What is your name?
Izzy S.O 
– Isabella Stevenson-Olds 

What is your genre of music? 
I always find genre a weird thing to pin down but initally influences stem from the 90s grunge/ soft rock scene and I feel like my music is a blend of pop-tinged rock and indie.

Give us a little bio about you. 
I’m originally from the West Midlands and I now live in london. I’ve always been drawn to artists and bands who’s music feels raw and accesible like you could be a fly on the wall of a studio so that’s what me and producer dustin dooley have tried to create with this first EP and hope to keep conisitent with everything we work on together for this project. High energy melodies and lyrics that really are an insight into my brain and the way that I see the world.

What made you go into music? 
I grew up in a household where music was a constant presence and I would always perform songs to family friends when they came round for dinners or parties. My primary school had a great acting teacher who put on shows twice a year so I think I had always felt very free to perform. But I think writing was the biggest pull for me – I’ve been writing since I was really young, I remeber writing a song called ‘Impossible’ when I was still in primary school about a friend dying even though I didn’t actually have a friend who had died. I’ve always had notebooks with little poems or snippets of songs and even when I was focusing on acting for a few years I still used poetry and voice notes of songs to process emotions and understand different stages of my life.

Who are your influences? 
Alanis Morissette is a big influence for me – her vocal performance on jagged little pill and the vulnerabilty portrayed in her lyrics is what makes music make sense to me. Damien Rice is also a big influence for me, his album ‘O’ is one of my favourite albums ever and I always return to it whenever I feel overwhelmed by life. I would always dance around my house to Gwen Stefani and Avril Lavigne so I think it would be a lie if I left them off the influence list.

Are you signed?
Yes – with Silent Kid records.

You released your new single ‘Flirting with Strangers’, tell us more about the single.  What is the meaning behind the single? 
Flirting with Strangers sums up the range of feelings I’ve felt since leaving school at the age of sixteen. it’s about the chaos that can come with trying to be an adult and the changes and complexities that come hand in hand with that. I was very lucky growing up that I had what felt like a very safe family unit but my parents actually split up around the time that I wrote Flirting with Strangers and leading up to that break there was a lot of chaos which made me question a lot of what I thought I knew about my childhood. Fliriting with Strangers is about that chaotic feeling but also about finding your own calm outside of all the things you can’t control.

What was the writing and recording process like? 
I wrote this song in one night with Tadhg Daly – I had already written the first verse and sang that to Tadhg at the start of the session, we then discussed what the song was about and wrote the rest of it within an hour or so, random bits of poems that I had written years previously popped into my head and it almost felt like one of those songs that just happens without having to think too much about it. I had the best time recording this with Dustin Dooley, being in the studio with him is one of the calmest things I’ve ever experienced, I think he really gets what I want from every song we work on without us really having to discuss it. When he plays parts of the songs I come in with it feels like they get an extra bit of life and character – that was especially prominent when he played Flirting with Strangers for the first time on the Piano.

Describe the track in two words. 
Growing Up

Who did you work with on the single? 
Written with Tadhg Daly, produced by Dustin Dooley and we had a studio day at Super Symmetry with Jack Parry engineering and Jan Simson on drums.

Will we see a Music video for ‘Flirting with Strangers’, what can we expect from the creative process? 
You won’t be seeing a music video for this Song but I am currently in the process of making one for the title track of my EP which is called ‘Can You Hear Me’. I’m really excited to crossover music and acting with this video – we have an amazing director on board who I used to act with when I was younger. The visual element for all of this has always been an important part of it for me so I think this will be a great way to bring that to life.

Will we see an EP or Album and if so, can you give us a teaser of what to expect? 
So, yes! Fliritng with Strangers is actually the first single of a four track EP, the next single will be announced very soon

Do you have any live shows or a tour coming up and if so let us know where we can catch you at? 
I have my first headline show at Strongroom in Shoreditch on the 28th July – come come come, it’s gonna be so fun!

What else can we expect in 2022? 
Well I’ve been doing lots of writing so they’ll definitly be another EP on the horizon, aiming to be back in the studio ASAP and get working on that!

Will we see any collaborations and if so, can you tell us more about them? 
Ooo i have no idea at the moment but maybe this is something to think about.

Where do you see yourself now in 5 Years? 
Honestly it would just be really nice to be making a living from music and not have to do any of the random jobs i do at the moment.

What quote or saying do you always stick by? 
Have faith in time.

I think things generally have a way of figuring themselves out in the end no matter how crazy things can feel at the time.

Do you have social media accounts so your fans can follow you? 
Yes – izzysomusic on all platforms, instagram is probably the one I use the most.