Stridulum II

VINYL FORMAT. Import! Zola Jesus is the endeavor of a solitary girl named Nika Roza Danilova to simultaneously combat and invoke the approaching apocalypse using the only weapon/offering she has; her voice. After a decade of opera study and a musical awakening involving such varied inspiration as Billboard bubblegum, classical arias, no-wave, and avant industrial, she was able to thread her influences into a sound uniquely her own. Born and raised in the countryside Wisconsin, Nika Roza was literally raised by wolves (well proximally anyways). Beginning her musical output at the age of sixteen, she released: two 7"s, an EP, a live recording from WNYU, and a split with neighboring Madison head-trip Burial Hex; on Sacred Bones, Troubleman, Die Stasi, and Aurora Borealis, respectively. It was her debut full length for Sacred Bones last summer, however, which suddenly grew Zola Jesus' profile exponentially. Her latest EP Stridulum is a huge leap forward in terms of fidelity and accessibility. Recording her vocals for the first time with professional equipment, Nika's voice is brought to the powerful forefront of the mix unleashing the full range of emotions that had only been hinted at in her previous work. No longer just the doomsday soothsayer, Nika refines her soulful psalms creating pop songs that are as equally nurturing as they are foreboding. We are delighted for Nika to finally have a proper European release on Souterrain Transmissions. Stridulum II is a full length and contains three tracks ("Tower," "Sea Talk" and "Lightsick") that thematically expound on the EP.