The controversially-monikered ZOLA JESUS is primarily the creation of one Nika Rosa Danilova. Despite her Eastern-sounding name, she hails from the US mid-west (Wisconsin) and was allegedly raised by wolves. Well that's good copy sorted for a start.
It's less easy to be flippant about her new album 'Stridulum II'. As may well befit an artist whose upbringing involved a decade of opera study tempered with Billboard bubblegum tunes, no-wave pop and the avant garde, it's not the stuff of Shoreditch haircuts, Fender Jaguars and Converse All-stars. It's predominantly pitch dark going on noir, though her dramatic, pleading voice has an undeniable presence and the songs themselves are anything but run of the mill.
Opening track 'Night' gives you some idea of the ambition at work here. Shifting into focus from ominous drone to a sort of Wagnerian synth overture, it's ultra-dark yet a pop pulse of sorts beats steadily beneath. Well, providing you count things like The Young Gods or the weirder bits of Depeche Mode's 'Black Celebration' as great pop, that is. And I probably would.
A series of Bible black vignettes follow in its' wake. When they work (as on 'Trust Me', for example) they're an exotic nocturnal seduction you're happy to give yourself up to, but elsewhere songs like 'Run Me Out' and 'Tower' are unremittingly bleak and funereal and they drain you trying to detect the merest hint of sunshine beyond their relentless black cloud cover.
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Happily, she saves the best for last. Penultimate track 'Sea Talk' is built upon great percussive flourishes and synths with a noticeable sense of purpose, not to mention perhaps her most naked and emotional vocal. The closing track, 'Lightstick', meanwhile, is perhaps even better. Far more organic than anything else here, it's built around a strident piano figure and another excellent vocal and after the murky, second-hand daylight of much of the album it's the sound of Danilova throwing the curtains open and embracing a new day. Great and refreshing to boot.
Menacing, yet curiously exhilarating, Zola Jesus is an enigmatic blot on the shiny pop landscape. Whether she will draw blood on a wider scale is anyone's guess, but for now I'd suggest you listen to this child of the endless night. What music she makes.
Zola Jesus on Myspace
Souterrain Transmissions online
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