Q&A: Blurring the Lines Between Passion and Pain: Gabriella Zauna’s “Apocalyptic Love” Shines in the Dark
INTERVIEW
INTERVIEW
☆ BY KIMBERLY KAPELA ☆
A LOVE THAT BURNS — Emerging alt-pop artist Gabriella Zauna invites listeners into the hauntingly beautiful world of “Apocalyptic Love,” her latest dark pop anthem that captures the turbulence of an all-consuming relationship. With hypnotic production, ethereal vocals, and raw lyricism, the track unravels the emotional weight of loving someone through their darkest moments—where devotion and self-sacrifice blur until one loses their own sense of identity.
Zauna paints a vivid portrait of love as both intoxicating and destructive, mirroring the song’s themes with an atmospheric soundscape that pulls listeners into its stormy depths. The melody sways between delicate vulnerability and swelling intensity, echoing the emotional highs and lows of a relationship that feels like the end of the world—both in its passion and its pain.
A true architect of her sound, Zauna is a multifaceted artist who takes the reins as a singer, songwriter, instrumentalist, and producer. She describes her music as “pop with an unstructured, darker twist,” bending the genre into something uniquely her own. Her approach is deeply personal, ensuring that every beat, lyric, and layer of instrumentation is infused with her artistic vision.
Adding another dimension to her artistry, Zauna experiences synesthesia, a rare condition that allows her to perceive music through colors, textures and shapes. This sensory connection informs every aspect of her work, turning sound into a vivid landscape of emotion. For her, a song isn't just something to hear—it’s something to see, feel and immerse oneself in completely.
With “Apocalyptic Love,” Zauna cements herself as a rising force in alternative dark pop—an artist unafraid to dive deep into the depths of love, loss and self-sacrifice.
LUNA: Thank you for talking to Luna. Our readers would love to get to know you and your music more. For any readers who aren’t familiar with you yet, what inspires your artistic style and sound?
GABRIELLA: I think a lot of electronic music really inspires me and the futuristic synths that are used in EDM, and I like to incorporate it in a pop structure, so it's not completely EDM, but it's not completely pop. Love Sabrina Carpenter, but she's very pop-leaning, but you have people like John Summit who are very EDM-leaning, so I like to combine them and meet them somewhere in the middle where it includes that darkness and also having that pop structure. I also grew up listening to a ton of jazz when I was younger, so I use a lot of major seven chords, dominant sevens. I incorporate that a lot into my melodies that I play on the piano.
LUNA: You have released your newest single “Apocalyptic Love.” What is the inspiration behind the song and what themes and emotions do you explore?
GABRIELLA: When I was in the car this one time, I brought my computer with me and I made a loop while my girlfriend was working. I was waiting in the car for her and she came back, and I was like, ‘I made this really good loop. You have to hear it.’ While we were driving and I was playing it for her, we were right by a military base, and there were planes that were flying super low, and it was really terrifying, like they were super low to the ground. I said that it looked like an apocalypse outside. I was like, ‘that's so apocalyptic.’ We both looked at each other and knew the title would include the word ‘apocalyptic.’ We wrote it together in my car and then when we got back, I was explaining to her how it was really healing, because the themes that this song explores is what it's like to be in a relationship with someone that's going through a really difficult time in their life, and how you take on their emotions and put them before you and how you lose yourself in that relationship. So being able to write that with the person that it's about was really healing for me. The song is about acceptance and acknowledgement and the healing process of all that.
LUNA: Can you walk us through the creative process for “Apocalyptic Love?” How did the song evolve from the initial idea to the final version?
GABRIELLA: The loop that I created was in the car and I added the synth loop first that I have in the very beginning of the song, and then I added ukulele plucks. When I got back to my studio, I knew that I wanted the song to explode. I wanted it to go up and really get wide and everything. The first thing that came to mind was strings, like an ensemble of strings. I've never had that in my music. I've always just done things like an ensemble of synths or pianos. I bought this new plugin that has these incredible strings, and I layered six tracks of them, and that was what pushed me to finish the song, because I wasn't in love with the loop. Then the ensemble of strings really took it to the next level, so that really inspired me to push through it really quickly.
I only went through four versions of the song, so that was super cool. I think the hardest part about the creative process for this song was actually the percussion, because I'm used to more fast paced, quick moving drums with a lot of ear candy and a lot of ticks and sounds that you wouldn't typically expect. Because this song wasn't a hype song, but it wasn't a ballad, it was somewhere in the middle for me. It was emotional, but it also had those futuristic synths in them. I didn’t know what direction I wanted the percussion to take and that was really fun, experimenting with different sounds, different beats, and I finally came to something I was happy with.
LUNA: Synesthesia plays a significant role in your artistic process. Can you describe how it influences the way you write, produce and experience music?
