Vlad Holiday (born May 24, 1989) is a New York City–based, Romanian-born singer, songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist. Holiday has been known to write about romanticizing the past, the human condition, and looking at love and relationships through realistically dark tinted lenses. He’s been open about living with a debilitating depression, which is likely why the happier moments in his songs are still tinged with melancholy. As if knowing those moments are soon to be fleeting, while trying desperately to hold on and find a way to truly enjoy them. Having gained nearly 40 million streams as a completely independent artist, it seems as if he’s resonating with a subculture of people that are also trying to do the same.

His love of music from the 1920’s to the 60’s is exceedingly present in his latest, “Downtown Baby,” which is the first single from his upcoming debut full-length album. The song describes Holiday’s psychedelic venture to his drug dealer in New York City’s Lower East Side. It’s dripping with spring reverb from the chugging Les Pauls to the Phil Spector-esque percussion, tinged with a bass line and string arrangement reminiscent of Serge Gainsbourg from a 1960’s Paris, and glued together by his captivatingly crooning vocals that always seem to be pulled from another era. Almost a nod to an older jazz singer, an equally gloomy New Yorker that beared the same last name. His new LP will tackle a lot of similar escapism, along with the gamut of gargantuan emotions from battling to learning how to live with depression. The yet to be titled album is tentatively out this summer.