“I don’t believe that not giving up will guarantee success. But I do believe that giving up guarantees silence.” — Sami Chohfi
Music Authentic covered Sami Chohfi in May 2022 under the title “What has Happened to Sami Chohfi?” Four years later, the short answer is that the first song he ever wrote — recorded in 2011, before there was a career — ended up in a Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson film. The longer answer is his own, and we are publishing it here.
Sami sent Music Authentic the piece below after “Suicide on Sale,” originally performed by his Seattle band Blue Helix and released on the Coda EP, was placed in the Amazon MGM film Mercy (2026). The song appears at the thirty-eight-minute mark, scored under a scene about alcoholism and emotional decay.
On his Apple Music profile, recorded before the placement happened, Sami listed three remaining ambitions: play Rock in Rio, play Lollapalooza, and get a song on a major motion picture soundtrack. The third one arrived — carried by the first song he ever wrote.
Here is what he wrote about it.
Some Songs Take Years to Find Their Moment
By Singer-Songwriter Sami Chohfi
“I wrote the song ‘Suicide on Sale’ in 2011.
It was the first song I ever wrote, and it was also the first song I ever performed live. I didn’t have a plan or really know what I was doing yet, and I had no idea where it would lead. The only thing that was certain was that it felt honest.
Like many first songs, it wasn’t written with strategy in mind. It wasn’t created for radio, playlists, or film. It was written because I needed to say something out loud.
For years, that song followed me quietly.
I kept writing, touring, releasing music, and booking my own shows wherever I could. Brazil became a second home to me, a place I’ve returned to again and again over the years. Sometimes I toured with a full band that I hired locally, sometimes alone with an acoustic guitar and everything I owned on my back. I’ve played shows in India, Cambodia, the Philippines, Singapore, Costa Rica, Mexico, and many other places, often without a team, without guarantees, just believing that showing up mattered.
There were nights when the rooms were empty, and nights when they weren’t. Nights when the connection was immediate, and nights when it had to be earned. But the music was always the point.
‘Suicide on Sale’ stayed with me through all of it.
Years later, more than a decade after it was written, that same song found its way into the film Mercy (Justiça Artificial in Brazil). Not as a theme song. Not as a big spotlight moment. Just a brief, restrained placement, subtle and emotional.
And somehow, that felt exactly right.
The song wasn’t chosen because it was new or trending, but because it had already lived.
That moment didn’t feel like a breakthrough. It felt like recognition, unexpected and grounding.
I remember sitting in the theater for the first time hearing my song and feeling my body react before my mind did. It almost didn’t feel real. Then it landed, the way things do when they arrive exactly when they’re supposed to.
As independent artists, we’re often taught to think in short windows: release cycles, algorithms, immediate reactions. If something doesn’t hit quickly, we assume it failed.
But art doesn’t always move on our timeline.
Some songs need years of life behind them before they know where they belong. Some only make sense after they’ve been carried through different countries, different rooms, and different versions of the person who wrote them.
I don’t believe that not giving up will guarantee success. But I do believe that giving up guarantees silence.
What I’ve learned through touring, songwriting, failures, and successes is that honesty and real connection have a long lifespan, much longer than trends.
‘Suicide on Sale’ taught me that.
It taught me that the work you do when no one is watching still counts. That songs can outlive the version of you that wrote them. And that sometimes the moment you were waiting for doesn’t arrive loudly. It arrives quietly, and exactly when it needs to.
Your work is not expired.
Your time is not wasted.
And the song you wrote years ago might still be waiting for its place.
As part of that unexpected journey, ‘Suicide on Sale’ also gained a visual chapter through an artistic music video, created not to explain the song, but to sit with it. For those who feel curious to go deeper.”
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🎬 Hearing the song in the film for the first time
Follow and listen to Sami Chohfi
Website: samichohfimusic.com Spotify: Sami Chohfi on Spotify Apple Music: Sami Chohfi on Apple Music YouTube: Sami Chohfi on YouTube Blue Helix: bluehelixmusic.com