At Home with Ella Collier

November 10, 2026

This has been a big year for Ella Collier. The singer-songwriter released her debut album DANGEROUS, as well as its deluxe version. And she’s not done yet. A new single is set for release on November 19. Combined with her high energy, cinematic music videos, tracks like “CHEERLEADER” and “ICE QUEEN” have made Collier one of LA’s most promising pop artists.

We visited her at home to talk about DANGEROUS, her partnership with GRANT KNOCHE, and her musical origins in Georgia.

What’s your musical background? Did you grow up performing?
I grew up forcing my extended family to watch me sing on vacations and my friends to be in bands with me, and you would frequently find me strutting down my basement carpet pretending it was a catwalk in a stadium. Growing up in Georgia, the access to music was pretty much choir or musical theater, and I quickly got involved in both. I did many musical theater shows from the age of 7, and picked up my mom’s nylon string guitar from high school at 11 years old. I wrote my first song that day and played it in my school talent show a few weeks after. The joy I felt from writing music was amplified tenfold when I had the chance to perform it. I found any opportunity to do so, playing dive bars all over the South after basketball practice, until I started selling out my own shows! At the time, it was just me and my acoustic guitar, playing sets of songs I wrote on my bedroom floor. I was always hungry to perform, and that hunger has propelled me to where I am today, in Los Angeles.

Tell me about the experience of making DANGEROUS. Were the songs all written about the same time?
Creating my debut album was extensive, soul crushing, expansive, and continues to show me new parts of myself even after it has been released into the world. The title track “DANGEROUS” was the first song we made for the project, which I had no idea at the time. Originally, I was just making it to cope with my unraveling anxiety about who I was and if I’d ever be able to make it as a musician. I honestly was never feeling incredibly good or happy when I’d start making these songs, which you can hear in the lyrics, but through the creation process, I learned to own these spectrums of emotions and turn them into something I’m now enthusiastic to say is empowering. I think the unique part about making this album is that it became a library of my consciousness at the time, while I was just writing songs and experimenting with sounds that felt not only exciting to me, but directly reflective of the mood or character each song was asking for. This album expresses the extremes of the ego and how they can manifest into different characters or masks we make for ourselves to survive our own fears. Songs like “FIEND” & “ICE QUEEN” are more linear representations of those characters, whereas songs like “DANGEROUS”, “DON’T FOLLOW ME” & “CALIFORNIA DREAMING” explore the mind behind them. The whole entire process of making this project spanned a little over 2 years. I’m really proud of how each song has its own personality, and how everything you hear in each song is intentionally connected to the message we want to get across. It’s been a gift to feel the reciprocity from the listener and how they have taken a message from a girl in a dark place and shed their own light on it.

Do you think pop music is in a good place?
What a nuanced fun question. I love pop music and always have. Although pop can be stereotyped as “simple” or “cheesy”, pop music is actually a really complex genre to write. To find a strong enough concept and explore it in a way that is relatable and singable, while also maintaining your artistry within the music is a mathematical feat in the writing room. If you go back and listen to some of your favorite pop songs, there’s some sort of catchy hook in almost every part of the song, that takes a lot of time and deliberation. I feel like pop music nowadays has turned into a melting pot of genres and personalities that has been celebrated and welcomed in a way it hasn’t in the past.

There are so many amazing up and coming acts right now that truly practice in the art of fusing personality into the lens of pop. From my friends, I really am inspired by Magdalene, she fuses theatrical storytelling into incredible pop music, my friend earthgirl, who crafts her lyricism into undeniable pop hooks while welcoming a whimsical world of her own, my friend Chandler Leighton, who cracks vulnerability’s skull with experimental soundscapes and undeniable hooks, and of course my close friend and collaborator GRANT KNOCHE, who not only performs his own music, but produces and writes it as well. I’ve been blessed to find true hunger in pop recently and have been such a fan of finding friends that see it that way. I’ve also had the pleasure of writing for many up and coming artists and have had the joy of exploring this with them! SLAYYTER, who I wish I knew personally, is an incredible example and inspiration of this. She has been hitting the ground with her artistry for a long time and it’s incredible to see her soar. Many pop artists are the most intentional of musicians, because they not only create songs, but they must create universes around them that can compete in the mass market.

The only thing I wrestle with in pop music these days is how much emphasis can be placed on looking like an artist, when the actual craft deserves just as much attention. It’s easy to get caught in the fanfare, but what truly excites me is the soul behind it, even if that soul wants to do donuts in the parking lot, I believe them. I challenge myself on this as well: am I making something that looks exciting, or something that actually says something? I don’t think we have to try as hard to convince people through bells & whistles if the foundation, in this case the music, is real too.

Looking back, how do you feel about your early singles like “Talk” and “cinderella?”
Well thank God you went back to the archives. This sort of ties into my last answer, but even with these songs, you can hear and see me starting to explore my sound and what it has become today. I was extremely proud of them when I released them and they were very true to me in those moments. That doesn’t mean I haven’t been battling with myself this year to go back and delete them, but also part of the journey for me as an artist is to show the process, and these songs were a very true part of it for me. I’ve been at it since I was a kid, and these were my first peeks into my adulthood as an artist.

What’s been your favorite music video to shoot so far?
Of the videos I have out, I would say “I DON’T DO DRUGS”. It was during a time of true heartbreak and feeling lost, and it felt like Emile (the director) and I were on the same page immediately. I felt safe and free enough to let my phone die and really live in the emotion of this song, while I trudged around famous Hollywood landmarks in gogo boots, sucking lollipops, and with wired headphones. Something about not knowing how anything was going to work out translated in that video so seamlessly. I also convinced them to let us on top of a double decker tourist bus for free, which was a flex.

To be honest, no video is easy to shoot! There is a ton of deliberation, planning, and excavating of my true spirit that happens when performing in these videos. It’s hard work, but it’s one of the most rewarding. Another one of my favorites is one you will see soon. I just finished shooting and producing a music video with director Riles Martinez, who is also someone very close to me. It’s rare when you find someone who would go as mad for the art as you do, and he is truly that. The video is for a song I have coming out in January, and I feel like it perfectly represents the entities of womanhood that suppress and motivate me, which is very fitting for the next era of music I am about to drop. I also feel like through the amount of videos I have shot, and the training in movement, acting, and production practice I have gotten over the last year, this video is the culmination of that budding experience.

You’ve collaborated with GRANT KNOCHE on a couple different tracks. What’s it like to work with him?
It’s so easy and natural. I think Grant and I have had a mutual respect for each other for such a long time before working together, so finally getting in a room together felt as natural as us getting McDonald’s at 2 am after going out together. It’s funny because the first two times we wrote together were for my song “ALL ME” and then for his song “FRICTION”, which both have been such a treat. We have also started to write together for both of our projects and really want to work more together! I think when you have such a strong foundation of friendship, everything feels much easier. I’m so blessed that we have that together

What’s next for you? Any new music?
Of course! The energy and momentum surrounding my first album has only inspired me to lay on the gas. I have been working on some incredible new visuals to pair with this next era of music. By the time you’re reading this, we’ll be pretty close to my next single dropping, along with the music video! I have another sister single dropping in January with that video I mentioned above. I will continue to forge forward as long as you will continue to have me, and even if you don’t, I’ll be knocking on the door as long as I’m here.