GABRIELLA: I've always had a difficult time explaining how I incorporate synesthesia in my music, because it's such a weird thing. I sound crazy when I'm like, ‘that song is triangles and it's the texture of clouds and it's orange.’ The easiest way to explain it is that different melodies and sounds always have a color. Say, I start with a melody that's green. I'll go into Ableton, I'll highlight that track is green, and I'll base the rest of the tracks off of that color that I initially felt and associated with what I was creating. It's easiest to see my synesthesia in my arrangement view in Ableton when I'm producing because I color code everything to the colors I associate with, like the pianos and then the drums and the vocals. I also incorporate it in every cover art that I make. This single is green so the whole cover art has this green overlay on it, which is really satisfying for me to be able to incorporate what I associate the song with visually to my listeners.
LUNA: Being a “one-woman band” means you oversee every aspect of your music. What are some of the most rewarding and challenging aspects of full creative control?
GABRIELLA: The most rewarding aspect is not needing to rely on anyone to create anything for me. If I want to make a song at 2 a.m. I can come in this room and make a song and I don't have to wait for anyone. I think that, especially as a female, it's so empowering to feel that way, because I know a lot of people that are like, ‘I got to get in the session with so and so on Friday, and I have to wait to create with him.’ I can't get behind that, because it's so empowering being able to do it on your own and not having to rely on anyone else to kind of restrict your creativity. I think that is what really pushed me to start producing when I was younger, and it still does push me to produce because I love collaborating, but there's nothing like being able to do it all on your own, and the amount of satisfaction that comes with that, especially as a woman in this industry.
I'd say the challenging parts is being alone, because when you're collaborating with people, you can bounce your ideas off of people, and you can get new perspectives, because you know they're not the same person as you, but when you're strictly just you and yourself and alone, it can feel like you're driving yourself crazy and going in circles and listening to the same thing over and over again. It's a give and take, like you're alone and it's great, and you can do all those things by yourself, but it's just you and your thoughts in your head. If you overthink things, no one's there to tell you to stop. I love my job, but it definitely comes with its cons.
LUNA: As an artist who wears multiple creative hats, what do you hope listeners take away from your music? Is there a message or feeling you want them to experience?
GABRIELLA: My biggest goal in making music is creating not just a three to four minute time period of music for them to listen to, but more of an experience for them to immerse themselves in the story that I'm telling and create their own narrative around it. That's so important to me. When I have shows and these kids come up to me and they tell me that my music has saved their life, it's such a great feeling. And having them tell me that my songs are so specific, but they make sense to them, and that is something that I'll never take for granted. I feel like I'm almost too specific sometimes, like in this song, I'm talking about how I had dinner with a person's mother and I talked about their struggles. That's a specific experience for me, but someone could listen to that and take it in a completely different direction. I think that's something really beautiful that I want to keep pursuing with my music.
LUNA: What inspires you to push boundaries within your sound? Are there any specific experiences, artists, or moments that have encouraged you to explore new musical territories?
GABRIELLA: I am super inspired by live music all the time. Anytime I leave a show, I always tell the person I'm with that I have to write a song. It feels so great because I'm looking at someone that I admire that I paid to go see, and I'm looking at them living something that I want to live. The only way to get there is to continue making music that's something people haven't heard before. I always strive to be a better musician and what I mean by better, it's just more educated and knowledgeable on different genres that maybe I haven't heard. There's a bunch of new music that's coming out right now that's super different like Doechii, for example. She's amazing, and I feel like I haven't heard a rapper like her in a long time, other than Missy Elliot. It's creating more knowledge or listening to more music gives you more knowledge and more power to expand your sound further.
LUNA: What’s the best environment to listen to your music in?
GABRIELLA: The rain. Cloudy weather. When I think of my music, I think of dark lighting, so dark blue LED lights. The new music that I have coming out, I want to imagine a club scene, just darker things like clouds and dark rooms.
LUNA: What are some artists or bands that have been on your radar?
GABRIELLA: RAYE has been an artist that I'm super honed in on right now. Doechii is amazing too. I'm working on a song right now that has fast paced talk singing, and so I've been referring to the two of them a lot to come up with more percussive melodies in my voice. Those two have been huge inspirations on me, and listening to a lot of Fred Again and John Summit.
LUNA: How are you feeling in this current era of your career and what does the rest of the year look like that you would like to share with Luna?
GABRIELLA: I'm super excited for the music that I am going to be putting out moving forward. I think that this song is very special to me, and it's definitely a very emotional one. I'm looking forward to picking up the pace, because the new music that I have coming out is more danceable and something that I really think people will enjoy. I'm excited to put new music out there, and hopefully people like it, but it has fast paced talking and more rhythmic drums. It feels lighter. This song feels really dark. It feels really sad and emotional. To have new music that I'm putting out really hits you in a different way. It’s empowering.
