For Lady Lazarus, the six years between releases were never about disappearance. They were about survival, recalibration, and learning how to live without constant productivity. After a hiatus, Sacramento-based artist Melissa Ann Sweat, the voice behind Lady Lazarus, returns with a heartfelt single, “Tough Guy,” which is both a reconciliation and a letter to her estranged father. 

“The distance in the years from putting out the last album, I would say there’s a lot that’s happened,” says Sweat in an interview with Culture Cabinet. “It’s kind of hard to get into everything, because it spans.” 

Her last record, 2019’s Impossible Journey of My Soul Tonight, she says, felt like a closing chapter. One she didn’t recognize until after it had already passed.

“My last record, I felt like was a really wonderful culmination. It felt like a very strong distillation of my vision as an artist sonically and visually and also emotionally. I kind of needed to release certain things, and I have often done that through the medium of music.”

After that moment, Sweat made a conscious decision to step away from output and turn inward, and rather than forcing a new album for the sake of making music, taking time to resist the industry’s constant pressure. 

“I just decided to shift my focus,” Sweat says. “I wanted to focus more on my human needs.  There’s just such a push to produce, produce, produce. I have long wanted to be out of needing that.” And now, with a new return, she comes bearing intention rather than urgency. “I wanted to come back from a place of strength, approach it differently. It felt like a sort of next stage of my development, artistically and emotionally. It has a very different feel and sound, but it feels really right.”

That return came through her new single, “Tough Guy,” out now, a song rooted in one of the most difficult and significant relationships in her life. “I wrote the song as a way to reach out to my father, who I was estranged from at the time, very minimal contact, for eight years, which is a long time.”

However, Sweat wanted to approach the song and its intentions with a sense of compassion and heart. Rather than confrontation, the song became an invitation. “It was about breaking down an emotional wall, a way to try to break down that wall. It’s about my father, but it’s also for my father. It’s not against my father.”

At the center of “Tough Guy” is empathy for both its subject and its author. “There’s as much empathy [in the song], trying to understand, what has made you such a tough guy? What in our culture, our value system, our family circumstances? There is very deep empathy, and obviously, love for my father,” Sweat reflects.

While she wanted to remain vulnerable and ensure her side of the story was told, she was careful not to turn pain into accusation, and naturally, time and art began to heal wounds, as writing the song gave way to a natural reconciliation. “There’s nothing sort of intentionally vilifying. This song wasn’t intended to be a political song, it’s intended to be a very personal song.”

“I wrote it with empathy, because I care about my father’s journey as a human being on this earth. I’m a part of that journey. Through the course of writing this song, I’ve reached out to him, and then through that process, we’re actually going to be meeting for the first time in eight years.”

The outcome still feels surreal, and has left her standing in the middle of a healing journey.

“I’m kind of right in the middle of everything. He’s going to come out here and see my home… I’m really excited to get to show him that.”

If it seems like music was a driving force behind Sweat’s ability to turn pain into healing, that’s because it is. For Sweat, music has always been more than art, it’s been a chance at survival.“Music is a healer. Music is a bridge. That is why I started doing music, to fix the stuff inside, get out the hard stuff, express it and process it, alchemize it, and share the grief, the pain.”

Now, she’s learning how to hold strength and vulnerability at the same time.“It’s a struggle to maintain that sense of strength, but not being completely cut off emotionally from each other, from family, from our community at large.”

At the heart of her return, both to music and to family, is gratitude.

“I’m just grateful for it. I love my dad. I’m grateful that he’s open to wanting to reconnect. I’m still kind of trusting that process.