This week’s Lightning 100 pick for Local Artist of the Week is Vlad Holiday with his song “By Myself!”
Vlad Holiday is originally from Bucharest Romania, before moving to Mahwah, New Jersey, where he spent his childhood. Not speaking much English, he started playing guitar at 12, and used music an escape from everything. Later, he would move to Greenwich Village in New York City to begin his professional music career. He dove into the city’s indie scene, and would form and front he band Born Cages from 2011 to 2018. Not long after this, Holiday fell in love with Nashville, moving here in 2023. His debut album My Favorite Drug came out in 2024 which featured appearances by Kacey Musgraves and Matt Schultz of Cage the Elephant.
A huge part of what makes holiday special is his combination of a slew of genres, which includes lo-fi, psychedelic rock, and alternative pop, just to name a few. His newest single, “By Myself,” is groovy and hip hoppy, with a guitar reminiscent of 70s rock, but in it’s own way, is really chill. Holiday has said the track is about “acknowledging and removing toxicity from your life,” but in a more specific sense, trying to find a way to live life through the winding road that’s the 2020s. The opening two lines of the song touch on this perfectly: “another fight, another day, you’re losing touch, slipping away.” Listen to “By Myself” below, or tune into Lightning 100 to hear it!
Listen to Vlad Holiday’s “By Myself” here!
