Premiere: ZELLi’s “Solid” Music Video Brings It Back to the Golden Age

Nodding to the hip-hop/R&B pop divas of the 2000s, ZELLi breathes new life into a classic style.

ZELLi first caught our eye back in August on the now omnipresent Luna God’s LGEP 2. That record’s “Booty Bounce,” featuring a slinky, sinuous hand-drum rhythm that felt distinctively non-Seattle (read: not sleepy), immediately lept out thanks to ZELLi’s schoolyard cool and lyrical double-dutching. In a town where hip-hop skews abstract and cosmic in tone, it was refreshing to hear ZELLi getting back to basics and urging folks to shake their asses.

Since then, ZELLi has dropped her own EP, Solid, and today, she released the record’s first music video, a mash-up of opening track “Sacrifice” and the eponymous “Solid.” Like “Booty Bounce,” ZELLi skips the abstraction and goes for that classic approach—this is a straight up pop diva production, something you don’t see or hear very much anymore, let alone on a local level. Voguing for the camera, stunting in front of a car, surrounded by her squad, fur coats and gold body paint—she’s even got a “Say My Name” shout-out in there. For folks who long for the days of Destiny’s Child or the 2000s boss brio of Trina, Rye Rye, and Lil Mama, ZELLi’s got you.