Today's Song of the Day, as chosen by Mike Ramos, in honor of Pushing Boundaries, is "Nobody" by FiFi Zhang, from the 2023 EP So Beautiful So Lonely on Gum Studio.
This week's Songs of the Day were selected by DJ Mike Ramos, in honor of Pushing Boundaries, KEXP’s celebration of Asian and Pasifika stories through music, taking place on-air and online throughout the month of May.
What started as a thesis project at the Parsons School of Design has since become a music career for FiFi Zhang. The Shanghai-born/Brooklyn-based artist was inspired by a sound design class to create her own songs, and submitted the track "Butterfly" and its accompanying music video. Since then, she's continued to evolve her ethereal electro-pop style, culminating in her latest EP, So Beautiful So Lonely (a title Zhang told music blog Grandma Sophia's Cookies was inspired by a line from the TV show Sex & the City).
Today's Song of the Day transforms the loneliness Zhang experienced during the pandemic into a house track, with a companion clip directed by Xiao Han and produced by Kennie Zhou. As she told GSC, "My image for the video was, you are at the bottom of the ocean and nobody can hear you, just floating by yourself in the bottom of the ocean. There is a scene where I’m a mermaid deep in the ocean, the sea creatures, my imaginary friends, all pop up from underneath me. It’s my version of turning tears into pearls, a productive solitary self-indulgence where my own creations make my world so colorful and beautiful. That’s the message of the music video."
