“I’ve been sitting on a lot of this music for a while and have been tinkering with the songs a lot. The title is a reminder to me exactly that: it is what it is,” says genre-jumping Miami-based indie artist Julia Bhatt when asked about her debut album [out independently on July 20, 2022]. “The album title is a little homage to one of my favorite ever albums, Is This It by the Strokes. I had a HUGE Strokes phase that never went away.” The first official single off the album, the jangly indie pop “Cotton Candy,” is out today and Bhatt says the track is “a love song of sorts, not necessarily about someone, but more of a feeling that can come from someone. It’s about feeling safe being on the edge and comfortable in foreign places… kind of like a rollercoaster. You put your trust in the thrill, sorta.”
From September 2019 to early March 2020, Julia was in a whirlwind of life-changes: she released her first three singles (“Tall,” “Marco” and “I’m Cool“), turned eighteen and graduated high school. Just as she was really getting started with the announcement of her first ever tour however, the pandemic brought everything to a standstill. Holed up in Miami and states away from her mentor and producer Elliot Jacobson (Ingrid Michaelson, Elle King, Vérité) in New York City, she started to write songs on software, Ableton Live, rather than on the guitar – a whole new creative experience for her. Proving that while the world was in quarantine, she could not be contained. In a creative burst of energy, she’s released the singles “Miami” and “Bird Girl” as well as her debut EP 2 steps back since March 2020. The first music to come from this new approach to making music were her 2021 singles “1:30” and “Hair Salon Vibes” both of which will be included on the debut album alongside an earlier recording of “Miami.”
An ear-opening concoction that defies categorization, Bhatt’s music is such a fresh showcase of her gen-Z genre-fluid talent (she just turned 20 in January). As far as how she’d describe her musical style, she says, “I like so many different genres of music and try to incorporate them into different songs, so I don’t really know what to call myself,” she says with a sly smile. “I suppose my music is a little more pop-y than my favorite music but hey, I got a knack for hooks.”
When discussing the themes on the album, Bhatt says swiftly, “I’m not sure if there are main themes just because each song is so different. Maybe, like, depression and how to work through it?” For instance, on it is what it is, she wrote the punchy upbeat keyboard driven tune “Fighting Type” about the anxieties and stress of having to use social media as a marketing tool. “I have to promote shit all the time on TikTok and Instagram and I have to watch numbers rise and fall and it’s just brutal,” she says of the effect social media has on her. “Unfortunately, that’s the music industry now so I have to adapt.” The synth driven indie-folk track “Confetti” shifts perspective from the internal to the external. “I can get completely consumed by little things, things that might not matter to anyone else and I lose sight of the bigger picture. I think a lot of people can relate to that. There’s always a rational voice in the back of my head telling me to chill out and slow down, but it gets buried very easily. I wrote this as that voice.” While she says that the airy folk-pop “On My Shoulder” was a very fun song for her to do as it depicts two halves that constantly battle about what could have been, “One [half] is ambitious and strict, while the other is carefree and relaxed. I think a lot of people usually settle into one side or the other at different points in their lives, but they never really stop questioning each other. At least, I don’t think they should,” she says. “All that deep shit is translated into a digestible story that could be nothing more than a silly little song.”
Since Bhatt took her time creating this album, she was able to mine her catalog of songs from “newer songs, older songs, and even older songs.” The fresh and carefree indie-pop “Karma” is one of the oldest songs, written around the same time as “Miami” when she was sixteen. Meanwhile, the synthy/slinky R&B “Sweetheart” was the last track Bhatt and Jacobson added to the album, “Elliot sent over the track, very similar to how it is now, and I ignored it for a little. Then I got stuck at an airport in NY for like five hours and decided, ‘Well. Might as well work on something.’ I guess the lyrics just came from being tired and traveling alone for a bit.
With this release Bhatt’s hoping the album will provide her with “direction and reassurance. “[There’s] definitely [been] a lot of progression since that first single. I’m not sure how I’m feeling. I wanted to take my time in making/releasing my first album rather than trying to push stuff out, but now I wonder if I’ve taken too long,” she worries. “I don’t like to sit with my songs for too long or else I start to hate them. I’m hoping the album release will help me fall back in love with some of these songs. I know they’re good, but I tend to find flaws pretty easily.”
Julia Bhatt‘s debut album it is what it is will be released independently on July 20, 2022. “Cotton Candy” is out today, March 16, 2022. She is currently available for interviews.
