“This is where we fight. This is where we express ourselves”: Cage Fight's Rachel Aspe is ready to rumble

“I have this personality where if I want to do something, I will just do it,” says Rachel Aspe.

Even chatting calmly as she cradles her rescued chihuahua Lucky, there’s no doubting the Cage Fight vocalist. It’s what’s drawn her to London from her native France, what pushes her forward, what’s made her one of metal’s rising stars.

“I’m not thinking about the consequences of what I’m doing, or if I look ridiculous,” she says. “This is why I moved to the UK. I took my stuff and I left. When I’m onstage, I forget everything else, especially when I scream. When I’m onstage it’s who I really am.”

It was five years after her initial move, right in the middle of the COVID pandemic that she found Cage Fight, a haven for the kind of artist she wanted to be.

The quartet – these days completed by guitarist James Monteith, bassist Will Horsman and drummer Nick Plews – quite literally see this band as a space where they come to duke it out with the stuff that plagues their minds. It’s shit that riles them up, swirling around in a whipping hurricane of pressure and electricity, as you’ll find on their second record, Exuvia.

It feels like an entirely separate entity compared to their 2022 self-titled debut. For one, Rachel has written the lyrics for the first time. It’s all rather apt, given that the album’s name alludes to the reptilian act of shedding a skin and emerging anew.

“The first album was made with another bass player and he was writing the lyrics,” she explains. “When I got into the band, I was still a bit shy with my English. I was feeling very exposed, so I never wrote lyrics back then.”

In 2026, it’s very different.

“Cage Fight is where we fight,” she asserts. “This is where we express ourselves. We’ve really found ourselves as a band.”

Before finding her footing in the ring, Rachel’s life as a young girl in France was a far cry from the world she now inhabits. As someone who still has a gentle manner offstage, Rachel still doesn’t know where her hunger to unlock the beast actually came from, but her singing career started in her teenage bedroom with the company of a CD player.

“I felt like I really needed to do it, I don’t know why. I was very, very shy, but I just threw myself in,” she says, laughing as she remembers the terror she imposed on her sibling for practising those feral growls.

“I have a little sister and she hated me. She was like, ‘You’re crazy! It’s horrible. What is this?’ I had a CD player and I [would kneel by it] every night after school, screaming into it. My neighbour hated me, too. She was knocking [on the walls] with her broom, but I did it anyway. I didn’t care!”

It’s been over a decade since a young Rachel went viral for her performance on France’s Got Talent. The show, known as La France A Un Incroyable Talent in her home country, presented a completely different version of the Rachel we see today. Now a tattooist, almost entirely covered with incredibly intricate ink, and sporting flaming auburn hair, she once stood before the judges in a business-casual dress, with her natural brunette do in ringlets. Then she absolutely tore into Sybreed’s Emma-0. It was the springboard that catapulted her even further into metal.

“I had a few small bands and then did France’s Got Talent because I wanted to be active in music and I didn’t know how, and it worked!” she says. “I’ve always been very driven to screams. Even when a song hasn’t got screams in it, I hear it with screams.”

Rachel joined French metal force ETHS in 2013 following her audition, and after they split in 2016 she moved to the UK for a fresh start. No mean feat, there were failed bands, cover projects, and, as she puts it bluntly, some absolute “disasters”.

Rachel’s passion has found a home like no other in Cage Fight. She already knew James prior to joining, and as she explains with a grin, knew that he was “a sane person”. Putting her faith in the guitarist after some rocky experiences with integrating into other groups, once they exchanged messages and demos, Rachel was instantly inspired.

“They were very welcoming, no judgement,” she smiles. “I’d never dealt with people so nice before.”

On Exuvia, Rachel’s lyrics show a comfort in expressing herself. Pulled from the pages of her private journals, the themes she explores are incredibly personal: sexual harassment, trauma, grief. She even co-wrote the title-track with her grandmother, who is battling cancer.

“We’ve always been very close,” she shares. “She always liked my music, and she was going through radiotherapy.”

Noticing her grandmother’s sadness, Rachel asked if she would want to put her feelings into music with her, and they crafted it while in a hospital waiting room.

