Isabel LaRosa is playing the long game

Now twenty-one, the Cuban-American singer-songwriter had shot to viral fame with her Platinum-certified 2022 single “I'm Yours”, amassed over two billion streams, and released her debut album, Raven last year. But those five years prior, as the end of high school was looming, so was the pressure of the real world.

“I just thought that I’d either have to take school seriously and give a fuck about that, or I could fuck off in school. One of them has to work,” she says, recounting her decision to pursue music genuinely. 

For LaRosa, that calling was the product of seeds sown years prior. “I was raised in music to some extent, in the sense that my dad plays and enjoys jazz music, and he always wanted musical kids,” LaRosa explains. “So my brother Thomas and I would learn jazz standards with him.” 

Together, the pair began playing at open mic nights and eventually started writing songs. “Once Covid hit, we decided to really go in on both of our artistic projects,” she reflects. “I was sixteen, and I thought, ‘I need to lock in’.” By this point, her dislike for school had come to a head, and she was exploring other options. “I hated school with such a burning passion,” she admits. “I just wanted to go online for the rest of high school, but I had to have a valid reason for doing that. So I knew I had to be focused elsewhere.”

That focus led her to independently release a slew of singles, “16 Candles”, “Closer”, and “GAMEBOY”. Not only did she gain traction online, but she also caught the attention of Slumbo Labs/RCA before she’d even graduated high school. 

When I ask LaRosa what it was like for her to take such an assured plunge and commit to the craft she was developing at that age, she summarises it in one word: nerve-racking. But nerves weren’t enough to disrupt the path that she knew she needed to walk. “I’ve always had this strange belief that if other people make it work, there’s no way that I can’t make it work,” she explains. “And I knew that I wasn’t going to have any high school experience, so I didn’t want to waste that time in my life. I really wanted it to be worth it.”

Just one year later, LaRosa would release “HAUNTED”, which she acknowledges as “the first time I felt like I fell into something”. Inspired by the likes of Melanie Martinez, The Neighbourhood, and Ariana Grande, she was still experimenting and trying to find her sound up until that point. “Everything was close, but not quite it,” she tells me. “But with ‘HAUNTED’, it was like, ‘Oh, this is what feels right to me.’ That direction felt natural.”

The song was LaRosa’s first RCA single, and would form one-third of her debut EP, i’m watching you, released in 2022. She reflects on the experience fondly, as she was able to try her hand at building a world around her music with visuals and a wider narrative arc. “That first EP was really fun. It was the first time I was able to do music videos, and all of the songs were very consistent with each other, which was really cool to me. Everything felt like it aligned the way that I wanted to, which was really special. It was an eye-opening experience.”

Once she found her natural rhythm, LaRosa had a solid foundation to build on. She’d established a theatrical dark-pop atmosphere to communicate her coming-of-age stories of infatuation, heartbreak, and simply figuring yourself out, ensuring that she maintained deep involvement in the creative direction of her visual aesthetics, which would prove to resonate broadly with a generation craving a sense of community and understanding within online communities. 

LaRosa went on to release one more EP in 2023, YOU FEAR THE GOD THAT LOVES YOU, before she was ready to put out her first album. Making Raven, she tells me, was something of a different beast entirely. “It was always so scary for me, because there’s so much pressure,” she admits. But she corrects the fearful perspective she once had, adding, “I don’t think that it has to be this whole thing where your career rides on it. I think that it should just be a body of work that feels consistent and says what you want to say.”

With those tenets in mind, Raven is a bold, cohesive collection of pop numbers that are both shadowy and incisive. LaRosa leans into a strong siren-like quality, with propulsive grooves across the album, from the bilingual and darkly romantic “Favorite”, to the acoustic-toned heartbreak of “Cry For You”. It embraces the full range of emotional texture LaRosa possesses, which she admits was initially challenging to pour into her earlier work.

