By Owen Brusse
Last winter, as my friends and I patiently waited for one of our favorite artists to perform at The Atlantis, a music venue in Washington, D.C., we listened to Zinadelphia, a neo-soul and jazz/funk singer-songwriter from Philadelphia. Moments earlier, her bassist, whose stage name is Harley, had gingerly walked on stage and introduced the artists to the eager crowd.
My friends and I all looked at each other and were skeptical of this random opener. Instead, we were pleasantly surprised by an amazing show that none of us would soon forget.
All the lights in the room went out and were replaced with a blanket of deep blue stage lights as the opening chords to a slower and sultrier version of Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive” emerged from the amp on stage. Zinadelphia’s voice was like nothing we had ever heard before. It was deep, gravely, sultry—not what we or others in the audience had expected from a small, dainty, cheery women. The crowd cheered and Zinadelphia smiled back. She gave off shades of Nancy Sinatra and Amy Winehouse as her lower range helped carry her low, gravely and resonant tone all the way through the venue.
Her voice was a deep, complex glass of bourbon being served in a Stanley cup. A traditional pastime full of soul and ripe with a vintage look and feel on stage. She looks like she was pulled from a vintage magazine, and her music is full of jazzy riffs and bridges that take you back to a jazz age that has long been forgotten. All of this is displayed in a package with modern messaging that oozes charisma and captivates everyone that can hear. Truly the best of both worlds.
It was at that moment that my friends and I fell in love with Zinadelphia’s music.
A few months later, in September 2004, she released her debut studio album, “The Magazine.” She is currently on her first tour. When “The Magazine” was released, my friends listened to it right away, some from their own homes, some from foreign countries and others from their cars. I immediately loved the twist on old soul music in the form of the modern-sounding lyrics like “So I held my breath, but the way my baby preached knocked the wind right out of me” and “Oh Zinfandel, once I’m awake in a few hours, maybe I should sit and talk with you for a while” in tandem with the big brass instruments making up the band track. The jazz-pop elements that made up the album and the lyrics immediately hit home for me. I immediately regarded the album as a breath of fresh air that would continue to be listened to repeatedly.
Zinadelphia’s message throughout “The Magazine” comes through in the deep lyrics and empowering tone of the album. Making women feel confident and helping them with a sense of self-worth and value is something that is all too necessary in today’s world. The themes of women’s self-value and independence along with empowerment within relationships help make up the overall messaging. It is that messaging that helps elevate this album.
As a jumping off point for Zinadelphia’s musical career, “The Magazine” serves as a stylistic homage to a jazzy age of music long before now. In the process, she delivers a varied suite of songs that all touch on the particularly modern issue of the way women are treated in everyday life, particularly by toxic men. All of this makes for a very complex and entertaining album.
Songs like “Snap Out of It” and “Knock the Wind” tell the story of falling and staying in love with her now “loser ex,” and how easy it can be to find yourself in that situation. The lyrics within them like, “Oh boy, forgive me for making you wait I held onto you cause I was scared of what you’d say” and “I apologize to everyone as you collapse, into the backseat. Back at my apartment and you’re sobered up and crying, and I somehow make it my fault, things are simpler when we’re lying” help tell the story of the toxic relationship she was in and how easy it can be to continue to feel trapped and look for the good under the guile of “love”.
These songs, however, are particularly jazzy and upbeat, which contrasts with the usually dark, slow and sorrowful portrayal of such topics in music. Elements like this make for a compelling listen. When combined with songs like “Advice From Ray,” “Love over Glory” and “The Magazine” that have a much more empowering tone and feature reverb guitar solos, saxophone hooks and a huge brass ensemble, it’s an amazing mix. The songs with the newer, more contemporary messaging about things like toxic masculinity and women separating themselves from men like “The Magazine” are also the ones that have a prominent new age flair to them like the reverb guitar solo. They convey that she is over her ex and was always too good for him anyway and to let him make her feel so small was merely a mark of his insecurity and her confidence and swagger as a singer and as a woman really come through and hammer that message home.
Zinadelphia’s music reflects the stylings of an older jazz age along with the heyday of the new soul age with a singer like Amy Winehouse. The band behind her uses instruments like the saxophone, piano and trumpet to lay the baseline and help tie the album to older ages. The vocal style of long, gravelly belt notes and choral tones also serve as stark reminders of where her style came from while also playing off newer musical elements to help form her very own style, one that can only be described as jazz-pop. Songs like “Snap Out of It” and “Zinfandel” combine the two particularly well with the older style instruments and modernly worded lyrics and structure to perfectly exemplify “jazz-pop.”
This album serves as a culmination of years of writing and reflecting on her past turmoil with toxic men and bad relationships. The statement she is making with this album is one to empower herself and all other women listening into a sense of self-worth and self-value. She has also been teasing songs on this album while touring with eclectic artists like Teddy Swims and Tori Kelly.
The style of “The Magazine” is one that music has been missing for quite some time. The fact that this new sort of style can be so easily married with such an impactful message shows limitless potential for the rest of Zinadelphia’s career and makes this album a very strong debut. The different takes on jazz and old soul music in conjunction with the modern language make it all the more relatable, as well as the more modern chord progressions make for an album that really has it all. It reminds you of the old classics as well as giving you a brand-new take on many of the new elements that music has to offer as well as telling a story with a lot of important lessons and morals for the listener to take in. It is all these elements combined that elevate the album to the next level and make it absolutely worthy of multiple listens and an immense amount of praise.