“You can hear hospital sounds in the song, because I recorded her. She was emotional when she heard it, but very proud.”

At the other end of the emotional spectrum is IHYG (I Hate Your Guts), where rage and utter disgust for another is shown plain as day. It suggests that we don’t have to forgive people, and that sometimes, they can just be real pieces of shit that you don’t have to stand with anymore.

“It all started with a traumatic experience,” Rachel explains. “I told James, because I’m very close to James and I tell him everything, and he was like, ‘Yeah, you should try to write about it, to put it in order.’ At some point I spit out this big thing.

“In my experience, you can give second chances, but most of them just go back to what they were. It’s really rare, sadly, that they change. I think life is too short and I don’t have the time to deal with them! I’m going to look for someone else and just forget them. I felt like I needed to write about it because this is my story, and I’m happy for you to know what I think about you. I’m not going to change my mind.”

Speaking of letting others know what you really think of them, one of Exuvia’s stellar, standout tracks is Pig. Opening with real squeals recorded by Rachel on a trip to a farm, it’s a response to creepy men who send her disgusting messages and unsolicited sexual images online. Its video, meanwhile, features real comments that Rachel has received on social media.

“Literally just yesterday I got a message even worse than the others,” she sighs. “The magazines and websites that have shared the song have got a lot of comments. Most of them are bad comments from offended men, but there are also a lot of girls that come to me and say, ‘Thank you for saying something.’

“Sadly, I’m used to it, and I feel like someone has to not be scared and show everyone how it is. I have a lot of good men sending very nice messages as well, but it doesn’t change.”

This predatory behaviour doesn’t just exist online, either.

“I’ve had people touching my shoes when I’m onstage,” Rachel says. “One guy was caressing my shoe one day and I kicked him. At the end – and this is the worst – he came to the merch and said, ‘Thank you.’ He liked it!”

Between the ugly weeds of Rachel’s DMs are more heartfelt messages, however. Cage Fight’s profile is rising exponentially. As they become contenders, the number of fans in their corner is mushrooming far faster and bigger than anticipated.

“I don’t think it’s sunk in yet, because I’m just doing my thing and I’m so focused,” she says. “I’m a very anxious person, so I try to be the best I can. When I go to a gig and I see a lot of our T-shirts, or I have a lot of messages, it’s incredible. I cried the other day! I can’t even reply to everyone. I just want to say thank you so much to everyone for their support!”

This summer, you’ll find Cage Fight at multiple fests, including a bucketlist set at France’s Motocultor and the likes of Radar and Beastfest in the UK. Wherever they’re heading, though, they have one simple request: phones away.

“For Pick Your Fighter I go in the crowd and I grab people to dance with me, but everyone is just filming. So please, dance with me!”

A way from stage and studio, Rachel is someone who’s always on the go. She practically never sits still and “can’t stand doing nothing”.

She’s a tattooist who specialises in abstract brushstroke work, a career she says is “the best
job ever” for musicians, and one that’s closely linked with the music world. Many of her clients are fans of Cage Fight. She also loves going to the gym, does pilates two-to-three times a week, and even does aerial hoop.

“Well, I’m trying but I’m shit at it,” she confesses with a laugh. “I’m doing my best!”

Another big love in her life is, of course, today’s furry interview companion. “I cycle with Lucky in a basket, he loves it,” she smiles.

Rachel hopes to bring him on tour in the future, should there be suitable and safe conditions for him to travel in. He’s already been along to one show Cage Fight did with Soulfly… though he did get stuck into the rider.

“He stayed backstage on the couch with a bit of chicken,” Rachel beams.

While we put a case forward for Lucky to have his own dressing room, Cage Fight are stepping up for their second round. The gloves are off, they’re coming out swinging and there’s so much more fight that Rachel has in her.

“I have so many things to say,” she promises. Ding, ding.

Exuvia is out now via Spinefarm. Catch Cage Fight at Radar Festival this weekend.

Read this next:

• Album review: Cage Fight – Exuvia
• 5 reasons why you need to check out Cage Fight
  
• “People are seeking a sense of belonging, a sense of connection, a feeling of authenticity and real emotion”: Inside the resurgence of hardcore