ANIMA STUDIOS PRESENTS FIVE GENRE-DEFYING ARTISTS

words ANNIE ZALESKI

ANIMA Studios boasts a dynamic roster of forward-thinking artists, offering genre-spanning music with emotional and cinematic depth—tailored for sync. Their sound moves through film, fashion, and culture. Each track stands apart, driven by vision and intention. This is the future of music. These are the voices behind it.

MIETTE HOPE

Good luck trying to pigeonhole Miette Hope. Based in Brooklyn, the singer-songwriter/producer uses a combination of natural/acoustic elements and synthetic/electronic sounds to create incisive music that overflows with emotion. “In Heaven” is a classic house music anthem with brisk beats and ethereal vocals. “Sacrifices,” meanwhile, starts like a wintry folk-pop song before incorporating thrumming electronic beats; the acoustic riffs of “Astronaut” give way to dreamy soundscapes and gently hopeful vocals; and “Bubblewrap” is a Y2K pop throwback combining floating synthesisers and percolating beats.

“The genre tends to vary depending on the song, but the throughline is that all of my music has some kind of left-of-center edge whether it be manipulated samples or found sounds,” Hope says. “The songs I’ve released over the past two years have all been self-produced and I’ve really found my sound by developing the skills to finish my work on my own. The power in a female creative taking up space in male roles creates a strong narrative for a cultural moment.”

Hope grew up in a musical family, surrounded by musical instruments, and wrote her first song at age 10. “[I] kept on writing and playing consistently from there, there was nothing else I was so passionately drawn towards,” she says. “I’m lucky to have been heavily supported and encouraged to be creative.”

Living in a Colorado mountain town, Hope initially was exposed to the folk and bluegrass scene popular in her hometown. But during morning car rides to school, she eventually discovered pop music via the radio. “The early 2000s were such an iconic time for pop music and pop culture and there were so many big stars to idolise,” she recalls. “I remember cutting up fashion magazines and making mood boards with my favourite outfits and colors and imagining what I would wear on stage if I were to become a pop star.”

Today, Hope is particularly inspired by the work of director-photographer Aidan Zamiri, who’s worked with artists such as Billie Eilish, Charli XCX, and Caroline Polachek. “His work portrays artists in a super raw and moving way,” she explains. “His aesthetic style feels super aligned with my brand as an artist and it would be a dream to work with him.”

Fittingly, Hope is driven by striking visuals as much as she is emotional sounds. “I’ve always had a cinematic vision for my music and will often be imagining visuals as I’m creating,” she says. “I’d love for people to feel emotionally moved by the music in synchronisation with the visuals whatever that may mean for them.”

As Hope continues to refine her sound and mine new ways to communicate her aesthetic vision, she never strays too far away from matters of the heart. “Music is such a powerful tool for bringing out the emotions in the listener,” she says. “My music is primarily conceptualised around the human experience and the range of emotions that can come up when navigating through life. [Accordingly] my best songs are made when I’m having big feelings whether it be joy, sadness or loneliness. By being vulnerable, my goal is that I can make my listeners feel less alone in their own experience.”

ELUJAY

When Elujay sat down with Billboard to talk about his 2022 album Circmvnt, he listed his inspirations for the album. Alt-rock icons Radiohead and Björk. Folk legend Joni Mitchell. The cult indie rock band Duster. Shoegaze music. Innovative R&B artists Blood Orange and Solange. The electro-indie act Broadcast.

Given such eclectic (and impeccable) taste, it’s no wonder that categorising the Oakland-born artist’s music is nearly impossible. “Luvaroq” is twinkling soul with a quiet storm vibe, while “1080p” is jazzy R&B with martini bar-like ambience. A pair of 2024 singles are even more memorable: “STORMBLUS” is folky alternative with falsetto vocals and lovely guitar, and “CREEPIN” sounds like the kind of throwback hip-hop booming out of radios in the early 1990s.

“I hope people get this nostalgic feeling of when they were young and innocent,” Elujay says of the goals for his music. “I want people to feel a sense of warmth, sort of like a warm embrace from the past and future. I always leave a little bit of nostalgia in my art to remind people of a better time before phones, social media, and the run-of-the-mill distractions that make people lose sight of being present.”

In his early phases of discovering his creativity, Elujay drew inspiration from skateboard culture, Pharrell Williams, and Kanye West’s Bathing Ape. Like many artists, he also started songwriting and producing while still a teenager. But he realised music was his true path upon selling out his first show in his hometown: “The crowd’s response was so viscerally intense I could tell that this passion was not only a gift but my calling.”

In the last few years, Elujay has embarked on four tours and landed several major TV placements. And he continues to dream big when it comes to future work, noting his ideal fashion house partners (“I would love for Kiko Kostadinov or Issey Miyake to design a collection. Their pieces feel dressy but have a utility vibe to it”) and musical collaborators (Raphael Saadiq, Burial, and Frank Lebon).

