Ashley Worhol: Dead Bugs, Metal, and Cinema
I needed a wing transplant for my tooth fairy, and that’s how I met Ashley Worhol for the first time in a decade.
We were both vending at the night market at the National Museum of Funeral History in Houston this past summer. I was hawking my horror story collections when I saw an exquisite display of insect taxidermy over by the crematory exhibit called Testament Designs.
Part of my table decoration was a large deer tooth with dragonfly wings grafted to it. The tooth fairy was a lovely conversation starter that helped sell a lot of books, but the wings were in bad shape after a recent move. Figuring an insect taxidermist could restore it, I walked over to inquire what that would cost.
It took a minute to recognize Worhol because when I first wrote about her band (also called Worhol) a decade ago, she was the acme of goth symphonic metal in every picture she took. Tall, with large eyes and the imposing arms of a tennis coach, she has what can only be described as Disney Villainess energy on stage and in her band’s cinematic music videos. At her table full of mounted butterflies, the vibe is more like a soccer mom that could probably hunt down a serial killer. She laughs when I ask why a rising rock star is selling dead bugs.
“The art pays my bills, and it pays for the music,” she says. “Doing all the vendor shows has given me an opportunity to reach out to people that I never would have been able to talk to. I see hundreds, thousands of people a weekend, and anyone who purchases something from me, you know, I always say, ‘Hey, what kind of music do you listen to?’ If someone is drawn to my art, they’ll probably like the tone of the music.”
Worhol is an odd band. Few people start a metal act with their guitar player dad, but it’s not hard to see why Worhol did so. When her father, Larry, stopped by our table, my teenager immediately asked if he was a rock star. Together with Worhol’s fiancé, Craig Malinowski, on bass, Worhol is a potent symphonic metal trio with shades of Evanescnce and Within Temptation.
Their latest EP is The Catalyst, six high energy tracks that are the loudest and angriest of Worhol’s career. “The Real Thing” is a defiant anthem of personal growth after a life of judgment and doubt, while “Fight Fight Fight” is an old school call to arms stand against falsehood and tyranny. Larry’s guitars sound like a bugler’s battle cry as Worhol issues angelic proclamations with her commanding soprano.
There’s nothing wrong with just listening to the record, but the real power in Worhol has always been their visuals. From the moment they hit the Houston scene, they’ve released highly cinematic music videos with intricate plots and costumes. One, their take on the classic hymn “Amazing Grace,” is a twenty-minute short film starring Worhol as a homeless woman seeking shelter in a church.
The music videos are one of the things that Worhol is most proud of. She’s been dividing her time between Houston and Los Angeles as she films videos for songs from Catalyst.
“We love being on set,” she says. “I love creating the vision of, you know, storyboarding, and I visualize every video whenever we write the song, kind of at the same time. The one thing that we do with our videos is there's always a story.”
The video they shot in L.A. over the summer, for “Fight Fight Fight,” involved the band being held and tortured by evil record executives. Worhol has long since parted ways with their original label, Imminence Records, pursuing a career on the band’s own terms. While that does come with less support, it hasn’t hurt their rising acclaim. This shoot has them working with MultiMojo, who did film and lighting for movies like Black Adam and Avatar: The Way of Water.
“Every step we're taking is this, like, another step of achievement,” she says. “So, I feel honestly, like we've already reached a point where I can say that we have made it.”
Worhol is at least busy enough that it took weeks to arrange a small interview and a chance to pick up my tooth fairy. When we finally met up again in a west side Starbucks, she’d expertly attached a small set of black and turquoise wings to the tooth, giving the fairy back her previous majesty with an elegant twist. Then she had to dash off to another video shoot and plan her next vendor appearance with her dead butterflies.
Before we parted ways, I asked her simply what kept her weird dream going.
“For me, it's not so much the fame and fortune, it's more of chasing the dream together,” she says. “In our own way and in our own terms, which I think is a very beautiful thing. My dad had many opportunities to make it in the industry, and when he had me, he kind of had to put everything aside to take care of me and my mom. So, I do everything I can to make sure that we are on the right path. We're moving forward, we're expanding. I will never stop fighting for that.”