“I used to be a little bit more scared of writing about personal stuff,” LaRosa admits. “It was a little bit like this kind of different version of reality. But I think that as I’ve gotten older, it’s become very cathartic to write about my own experiences. So I think that the music has gotten increasingly more personal as I’ve gotten older.”

She recognises this as not just a natural progression in accessing and sharing her own vulnerability, but also having a means to connect with her audience authentically. “I think people have a good sense of things, and can tell when something is fake and when something is not,” LaRosa explains. It feels especially important when nurturing a connection with thousands through such a strong online presence, namely when it comes to replicating that feeling on stage. Back in 2024, she sold out her God’s Watching headline tour. Now, she’s gearing up to open for Madison Beer on her locket tour, with dates across the UK, Europe, and North America. 

"It's almost easier when it's online. People can hear it, and you don't have to be like, here's my face too," she laughs when I ask about her experience of letting her guard down on stage. “But it’s very special to be able to see their reactions, and hear that a song meant something to someone when it means a lot to me.” And for all that, performing is where LaRosa feels most herself. She describes it as theatre, allowing her to create sets and moods that breathe life into the songs. “I want people to feel like they’re really in it,” she muses. ”It’s genuinely my favourite thing on the face of the earth. I love it so much."

Having touched on several career milestones and forged connections with her audience over the last few years, LaRosa feels equipped to delve into more personal, revealing work. It’s a notable shift that she’s introducing with her new single, “Hallucination”, her first new music since Raven. 

“I wanted to have things be able to evolve and feel different,” she says of her intentions behind the song. “I hope that song feels different, and I’m curious to see what people think and how they take it in.” It’s one that unearths a side of heartbreak that sees LaRosa stuck in place as she candidly belts, “Can’t believe that you’re gone / I don’t wanna move on / I don’t want someone new / It’ll always be you”. 

It feels like the catharsis that she touched upon earlier, and this is just the beginning. As she looks back at her career, she feels more affirmed to step deeper into what’s true to her. “I feel like I’m getting ready to hone in on what I really want musically,” she says, with a sense of inspired possibility. 

This is something that required time and stillness for LaRosa to come to terms with, however. The first few months of the year were the longest stretch of time that she hadn’t been touring, giving her the space to sit and really consider what she wanted for herself as an artist. “It’s been nice to sit down to think about what I want to do, reference, and talk about. I’ve never really had the mental capacity to do that. But I’ve lived through a lot more experiences, and now I’m able to talk about them.”

LaRosa tells me that as she looks ahead, she hopes to step into a more evolved version of herself. Her upcoming project expands beyond heartbreak, tackling feelings of abandonment and learning how to cope with loss. “A lot of what I’m talking about is the feeling that you can never fully hold onto something before it leaves,” she reveals. “It feels like different stages of grief.” 

Beyond addressing grief, LaRosa is also stepping up to talk about body image and reflecting on what it means to be perceived. “It’s been interesting to be able to write about things that aren’t just heartbreak,” she tells me with a sort of relief that comes with moving on to something new. “It’s stuff that I’ve wanted to talk about for a really long time, but I never felt comfortable enough to talk about.” Not only is LaRosa comfortable in doing so, but she’s excited to apply new perspectives to her creative work and show others what growth looks like for her. 

“I’m very excited to show people what’s been going on in my head for the past however many months,” she muses, an eagerness behind her words as she considers the new music and visual aesthetic that she’s been preparing. “I’ve just been like, God damn, I can’t tell you yet, but it’s awesome, I promise!”

At this stage, LaRosa is assured in what it means for her to share such an intimate piece of herself with the world. And she recognises the importance of everything that it took to get there. When I ask what she would tell her younger self, the version that was weighing up whether to stick with school or trust in her passion for music, she emphasises patience and process. “I’d say, don’t take shit for granted,” she affirms. “Not even a little bit. It’s about longevity and consistency above achieving things immediately all of the time.”

“But also, I don’t know if I would tell her anything,” she continues. “I wouldn’t necessarily want her to know what’s going to happen. You have to go through it; this is just character development.”