In the meantime, Elujay plans to continue directing, designing, and producing, and is working on new music. “Bass harmonics and drones have been a huge part of my musical production since 2021,” he says. “This new album I’m working on is full of these textures, processed through analog gear.”

In short, Elujay is continuing on the path of taking his sound to transcendent levels—and well on his way to achieving his dreams. “Creating my own clothing pieces and directing my own visuals has been an integral part of my rollouts,” he says. “With the exposure I’ve been getting, I want to keep putting my best foot forward in these fronts. I want everything I create to have a great background story so it has more depth. I want to be known as an all-around creative who made an impact on his city and brought inspiration to those looking for more than just being in one field.”

photography MYLES CUTCHEMBER

JADES GOUDREAULT

You might be familiar with Jades Goudreault because of 2021’s “nuh uh,” a kiss-off to a no-good guy with grimy guitars and dancehall rhythms. In the years since, the Montreal-born, Los Angeles-based artist and songwriter has expanded her sound considerably: Newer singles such as 2024’s “JET LIKE BENNIE” and “INSTRUCTION MANUAL” boast harder-edged electronic beats and confident vocals, while 2025’s “NOT THAT DEEP” is solemn, slow-burning indie-pop with emotional vocals and minimal keyboards.

“I usually gravitate towards blending organic instruments with more modern pop elements, but I also let myself explore and let go of genre and let feeling guide me most of the time,” she says. “But the main element that makes all of my music feel cohesive is my voice and my taste. I do whatever feels like me and feels natural in the moment. And hopefully, that comes across in my music.”

Growing up, Goudreault originally wanted to be an actress—a dream she put to the side after seeing a video of a Gwen Stefani concert and “became obsessed” with the No Doubt leader-turned-pop star, she says. “I started to gravitate towards that world. For a school talent show, I lip-synced to one of her songs.” (Fittingly, the upbeat 2025 single “pop that,” a retro-kissed electro-pop tune with kicky dance beats, feels very Stefani-esque.)

At the same time, Goudreault was also inspired by DIY creatives—like the “avant-garde fashion I would find on Tumblr and small music artists I would find on YouTube/Spotify,” she notes. “I was kind of a curator. I loved discovering artists and making playlists. Gradually I started seeing myself making music too.”

Eventually, Goudreault combined these passions and started singing and recording covers on YouTube, which evolved into her writing original songs. During the pandemic, she started taking her career even more seriously and started making friendships and connections in the music world. This hard work has paid off: She’s been featured on 50 Spotify-curated playlists, including New Music Friday four times, and earned over 150 sync placements in the past two years, including in a national six-month Walmart commercial and a CBS image branding campaign, as well as on ESPN’s SportsCenter and Selling Sunset.

For Goudreault, these placements have only increased the impact of her songwriting. “Music is one of the most powerful arts in the world, so when it’s combined with film, TV or fashion, it helps get that communication across, which is really special,” she says. “I love when different art forms come together to create something magical. That can truly lift anyone out of their problems and give them some relief. I love being a part of that; it’s very powerful.”

She’s currently hard at work on an album and looking forward to making a difference—and even more connections—in the coming years. “I want my music to feel like a shared universe, where people connect, feel understood, and get lost in something bigger than themselves,” she says. “Sound has no borders; it moves through emotions, cultures, and languages effortlessly. I want to be known as an artist who bridges music, fashion, public speaking, and humanitarian work.”

THANDI PHOENIX

Thandi Phoenix is the rare artist who sees music in multiple dimensions. “It’s not just sound—it’s emotion, visuals, movement,” says the Sydney, Australia-born artist. “When it’s placed in new contexts like film or fashion, it transforms again. It becomes part of a visual language, adding colour, building mood, shaping how a story feels. I love that because music is so subjective.

“Music is energy,” she continues. “It has the power to move, challenge, and inspire—so why limit it to one lane? It can exist anywhere people need to feel something—runways, installations, campaigns, cinema. I want to create experiences, not just songs.”

Fittingly, Phoenix’s music is vivid and colorful, with luxurious textures and dense arrangements that show off her soulful R&B vocals. She initially broke through in 2018 with the infectious single “My Way,” a Rudimental-produced track that combines beatific vocals, peppy horns, and insistent drum ‘n’ bass grooves. From there, she continued setting dance floors ablaze with collaborations with Sigma (the ’90s house music throwback “Say It”) and Mell Hall (the disco-kissed No. 1 Australian club hit “Knock Knock”), while other solo singles touch on Afropop (“Hot Sauce”) and ’80s electrofunk (“The Rush”).

