Fire Arrow Records

Sutera “Sooty” Melati has built an entire persona around one very useful assumption:

people are easier to control when they underestimate you.

Malaysian-born, petite at 5'2", and almost always impeccably composed, Sooty does not look like the loudest or most aggressive person in a room. She rarely needs to be. Her strength comes from patience, observation, and an ability to understand what people want before they realize she has been studying them.

That is why the taipan became such a natural symbol for her.

Sooty does not imagine danger as something that has to announce itself. A taipan does not need theatrics. It waits. It conserves energy. It acts when the moment is right. That philosophy runs through her music, her visual identity, and increasingly, the way she navigates life inside Red Rascal Records.

Her songs often work the same way. They can arrive wrapped in silk, warmth, sensuality, and polished production while something much sharper sits underneath. Sooty is comfortable sounding inviting without being innocent, vulnerable without actually surrendering control, and romantic without ever making herself easy to read.

Visually, she moves between two closely related worlds. The first is serpentine: black, burgundy, deep green, satin, smoke, firelight, and long controlled lines. The second draws from the electric eel, replacing quiet venom with stored voltage—electric teal, liquid surfaces, gold current-like details, and the feeling that something beautiful is carrying far more energy than it appears to be.

Both are Sooty.

One waits.

The other discharges.

Inside Red Rascal Records, that patience matters.

Jonny Rochester may have founded the label, but Sooty pays close attention to who actually holds influence inside it, who wants more, and who could become a problem later. She does not need to challenge people openly when positioning can accomplish the same thing more cleanly.

That puts her in an especially complicated relationship with Goldi Brun. Goldi is ambitious, intelligent, and powerful enough to become a genuine obstacle. Sooty recognizes that immediately. Whatever exists between them is bigger than ordinary rivalry; they are two women who understand strategy well enough to recognize another strategist across the room.

Scarlette Pearse presents a different problem. Scarlette is not easily intimidated, manipulated, or pushed anywhere she does not want to go, and Sooty knows better than to treat her casually.

Sooty’s preferred solution to problems like these is rarely open warfare.

If somebody can be persuaded to leave the board voluntarily, there is no need to knock the piece over.

Her relationship with Shimmer O’Shea reveals another side of her. Sooty genuinely likes Shimmer, in part because Shimmer has little interest in Red Rascal’s internal struggle for control. She is there to make music, not build an empire. That makes her unusually easy for Sooty to trust—and perhaps one of the few people around her who is not immediately evaluated as either an ally or a threat.

Their collaboration on “Corkscrew” also demonstrates what Sooty does especially well musically: step into somebody else’s world without disappearing inside it. Malaysian electropop and Shimmer’s country instincts should not fit neatly together, yet the tension between them is exactly what makes the pairing work.

For all her calculation, Sooty is not simply cold.

She can be funny, affectionate, generous, sensual, and genuinely supportive. The mistake is assuming those qualities cancel out the dangerous ones.

They do not.

Sutera Melati can smile at you, pour the drink, listen carefully to everything you say, and make you feel completely at ease.

By the time you realize she was paying attention for a reason, she may already have what she wanted.