RELEASES NEW TRACK + VIDEO TODAY FOR “GASOLINE”
NEW EP THE BLUE COMING SOON VIA ISLAND RECORDS
BUILDS ON MOMENTUM OF VIRAL ANTHEM “WHAT A SHAME”
(Mar. 12, 2021 – New York, NY) Leyla Blue, soulful New York City native singer/songwriter and Island Records 2021 Artist To Watch, follows up the powerful viral explosion of her female empowerment anthem “What A Shame” with the brand new track and music video “Gasoline,” the latest advance from THE BLUE, her upcoming EP via Island Records. Leyla’s self-penned “Gasoline” details a date that never happened due to the interest being a no-show. The music video is a fun one-shot visual that shows Leyla freely dancing with the blue clouds as her backdrop.
“What A Shame” made waves as it amassed over 200,000 TikTok videos that were created using the track, and over 15 million global streams which catapulted Leyla to over 25 million streams and landed on more than 15 Spotify viral global charts, including the influential Spotify Pop Rising. The retro/art deco stylized music video “What A Shame” was co-directed by Leyla’s mother, Anna Palma, and cousin/collaborator Agusta Yr. “Gasoline,” the anticipated successor to “What A Shame,” follows-up Leyla’s debut EP Songs For Boys That Didn’t Text Me Back. In September 2020, she issued “Company,” a new track + video which, along with “Gasoline,” will be included on THE BLUE.
ABOUT LEYLA BLUE:
For those raised on Britney Spears’ generation of pop artist, a recording career seemed like a shortcut to fame and fortune. For Leyla Blue, born months after Rolling Stone splayed Spears across satin sheets as the face of teen superstardom, music meant something different. The now 20-year-old singer-songwriter sees pop music as an under-utilized vehicle to communicate a distinct perspective, rousing awareness via reactive emotion. Leyla Blue lenses music not as magazine covers, but a Trojan horse — facilitating universal connection one radio-ready bop at a time.
Blue is the daughter of two successful photographers, but it's New York she credits for creative prowess. When it came to her musical education, the city was “everything,” she claims, spending her adolescence composing music every day in her bedroom before becoming a professional songwriter at 16. But the latter brought its own set of challenges. Blue became increasingly frustrated how pop music was mechanicalized, with “a bunch of people sitting around trying to work out what a young female artist might be thinking.” When a producer suggested she should focus on her own artistry rather than formulating that of others, Blue knew she needed re-orientate.
Accepted into the prestigious Clive Davis Institute of Music at NYU, Blue approached her studies with the same fervency she did her initial entry into the industry. A Christina Aguilera-obsessive (ironically the artist to whom she’s now most frequently compared), Blue spring boarded off soulful Y2K favorites until her output sat in the sonic middle ground of Destiny’s Child and Lorde. She committed to lyrically driven creations, resolving to hold nothing back from listeners and concurrently rebut her father’s belief that all pop music was “plastic.” Still, while it’s emboldening to sing of rejection and mental illness as a young woman, even title a debut EP, Songs For Boys Who Didn’t Text Me Back, the tradeoff of oversharing is that a whole host of strangers now know every intimate detail of Blue’s life.
“It’s a weird conundrum,” the singer admits. “But when I make sense of something myself and own up to it, I feel empowered. I can’t control the chemicals in my brain, but I can understand it and direct it towards something productive. My OCD and eating issues have absolutely what has made me who I am, so I’m just telling my story and hope that inspires others to be open about their own story.
A recent Island Records signee, Blue is preparing to release a new body of work. Her unwavering vulnerability means Blue maintains the same group of close collaborators, working with the same female producer and editing her own visuals shot by her mother. It’s a conscious departure from the hyper- manufactured pop landscape to which she listened to and lived, and for good reason. Because Leyla Blue knows earning the trust of arena-sized audiences requires bold authenticity. Leyla Blue knows it’s not enough to “talk the talk” when you’re walking at a different pace. Leyla Blue knows the power of pop, and she plans to harness it. “I’m just starting out. There’s so much more I want to do and so many more people I want to reach. For me, the ‘I made it’ moment is some manifestation of inspiring or helping others to reach their potential — having a real effect on a life.”
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