When was the first time you saw a Black woman fronting a rock, punk, or any type of alternative band? For the vast majority of people, that concept in itself is an anomaly – but for the true punk-heads, names like Skin, Poly Styrene, Stephanie Phillips, Tamar-kali, or maybe Fefe Dobson may come to mind. However, for many Gen-Z aged punk fans, Edith Victoria of Meet Me @ the Altar is one of the first unapologetically Black, feminine representations in the scene they’ve ever witnessed.
Meet Me @ the Altar is made up of Edith Victoria and Ada Juarez; the dynamic duo challenging the idea that women of color making alternative music is an anomaly. Around 2020, hundreds of thousands of people on social media – including Alex Gaskgarth, Dan Campbell, and Halsey – watched as Meet Me @ The Altar’s electric single, “Garden” went viral. At the time, they had just been signed to historic label Fueled By Ramen, and were the only all women, all POC pop-punk band that people had ever seen; including me.
From parting ways with former members and their former label, Victoria and Juarez have gone through major changes in the last year and are ready to release all of that emotion. Now completely independent, MM@TA is embarking on a new journey in real time as they head off to tour their newest project Worried Sick. The new EP returns to the band’s earliest roots; a heavier sound and complete unfiltered expression of self.
RVA Magazine was able to sit down with Meet Me @ The Altar at the first stop of the Worried Sick Tour, to discuss the band’s new music, pop-punk inspirations, and overall mental health during this new chapter.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
In general, how has 2026 been for y’all so far?
Edith: A little rough, but we’re getting our bearings. I feel like people often talk about how your 20’s are just like lessons, and I haven’t experienced that type of true lesson learning until like a year or two ago. I’m still learning a lot of lessons. They never end, they never stop coming. I’m 25 now, but maybe 23 and a half is when I really felt it. But yeah, 2026 so far has been pretty up and down. Just trying to get used to a new normal.
Ada: Yeah, we have had some similar experiences – me and Edith. But I do think it’s hopeful. It’s not going to be like this forever. We’re still just getting it together. And once we do, hopefully it’s just going to be flying high from then on.
Edith: 2026 is like the very start of this new chapter for us as a band. We released our EP top of the year, and that was really nice because it felt like we were finally moving forward. This whole process has been very long, so when we were able to release some new music it was like, “Thank God!”
How was it finding out you’re playing Warped Tour this year? Did you go when you were younger?
Edith: Oh my gosh – so we actually got the offer to play for the first time last year, but we just weren’t in the right place mentally. We were very unhappy mentally, and that was at the peak of our unhappiness as a band, I think. So it just wasn’t the right time. But we’ve always wanted to play so we’re so excited to be going this year! I grew up going, my mom would drive me with all my friends. She’d stand in the parent tent; the hot ass parent tent.
Ada: Shout out the parent tent.
Edith: Warped Tour is a big part of me finding the scene when I was like 14. I’ve gone to so many.
Where are y’all from? Where did you grow up?
Edith: I’m from Georgia. I grew up there, I still live there.
Ada: And I’m from New Jersey. I live in Florida, but I hate Florida. So I just like to say New Jersey.
Who was the first woman of color, or honestly first woman in general, that you saw in the scene growing up?
Ada: I mean the easiest answer that came to mind was Hayley Williams obviously. And we can even go as far as to say Gwen Stefani with No Doubt. And we can go even farther to say Demi Lovato, you know like the Disney stars.
Edith: Yeah, and also Lacey from Flyleaf, Amy Lee from Evanescence. But specifically women of color? There was really no one.
Ada: There was obviously Fefe Dobson, but she was Canadian. And they [her label] did not push her enough..
Edith: Yeah, I didn’t know much about Fefe Dobson at the time.
Growing up I didn’t either, but I just recently learned that Miley Cyrus’ “Start All Over” was written by her.
Edith: Yes! I saw that interview. I hope she’s compensated for it now, but at the time they just dropped her, took her song, and gave it to someone else. Like that is crazy! I would have loved to know who she was when I was younger.
So talking about the new EP, Worried Sick – when did you start working on it and what was the process like to finish it?
Ada: If we’re including the deluxe songs, it was immediately after tour; literally January 2025. We got off of the State Champs tour and a ton of stuff happened. So, as soon as we got off that tour, Edith and I just hit the gas. We went into the studio for “Hurts Like Hell” and “Live Without” in February of 2025. And then the rest of the EP, we started I think, what was it, March or April? We wanted to release it in March and stuff kept happening, and then it didn’t get to be released until 2026.
Edith: The release process obviously took longer because we needed to find a new label, like a distributor and stuff. We could have released it sooner if we had other things in line at the time. We had to shop at different labels and find the right fit for us. But yeah, that was January through April.
The EP has a lot of emotion you’re working through. In a lot of the lyrics, you get into expressing a lot hatred and anger, but also trying to not feel shame towards those feelings. How was the writing process for these songs compared to in the past?
