American singer Uniity speaks out against American capitalism

Raven Clark, the woman behind Philadelphia-based hardcore project, Uniity, came up to Edmonton for the 2025 Purple City Music Festival. In breaking out of the wild United States (U.S.), Clark chatted with The Gateway about her beginnings, recent music, and being in Canada.

Growing up in west Philadelphia and raised “by [her] grandma in the hood,” Clark said she had a rough upbringing. “We didn’t have a lot of money. And there’s a lot of unresolved trauma. There was gun violence, poverty, the whole nine yards.”

She got into dance at a young age, and after falling into depression, stopped. She then began playing piano. “I didn’t have any friends, couldn’t talk to my family because the family dynamic was not very good, very abusive. I didn’t know what to do with all the things I wanted to say, so I got into playing piano and writing music,” she said. 

She ended up discovering Lamb of God on comcast as a young kid, and that propelled her into a love for hardcore music. “I’d never heard anything this exhilarating, raw, and wild. I begged my mom and my grandma for a phone because I wanted to explore what I found, but nope. They gave me an Obama phone, a text phone.”

“During that time, I started wanting to learn how to scream,” Clark says 

Clark said she ended up using her mom’s phone late at night and discovered bands like Pierce the Veil and Bring Me the Horizon. “That opened a whole other door to me. Emo shit and scene music and all these different genres. During that time, I started wanting to learn how to scream,” she said. 

While she was really into hardcore, she didn’t feel able to listen to it. “Growing up on the hood, it was always R&B, trap, and hip hop. That was what everyone listened to, and you don’t want to stand out.” 

But she didn’t let that discourage her. “No matter where I go, I’ll kind of be an outcast. So that became my mission. I want to make music for everyone. But, don’t get it twisted, it’s mainly for people that are Black and brown that grew up in circumstances where they couldn’t be themselves. Where they had to fight for what they wanted to do or what they wanted to listen to or how they wanted to dress,” she explained. 

After running away to Cleveland, Ohio at 17, she released her debut full length record, Hives. 

She said that narratively, her music revolves around social issues. “What I’m talking about is finding ways to deal with my own trauma, to unpack and understand it. But I’m also upset at the government and things that are wrong. [In the U.S.] rights are being stripped away. People are dying.”

Clark’s newest song, “Swans”, considers living under capitalism. Clark said “it poses the question: what’s the value of human life under greed and capitalism? People are unable to explore or be themselves or do what they love because they’re so focused on needing to pay rent and other loans. And I think that’s extremely unfair.” 

“People seem actually happy, at least in Edmonton. People can, from what I’ve seen, afford to live in some capacity,” Clark says

She said what inspired the song is her being “22 and just very fed up.” She said the cycle of working to pay for housing she doesn’t own and unhealthy food from corporate markets has her upset, and the song is a direct response. 

“If you’re lower income, you don’t have the money to fucking travel, take time off to go to rehab if your need it. Or, therapy or to even sit in the park and think. And that makes me very angry because people should have that right to do that, to live their lives as they see fit,” she said.

“The most important thing you get is the time that you have here. Once it’s gone, it’s gone,” Clark added.

For what Canadians could do to help Americans with their current situation, Clark said, Americans should be given the opportunity to travel to Canada. “I don’t know the intricacies of how it would work, but [having] more Americans, specifically targeting lower income communities, travel here [to Canada].” 

She added that a big thing growing up was the belief that her situation was all there was to the world. She said that since coming to Canada, she’s called her family to show them the clean air. And, said that while going out at night, no one bothered her. “People seem actually happy, at least in Edmonton. People can, from what I’ve seen, afford to live in some capacity. [And], the water is clean,” Clark said. 

Clark played in the Freemason’s Hall for Purple City Music Festival. Her latest release, ”Swans”, was released on September 2.