Hannah Jadagu - Describe

On Describe, Hannah Jadagu learns the hard way that distance is relative. After her 2023 debut album Aperture garnered glowing praise from outlets like The New York Times and NPR, Jadagu’s blossoming career took her away from her blossoming relationship in New York. Her expansive second album sees her grappling with that separation, finding connections that extend beyond the physical and strengthening her own voice in the process. Describe reverberates with that tension, between wanting connection and craving space. Its lyrics, as on her debut, ache with an emotional specificity that can only be pulled from lived experience. “I’ve been five thousand miles away,” she sings over ricochetting hi-hats on “More”—“Why does three thousand feel like more?”

But that distance also pushed Jadagu to explore new dimensions of her sound. “I'm super into artists that are able to mix analog with modern,” she said, and moving to California for the summer gave her the opportunity to meet new collaborators and experiment with analog synthesizers and drum machines. And while the warm hum of her guitar was her primary instrument for Aperture, she began to feel that her muscle memory of the instrument was holding her back. “It was freeing to be able to sit at a synth and drone on one note while I explored my vocals," she said. ”I found that to be a bit more freeing than playing on a guitar.” Working with producer Sora Lopez at his studio in Altadena and remotely on a few songs with Aperture co-producer and collaborator Max Baby out of Paris, Jadagu carved out a sound on Describe that is both distinctively hers and a total departure from the distorted guitar melodies of her debut.