Edith: I think in the past I was really choosy with the words I used, and the emotions I let people know I was feeling. I think it’s also just like growing up and experiencing heavy emotions. I wouldn’t say that I was really in tune with my emotions in my early 20s, or really much of my life, until I got older. And then I was like, I don’t know what to do with all of these feelings. I was feeling everything at once and I haven’t really experienced that yet. But I think life experiences give your music substance, so I was really trying not to get in my own way of what I was saying. What also helped is that Ada and I are going through this change together. And so I didn’t have to check if I should write a song about this because I knew that she was feeling the exact same way as I’m feeling. So that gave me even more freedom to just say whatever.
Ada: I would say it was absolutely different. Way more emotions. Way more asking, “Is this okay?” There were a lot of little lyrics that you [Edith] would write – you would send the demos to me – and you would be like, “This is really real, but is this too much?” And sometimes yes it was a lot, but it needed to be said. It’s like a diary for you, I would argue. I don’t see why that’s a bad thing to just let your emotions out; even if they are a little harsh. And a lot of people feel that way too.
Edith: Yeah, I think people just don’t like to admit it.
I totally agree. I also really love the album art! Who’s the artist?
Edith: Oh my gosh. So I have to go back a little bit here – at the beginning of our band, a tool we use so much is Fiverr. It’s this app where you can find different creatives; it’s basically like a dating app for finding any type of artist. There’s painters and podcasters and voiceover people. Like, for one of our intros we hired a voiceover guy to do it. Fiverr is an amazing place to go as a starting artist to just find other creatives. So I was like, I can just use Fiverr again. We found this guy who’s Italian and does lots of art. His name is Zankay. He’s really cool.
Ada: He nailed it too. We gave him so many different things like, she had to be black, she had to have that type of hair. As soon as we saw it, we were like, “No, this is the one that we need!”
Edith: The goal of this EP was just to be as in your face as possible, and I was like let’s just make her be puking. That’s like really punk.
Ada: And that’s exactly how it feels to be worried sick.
So with the things you’ve experienced recently with your former label, has that changed your attitude towards releasing music or working with other labels in the future?
Edith: I think this goes back to learning a lot of lessons. It’s really easy for a bigger label to sway a more impressionable younger artist. I don’t think there’s necessarily always ill will towards it, but they don’t think about what’s best for the artist. They tend to think about what’s best for the business, and that is important too. ButI feel like it’s really easy to lose your sense of self when you have people who should know what the best decision is steering you. At the end of the day, we learned that the only person that knows you as an artist is you. And I also learned to never ever ignore my gut, and my gut feelings. Usually my gut never steers me wrong, and during that era, I was kind of ignoring it.
Now I’m not scared of going anywhere because having that lesson was so valuable. And if another big label comes knocking, we won’t do the same thing because we have that lesson learned. So there’s definitely regrets there, but I think it’s definitely for the best.
Ada: Yeah, we learned a lot. We learned what we needed to learn to know what to avoid in the future. Also at the end of the day, we 100% learned that it’s just us. Like no matter what, at the end of the day it’s literally just us two; no manager, nobody else, just us. What really matters is how we feel about what we’re doing.
What are you most looking forward to for the rest of the tour?
Ada: I’m really excited to just go to these places you know, Richmond, and like Chicago – that’s gonna be so much fun. I’m honestly just excited for the shows.
Edith: The shows definitely feel different than what we were doing before, yeah. I think this tour is really healing for us because we’re in this space where we were most comfortable similarly to when we first started. So it all feels really familiar. We’re playing as a four piece again, and everything that we are doing now is what we used to do. It’s very healing to connect with the older version of us, because that’s when we were really enjoying what we were doing. There’s a lot of parallels with that; it’s like smaller venues, it’s like a heavier setlist.
Ada: A lot more things land on our laps now too, instead of on a manager. Which is nice because it’s literally our sweat and blood is in this tour.
So what song from Worried Sick are you most excited to perform tonight?
Ada: My answer is always “Heaven’s Sake” because that is my favorite song on the EP. It’s just so fun. It kicks my ass a little bit as well. But who doesn’t love a little ass kicking.
Edith: I really like “Dead to Me” because we open with it. It’s exciting as an opener because it’s so heavy.
Ada: I love when that break kicks in. Once that breakdown happens, it just feels really satisfying. And it’s still the first song!
If you have to put either “Dead To Me” or “Heaven’s Sake” on a mini set or playlist with two to three other songs that have similar meaning to you, what songs would you choose? Any artist.
Ada: With “Heaven’s Sake,” what comes to mind immediately is that No Doubt song that “Heaven’s Sake” is loosely inspired by; “Ex-Girlfriend.”
Edith: For “Dead to Me”, I would put it on a playlist with any type of “The Story So Far” or like “Real Friends” because I was like singing to these 2013, pure pop-punk albums and I’m like, “Dang this is like really angry.” It’s all low-key misogynistic, but ignoring that part, the anger that they are exuding with the lyrics reminds me of “Dead to Me” a tad. Like “Old and All Alone” – when it’s like, “When you grow up I hope that you end up old and all alone.” Yeah, that’s a really really good one. And then there’s also I think it’s called “Get By.” They sing, “You’ll get by, while I’ll get better.”
Photo by Efua Osei
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