The Rebirth of Alex Little

The Vancouver songwriter speaks about renewal, Springer, and her return to rock and roll.

By Khagan Aslanov

Photos by Megan Magdalena

Published on November 19, 2025

There’s a snippet of old footage in Fights, Camera, Action, the docu-series about the Jerry Springer show, when Springer leans into a camera and, with a knowing, sinister smirk on his face, says: “I ruined the culture.” That moment, along with countless other chilling revelations from his production staff, sets the stage for the inner workings of the sleaziest daytime show of the ’90s—and the cold-blooded, scheming manner in which it displayed the ugliest aspects of family life and human behaviour, all while targeting low-income, vulnerable populations.

All that garishness, and how it feels now decades removed, is the inspiration and driving force behind “Sounds Like a Deal,” the lead single from Alex Little’s new EP Spider in the Sink. The song, a tight three-and-a-half-minute burst of pop-punk, skewers manipulative behaviour over a paradoxically sunlit, upbeat progression. In a way, it’s the perfect overarching closer to an EP that has allowed Little to look inwardly at all the memories, lessons, trauma and triumphs that have led her to this point—her return to making music.

The daughter of a rock and roll drummer (her dad was in The Payolas), Little’s introduction to music came from a very early age, the house inundated with records from all genres and eras, from Sex Pistols and Iggy and the Stooges to Tom Jones (at seven years old, Little’s first concert). Wanting to emulate her father, Little took up drums and played in her school band. It wasn’t long before she indoctrinated herself into the Vancouver underground scene. Though her first stint in a band was as a singer, drums remained her primary instrument, and for some time she played in a string of Van City groups ranging from three-piece punk to the elaborate, orchestral rock that swept over Canada during the indie explosion of the 2000s. At some point in that melee, she even got to play with her father, as their respective bands opened for D.O.A. at the now-defunct Vancouver venue Richards on Richards.

She then went on to become a touring drummer for Vapid, a well-known punk outfit in the city. All the while, she was composing her own songs and uploading them on MySpace. A co-worker at a diner heard them and offered to jam and see where the songs would take them. These sessions would lay the groundwork for her first group as a creative leader and frontwoman: Alex Little and the Suspicious Minds. Surrounded by professional musicians who were well-known on the scene, Little felt an internal inadequacy that proved hard to shake at that stage in her life:

“I always wrote songs, but I remained quite shy, and never wanted to show them to people. I guess I didn’t really think they were that good. I was always really hard on myself,” Little says, remembering a time in her punky youth when she thought pop-inspired writing was something to be embarrassed about.

Though Suspicious Minds recorded, toured and made a name for themselves, the power dynamics and overall output weren’t something that Little envisioned. Despite the fact that the songs they wrote were of her personal experience and composed by her—at least in their skeletal form—Little felt that her creative control was slipping away.

“These songs were about my life. But in the end, it really wasn’t what I wanted for it to be. I just didn’t have the strength to say it. The band were very dominating in some ways, perhaps without realizing it. And I wasn’t confident enough to voice it. Looking back, I’m very proud of it all, and the guys are great. But it wasn’t what I wanted aesthetically,” Little says, weighing the skewed gender dynamics that too often overtake bands with a sole female member.

As Suspicious Minds fizzled out, Little’s life began changing in all sorts of ways. She had a daughter, stepped away from music and was making moves to transition into a simpler, more quotidian working life. Of course, for someone who had restlessly pursued creativity for the bulk of her life, that wasn’t going to last long. With the help of her old label and Adam Sabla, her partner in both life and the arts, Little began putting together and polishing new songs.

“It took two years to record five songs! When you have a kid and a job, finding time is difficult. I would drop my daughter at pre-school, and because I didn’t have time to go across town, would go into an Evo and put a drum track on and sing to it,” Little laughs, remembering how she balanced determination with the practical aspects of life.

Which is how we arrive at Spider in the Sink, an EP that more or less chronicles Little’s journey to now. Cradled in these tightly composed garage-pop songs are detailed accounts of childhood and parenthood, struggling with mental health, coping with abuse, switching lanes in life, finding peace and happiness, and gaining confidence and strength in moving forward. With the loving help of Adam Sabla, Little’s re-emergence is something truly worth witnessing.

For what really amounts to a grizzled veteran of the underground scene, there is no part of Spider in the Sink that sounds jaded or resigned. In fact, what translates while listening to these sparkling, world-weary tunes is how they glow with life—the product of someone still excited to be making things happen.