From the beginning of her songwriting journey during her childhood years in Malaysia, Zoe Tan has aspired to connect with listeners through intimate storytelling. Now a junior at NYU’s Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music, she has long since taken inspiration from pop-folk artists such as Lizzy McAlpine, Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeran to write poignant, emotional music. After being featured on the artist Fizz’s single “Next Morning I’m Gone” in 2021, her summertime release of “Walk Out The Door” marked her debut single, which was produced in collaboration with other students at Clive Davis. Most recently, she headlined at The Woodshop at the Brooklyn Monarch. Her newest song “Distance” will be released on Dec. 13, and tells a vulnerable story about grieving the end of a relationship.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

WSN: Could you tell me a bit about your life growing up? How has that impacted where you are now, music-wise?

Tan: I grew up in Malaysia. I’ve been there my whole life, right up until I came here to NYU in 2022. I’d say growing up in Malaysia definitely influenced how I perceive life, and when I came here, I think it totally flipped my world upside down in terms of what I knew about life and myself. I started writing about my own personal experiences, but I was really forced to take a look at myself and ask a lot of questions about myself that I wouldn’t have had I stayed in Malaysia. The songs I wrote before coming to New York were mostly about what life would be like when I got here.

WSN: What’s the most important thing you think you’ve learned at Clive Davis so far?

Tan: Don’t compare yourself to everybody else. Being at a school like Clive Davis where everybody is the best, it’s really hard not to do that. Instead of seeing your classmates as competitors, you need to see them as collaborators. I’ve made some of the coolest stuff with my classmates. College is supposed to be a place of experimentation and figuring out who you are, what you like and don’t like. I could say the same for music.

WSN: You released the single “Walk Out The Door” in August, which was accompanied by a music video. What was the process of getting there?

Tan: I think I started recording it in 2021 or 2022. It was right before I came to New York. I went to a producer in Malaysia with the song fully written out, chords and all, and he helped me produce it and arrange the track. It was the first time I had been a part of the production process. I got the song mixed and mastered by Carter Elliott, who I’d met through school, and a ton of friends helped me with the music video. We all got up at 5 a.m. to get on a train uptown and shoot some scenes — it was such a long and arduous process. My good friend Adrian Hui — a godsend — directed, edited and shot everything. It took him a while to color grade and edit everything to really just get it right. It was totally worth it, though, and I couldn’t ask for better friends.

WSN: And now your new single, “Distance,” is coming out this month. How did you approach vulnerability within your songwriting?

Tan: That song I wrote in the summer after freshman year. I was living in Washington Heights, subletting, and I was in a relationship at the time. I felt we were so far apart even though we were spending all of this time together. But I wrote this song in the backyard of the house I was staying at. In New York, it’s so hard to be surrounded by nature. It feels so concrete and lifeless sometimes, so the song has a lot of references to nature. It’s about growing apart from somebody but feeling like you don’t want to let go.

I was really excited about this song — we knew we wanted it to be very stripped down. We did have a few different elements toward the end come in and out, but it’s essentially just me and my guitar, and that’s the way I wrote it. I feel like I’m a songwriter before anything else, and the first few lyrics of this song are probably my favorite that I’ve ever written. The beginning, “I feel a distance washing over me like waterfalls / And you feel it too / I hear it in the way you say, I love you,” to me, was a very authentic, straightforward way of explaining how I was feeling.

WSN: How do you feel about your songs being released for everyone to hear?

Tan: [It’s] really scary, but also really liberating, because there might be somebody or multiple people out there that feel the exact same way, and it feels nice to be united in this. Especially when it’s a song about pain and heartbreak, it makes you feel a lot less alone, but the same is true for positive songs like “Walk Out The Door.” I’m really glad that was the first song released under my artist project because that song is about walking out on things that don’t serve you anymore. So it’s cool to feel united through those feelings as well.

WSN: Where do you see yourself taking your music?

Tan: I’ve been performing a lot both in Malaysia and a couple of performances here, but I’ve been focusing more on recording and writing this semester and hopefully next. Balancing school and life and work has been fairly difficult, but the plan is to keep recording and have a project out by the end of 2025. I’m also excited to collaborate and write with more people. With my project for the end of next year, I want to try to have a different producer for every song. Everyone has such a unique perspective for how to build a song, so working with different people is a huge thing on my list. I’d also love to experiment with different forms of songwriting.

Contact Eva Mundo at [email protected].