Rozzi’s Learning What to Hold On To
With her new single “Hold Tight” and the forthcoming album Fig Tree, the singer-songwriter turns vulnerability into something electric.
Published
Like any good story, this starts at a karaoke bar. Specifically, Sing Sing on Avenue A (let's address the complexities of the name at a different time). It was a sweaty evening, celebrating Mejuri’s campaign "A New York Minute" at a party put together by Roman Coppola’s The Director’s Bureau. Each room, a different moment—weddings, birthdays, teenage bedrooms, etc. Song after song after song, my friends and I sang into the mic, to the point of, well, exhaustion. Until a second wind arrived. A wind named Rozzi.
Rozzi, a singer-songwriter, has long been one of music’s most quietly powerful voices. She’s one of those singers who reminds you what a voice can do. She got her start as Adam Levine’s protege, has collaborated with legends like Nile Rodgers, and lent her songs to shows like The Morning Show. Her songs are modern, sharp, and full of feeling. An honesty that sneaks up on you.
At around midnight, Rozzi grabbed the mic and sang a rendition of Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You” so moving that I just got goosebumps rewatching the video. Our room full of girls giggled and cheered, oohed, awed, and wowed. “I’ve been waiting for this room,” Rozzi said afterward. Girl, we were waiting for you.
Fast forward to now, and Rozzi is channeling that same once-in-a-lifetime voice into Fig Tree, her forthcoming album produced by Mocky. Taking inspiration from The Bell Jar, where Sylvia Plath’s fig tree symbolizes the endless choices and possible lives before a woman, Rozzi’s Fig Tree explores that same terrain—growth, fear, love, and the vulnerability that comes with choice. The project’s latest single, “Hold Tight,” follows the title track and dives deep into the uneasy space between control and surrender.
Earlier this fall, Rozzi previewed the project through a six-week residency at New York’s Ki Smith Gallery, where 26 artists from around the world created visual works in response to songs from the album. The result was a conversation between sound and sight—each piece refracting Rozzi’s stories of womanhood and self-discovery through a new lens.
Below, we talk about the hormonal hurricane that inspired “Hold Tight,” what it means to sound like yourself, and which Rozzi song makes the ultimate karaoke pick.
Gutes Guterman: “Hold Tight” captures the raw, uneasy kind of vulnerability when love starts to feel both grounding and terrifying. Can you talk about how that emotional tension shaped the sound of the song?
Rozzi: I wanted the song to feel as unsteady as I felt writing it. It’s just one chord that pulses throughout and builds. Mocky and I wanted the production to brew like a storm. The feeling of reaching a place in a relationship where you really belong to someone is terrifying. Like, ‘Oh, now you could actually ruin my life.’ It’s exciting and cozy and unsettling all at once.
GG: You’ve said you wrote “Hold Tight” the week after freezing your eggs, describing it as a “hormonal hurricane.” How did that experience influence not just this track, but the emotional core of Fig Tree as a whole?
Rozzi: Freezing my eggs made me very existential. It made me think about motherhood, about gender roles, and about choices that change the course of your life. “Hold Tight” was in the hormonal aftermath, which makes it particularly charged—but the whole album is really answering the questions the experience brought up for me. Like, what life do I want to live?
GG: The Fig Tree metaphor—drawn partly from The Bell Jar—feels so rich with meaning. What does your own “fig tree” look like right now? What branches feel most alive to you?
Rozzi: One branch is very excited about this album. Shaking with nerves but excited! One branch is deeply concerned about democracy and is trying to stay alert without feeling constant doom. A third branch is my creativity branch, where I’m always trying to make something. Another branch feels very proud of the people who choose to be in my life. I love the people I get to talk to every day.
GG: You’ve worked with some legendary collaborators—Nile Rodgers, Mocky, Adam Levine—each known for such distinct approaches. What did Mocky bring out in you as a producer that maybe no one else has before?
Rozzi: Mocky is one of my musical soulmates. Making this album with him was an actual dream. I actually have literal dreams that I’m once again in his back house, playing the Rhodes. We recorded a lot of it to tape—something I had never done before—and did almost exclusively full vocal takes rather than recording things in sections and editing them together. So much of the world is digital, robotic, and fake—the goal was to make this album feel like the complete opposite of that. Like I’m a real-life human sitting right next to you, telling you the truth.
Still from "Hold Tight," directed by Lucy Tarmarkin.
GG: The Ki Smith Gallery residency turned your songs into visual art. What was it like seeing your music interpreted on canvas, and were there any surprises in how artists “heard” your songs?
Rozzi: It really was a highlight of my life! I feel dramatic saying that, but witnessing these brilliant artists create work that completely captured my music—songs that came from my most personal stories—was just insane. Especially when they made something that surprised me. It reminded me how far a song can travel on its journey to reach someone else. I feel so lucky to have had the experience.
GG: You’ve written and performed across so many genres, from soul to pop to cinematic ballads. Do you feel like Fig Tree is a culmination of everything you’ve explored so far, or the start of a new chapter?
Rozzi: This album is just far and away my favorite thing I’ve ever made. It’s really that Miles Davis quote: “Sometimes it takes you a long time to sound like yourself.” I’m a late bloomer in all ways and, with this record, I feel like I just arrived.
GG: Between performing on Jimmy Kimmel, writing for Netflix, and exhibiting in a gallery, you’ve crossed nearly every creative medium. Is there one space that feels most like “home” for you right now?
Rozzi: Singing is literally the love of my life. It always has been and it always will be. I love expanding my creativity whenever I can—I love to scare the hell out of myself by doing something I’ve never done before—but singing will forever have my heart! I’d rather die than not be able to sing!
GG: If you had to sing one Rozzi song at karaoke, which would you pick, and which one would absolutely never make it to the karaoke mic?
Rozzi: Obsessed with this question. “Hold Tight” honestly would be the pick. It’s dance-y but moody. It makes you feel like you’re driving around in a ’70s movie—as in it’s sexy and dangerous and just a little bit unhinged. That’s the energy I want at karaoke. I wouldn’t do my song “Bad Together” cause I don’t need to bring that kind of pain to a party!!
