You know how much I love finding new artists at the start of their road. Zandi Holup was a social media sensation before signing with Big Loud. They describe Zandi's singular eccentricity which is lovely but doesn't capture the creature fully.
Zandi Holup's allure is I think born of a contradiction. She has been posting recently about how Go Find Less has been perceived by many as an anti-man song. I did not see that even for a second. It's not only a song about romantic attachment either. It could apply to any friendship whether at work or at home. There are always the moaners, the neg heads, who are low on self confidence and instead of trying to work on that, they suck you down to their level. That is what Go Find Less says to me.
PAUL DETTMANN
The contradiction is that Zandi looks like butter wouldn't melt but many of her songs have an explicit language warning, as do her reels, and the middle finger pops out every so often. She's giving wholesome country girl until the moment she begins to sing. The music is light and ethereal but her voice, and the lyrics and the language never are. This must be a compelling mix in her live performances, where she is just as likely to be supporting Steve Earle as headlining in her own right. I think she's a star in the making, and I cannot wait for her first album, Wildflower, to come out. Didn't someone else do one of those? Give or take a letter, Tom Petty did a Wildflowers in 1994 and there are occasional similarities.
Many people I know are revisiting Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way this summer and with good reason. It is a book for when times are hard. Julia talks frequently about the malign influence of others around you. The artists who are blocked are never content to be blocked alone. They seek out other artists to drag down. Watch out.
And don't think for a minute that all of that negativity exists in others. Even the most positive, the most confident artist will always try to drag themselves down too. It reminds me of the sentiment in Zoee's recent song, I Could Complain. Even if you are a positive soul, complaining is addictive. As humans we are addicted to fear and darkness and negativity. It is to do with Darwinian survival theory. We are always on the look out for danger before anything else, before love, before humour, before food. Danger is life-threatening. Darkness is addictive.
Dirty Wings follows Mountain Man and is the one before Go Find Less. Don't ask me why I'm writing these in reverse order. It just happened that Go Find Less caught my ear first. The way she sometimes holds onto the fffff in Find, reluctant to let it go, makes me expect her to sing Go Fuck Yourself and that is more or less the attitude she brings to Dirty Wings too. She’s angry. Very angry. But very sad also.
There's the E warning as well. It should be an F warning really, but it is used sparingly and for maximum effect. The meaning of Dirty Wings is pretty clear from the lyrics but if you watch the "movie in three minutes" that is her video then everything is very obvious. She's a girl with a past. Can you still love her, if you know what she used to be? It turns out Zandi is a useful actress as well as a unique singer.
There's something about backstage at the revue bar, or the strip club. It is a place full of emotion and conflict in the recent BBC drama Dope Girls. There is a scene in the first episode of that show when Billie (as played by Umi Myers) gets ready to go on stage. When performing, she seems to be the most confident, radiant woman any man could imagine. But to get to that place takes alcohol, chanting in the dressing room, shouting in the mirror and slamming her hands on the dressing table. She can just about do it, but only for the length of the show. If this really was Billie all the time then she would quickly burn out. We have to understand that a performance, any performance, is a temporary state. The stunner on the stage, with a fistful of Benjamins stuffed in her bra, is just an act. There's a fragile woman behind the facade. The money is probably feeding her young child asleep at home, or the college course where she meets the guy who turned out to be a bouncer at the strip joint.
Find the beauty in the ashes
One of the great life lessons that Zandi Holup reminds the rest of us about is that surface beauty nearly always conceals scars. In a culture that seems to prioritise what is on the surface, we miss the value in what lies beneath. For beautiful young women in a social media world, turning that beauty into cash seems easier than ever. It is hard to rise above the algorithm if you take that path, and it is an algorithm devised by those disgusting tech bros. It is a path that has always been dangerous, as child stars like Drew Barrymore, Erika Eleniak and Brooke Shields have shown us. But now it is available to everyone with a phone. Which is basically all of us in the West.
I don't know what it is about Nashville but it attracts young women who are wise beyond their years, over-achievers who somehow amass a whole life's worth of hard lessons before their thirtieth birthday. Perhaps some men are frightened by this. Perhaps these tunes are intended for other young women. But I think men have more to learn. If you think sending gross pics to women you don't know is cool or funny, then have a listen to Dirty Wings.
Go Find Less, Dirty Wings and Mountain Man are available now but there are others too while we hold our breath for Wildflower later this year. Go find more about Zandi Holup now.
Zandi Holup
In her own words: evocative artist-writer Zandi Holup is a wildflower: unique, free as the wind, and blossoming in Music City. Born in Pennsylvania, she drifted from city to city until she found her home in Nashville six years ago. Cut from the same cloth as legendary folk singer-songwriters like Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, and Joni Mitchell, Holup’s raw brand of original folk country flourishes through unfiltered storytelling reminiscent of Dolly Parton and emphasized by her emotive vocals. A grassroots following placed her on the map as snippets of demos and unreleased songs resonated across social media in increasing numbers. Her first release, “Wait for You,” sat at No. 1 on the all-genre Spotify Fresh Finds playlist, amassing over a million streams with no promotion outside of her TikTok following. Named a 2023 Artist to Watch by The Nashville Briefing, Holup signed a publishing deal with Arthouse Entertainment and TurnTable Music in partnership with Universal Music Publishing, and a record deal with Big Loud Records last year. Holup’s first release on the label, “Gas Station Flowers,” is available now. Previously opening for the likes of Jamey Johnson, Amanda Shires, Midland, and 49 Winchester, Holup supports Steve Earle, Ian Munsick, and Wyatt Flores late summer into fall.
