The album, whose name derives from the Russian word for “shackles,” is the moment where Danilova was finally, as she put it in an interview, “getting to the point where I am fluent in all of these things, and I can finally use music as a means to communicate what I want to communicate.” Few songs reflect that as well as “Soak,” which marries a trip-hop-inspired beat with string arrangements that are as gorgeous as they are imposing and ominous with lyrical imagery of a woman choosing to drown in the river, rather than face another, more horrifying fate at the hands of an assailant. Tasked with picking a list of 10 killer Zola Jesus tracks, you could easily just choose the entire tracklist of her 2017 album Okovi. I didn’t quite know what to make of this track on my very first listen, but before I knew it, it had become one of my favorite tracks she’s done to date, as the hooky pop appeal of this track is not coming at the expense of her signature gloomy atmosphere. The word “funky” is one that would have never crossed my mind to describe her music at any point previously, but this song’s groovy bassline somehow fits perfectly into the Zola Jesus universe. Taiga doesn’t feel like an outright misstep as much as it feels like an artist tying her own hands behind her back in an attempt to assimilate into what pop music is “supposed” to sound like-which is what makes the self-assured confidence of “The Fall,” from her new album Arkhon, feel so liberating. Her decision to sign with Mute in 2014 to release her attempt at a full-on pop record, Taiga, was met with a mixed critical reception, with some saying that the attempt to streamline and brighten her sound had sanitized the appeal of her music.
Zola Jesus’s relationship with pop music and how she fits into that landscape has always been complicated. Arkhon proves that, more than 10 years into her career, Zola Jesus is still just getting started, and thus it feels like the perfect time to look back and rank the best songs from her impressive discography. It wasn’t easy for Danilova to give over partial control of her songwriting initially, but a particularly bad spell of writer’s block forced her to step outside her comfort zone and try something new, and the people she picked couldn’t have been a better fit for her sound, demonstrating the heights she can reach with the right collaborators. While Danilova has served as the sole auteur of her work as Zola Jesus for most of her career, for the first time, this new album is a true collaboration with two other musicians: producer Randall Dunn (known for his work with Sunn O))) and on Jóhann Jóhannsson’s score for the film Mandy) and drummer Matt Chamberlain (a session musician who has played for David Bowie, Fiona Apple, Tori Amos and many, many more). Last week, the newest Zola Jesus album Arkhon arrived via her primary label home Sacred Bones Records, and it simultaneously picks up right where Okovi left off and serves as a significant turning of the page into a new chapter in her career. Despite this tweener status that plagued her career for many years-too pop for some experimental music purists and too weird for the world of more corporatized pop music-her 2017 album Okovi was validation for true Zola Jesus believers, a project that unites the many different styles her fans expect into one incredibly satisfying album experience.
ZOLA JESUS VESSEL MEANING HOW TO
At the same time, she clearly has always known how to write a knockout pop song, and for years after her breakthrough Stridulum EP, listeners like myself kept waiting for a mainstream crossover moment for Zola Jesus that never quite arrived.
Her music combines an classical, operatic approach to vocals with foreboding, yet entracing electronic-tinged instrumentals it pulls from genres including darkwave, neoclassical, industrial and techno, as well as historical and cultural music traditions like Gregorian chants, in an attempt to bridge the gap between music’s experimental future and its elemental past.
Nika Danilova, who releases music under the pseudonym Zola Jesus, is paradoxically one of the most acclaimed artists in her field and also wildly under-appreciated by an industry that prioritizes artists who fit neatly into established archetypes they can easily market.
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