“Rhythm is at the core of everything I make,” Phoenix says. “Whether it’s the percussion, the bassline, or my vocal flow, I’m always chasing that pulse, that pocket—a groove that pulls you in and makes you move instinctively. I aim to make music that moves people, be that emotionally or physically.”

Unsurprisingly, Phoenix grew up with parents with impeccable taste in grooves, who listened to jazz, soul, salsa, bossa nova, R&B, and Afrobeat. “Music was part of my DNA before I truly understood its influence,” she says. In turn, artists such as Amy Winehouse, Alicia Keys and Erykah Badu inspired her to start writing songs in high school and “use music as a form of self-expression,” she says. “They were more than musicians to me, though. They were alchemists who would turn feelings into sound, pain into poetry and they taught me the power of music and creativity.”

After graduating from high school, Phoenix started going to see live music and decided to start performing as well as writing songs. “Seeing artists on stage, seeing how music could connect people, shift energy in a room, create community, that lit something in me and made me realise music wasn’t just something I wanted to keep to myself,” she says. “I wanted to share it; I wanted to give people the same feeling that music gave me.”

Like many artists, Phoenix also sees fashion as “an extension of that same creativity and self-expression” she sees in her music; in fact, her dream collaborators are LaQuan Smith or Daily Paper. “LaQuan Smith captures the bold, sleek, high-energy side of my sound, that confident, diva, dance floor-ready energy,” she explains. “Daily Paper, on the other hand, reflects the cultural roots, the rhythm, and movement that ground my music. One brings the fire, the other brings the soul and together, that’s the full picture.”

Unsurprisingly, when Phoenix thinks about where she wants to be in five years, it’s still performing music, but also stretching out into other art forms. “I see creativity as limitless, whether that’s stepping into film, acting, modelling, fashion or spaces I haven’t even imagined yet,” she says. “I want my career to reflect that freedom and to show that you don’t have to stay in one box to be successful and hopefully inspiring others to back themselves to do the same.”

photography NYNNO BEL-AIR
styling FOZIA A
hair and makeup NISAL

FARRAH FAWX

There was never any question that Farrah Fawx was going to be a musician. After all, the Virginia-born artist recalls that she started “trying to write songs similar to what I was hearing on the radio” when she was just five years old. Years later, Fawx has grown into a musician who’s writing the kind of songs that make radio sound more unique.

After debuting with the 2022 EP The Hopeful Cynic, she’s released a steady stream of singles that show off rapid-fire vocals and acumen with melody. In 2025 alone Fawx issued the house music-influenced “Really, Really” and retro-leaning “Grab a Plate”—both of which feature uptempo dance beats—as well as drum ‘n’ bass-inspired tracks such as “Chop Chop” and “Hi My Name Is” and the avant-hip-hop anthem “Stretch.”

Fawx was inspired by “ultra-feminine R&B artists” such as Brandy, Mýa, and Destiny’s Child, but also “unapologetically raw and aggressive rappers” such as Cam’ron, Foxy Brown, and Lil Wayne. “There was never really an in-between for me,” she says. “It was either soft and emotional or loud and audacious. It made me want to create from both worlds, pretty but gritty.”
Her fashion influences are equally bold (“I’ve always been inspired by people who looked like they belonged to a world they made up like Gwen Stefani and Missy Elliott”), while if a fashion house were to design a collection inspired by her music, she’d pick Marc Jacobs (“Perfect fuse of new and classic, edgy and collected”).

But Fawx’s dream collaborator is the Tony Award-winning stage/theatre designer Esmerelda Devlin, who brings cutting-edge artistic flourishes to her work. “I love and appreciate how she has a why for everything she touches and she never places herself or even the artist she creative directs for at the center,” Fawx says. “She sees the bigger picture in everything and I am fascinated. That’s an intention I align with.”

Fawx’s own creative process is visionary, as she’ll often consider how her music might work in certain kinds of cinematic or television scenes. Chalk that up to her experience playing video games such as Tony Hawk Pro Skater and GTA, which “expanded my taste in music beyond what I would hear in my immediate world,” she says now. “It’s a powerful feeling when my music can aid in someone else’s storytelling and be re-envisioned through a different medium. Especially because I love discovering new music through film and TV.”

At the moment, Fawx is gravitating toward “sonic maximalism” with her music, with tempos between 130 and 160 BPM. “I really enjoy how that range feels in the body.” But in the future, she’s looking to be an artist known for transcending genre and mediums, who isn’t easily pigeonholed.

“I believe creativity is creativity,” she says. “Whether I am creating music for myself or picture, creative directing, or designing, to be able to share my voice and perspective is adding to culture and shaping it, even in the slightest. I don’t take that lightly—and I love every bit of it.”

photography GAGE GARZA