Zsela

Zsela (ZHAY-la) knows that artistic arrivals take time. The ambitious artist emerges this year with Big For You — a debut album that is raw, vulnerable, and a force to be reckoned with. Produced alongside close collaborators Daniel Aged and Gabe Wax, Zsela's first full-length effort flows between grandiosity and intimacy to build a sonic landscape overflowing with introspection. Big For You is a quantum leap for an artist who has taken giant strides as a performer in the years since her inaugural release — 2020's Ache of Victory, a five-track EP that The New York Times praised as "emotive yet elusive, slow but infused with undulating motion, at once earthy and otherworldly." Dripping with rich textural treatments and amorphous, heart-on-the-sleeve arrangements, Big For You proves Zsela is painting with a wider palette than ever before. “It was important for me to stay open in this process, finding the truth of what the songs want to be,” says Zsela. “That meant breaking them down and building them back up again and again, not being precious and trying to listen.” The negative space of these compositions casts a spotlight on Zsela's voice — a confident presence that anchors the lyrical weight of her compositions. As a full length opening statement, Big For You emphasizes the expansive tension and release of a journey rather than its destination. It is the work of a sonic storyteller who has settled into a groove of her own, unafraid to ask unanswered questions.