Whatever Zola wants…

I saw Zola Jesus at SXSW – and was immediately fascinated by her extended vocal capabilities meshed with this year’s accessory of choice, heavily reverbed keyboards. Got back and a friend shared some Zola recordings with me, also pretty compelling…including this EP called Tsar Bomba, which I reviewed for Dusted . I began:

“Zola Jesus, known in real life as Nika Roza Danilova, is a striking woman, with pale skin and long glossy black hair, dressed conservatively, almost primly by rock standards, and with a certain chilly reserve about her. She looks every inch the classically trained vocalist that she is – and so it is a bit of a surprise when she begins wailing into the mic, howling and keening above industrial abrasions of synth and drum machine. Like Jarboe in Swans, she floats arias atop a grinding mash of inhuman noise. Like Caberet Voltaire, she and her band perform obscure sonic rituals to mesh spirit and machine. There is, perhaps, a bit more frivolity implied in these dance-ish synth rhythms than No Wave ever allowed, but not much. If pop enters in, as it does sometimes in Danilova’s sweet middle register, it is quickly swamped by tides of distortion.”

More here.

“Dog”

”Odessa”