stage.”

It’s also affected the style of the record.

The single, JIM, a “theatrical sweeping song,” was first released with plans to follow with the second single Broke into Your Car in 2020 but with the social unrest unfolding shortly after JIM's release, Naked put it off until 2021.

“We waited and I’m glad that we did because we wound up writing more material for (the album),” Naked said, adding by the time it’s completed there will be songs inspired by the pandemic.

“They’re thrash metal, man, they’re angry and that’s kind of funny because I find that the older I get, the less I worry about how it will come across,” she said.

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The 50-year-old has had a lengthy music career, releasing her debut album Bif Naked in 1994. She's unafraid to sing about things once considered taboo: rape, divorce, abortion and sexuality.

“We wrote about poop. Like we wrote songs about everything and as I became a solo artist, I was able to find my voice as a young woman experiencing the world in the 90s and dealing with issues like rape, issues like abortion and biracial relationships… It was a different era and at the time, it was scary to sing songs about being sexually assaulted or about pregnancy termination and now I think young artists today, the sky is the limit.”

One of her career’s defining moments helping mould her into who she is today has been the collaborative ones, like singing on a DOA record in the 1990s.

“Those experiences still make me completely humbled… I get tears in my eyes thinking how I proud I was to be asked, like it was so validating for me as a female and a younger artist in those bands, I could have died happy, really.”

There’s always going to be sexism, misogyny and ageism in the industry but artists no longer have to rely on an industry primarily dominated by men, she said.

“Being 50 now, it’s much more fun for us to tell them to fuck off. Whereas when we were younger we were always concerned about the repercussions and the music business for a long time was still kind of run by guys and particularly the rock music industry.”

The internet has served as an equalizer in that respect to Naked.

“I can put a record out the same day as an unknown artist of equal or greater value and we’ll both we heard. There's an equity that was never there when I was a young artist,” she said.

She last visited the Okanagan in 2016 as part of a national tour to showcase her memoir I Bificus and performed prior in the 1990s.

“It’s quite magical and we have a lot of friends there, it’s nice to come back, I’m so excited,” she said.

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