In a rock scene where women with guitars still fight for credibility, London-based, Armenian-Canadian artist Arabella Lucia refuses to stay quiet. Out November 13th, her five-track debut EP, Tough Act to Follow, is a sharp coming-of-age statement that fuses raw punk defiance with infectious alt-rock hooks.
Lucia operates inside what she calls her “Rockstar Princess” world – an aesthetic that pairs hyper-femininity with distortion-heavy grit, weaponising tiaras and Gibson SGs alike to subvert expectations in male-dominated spaces. Across these five songs, she wrestles with a central, urgent question: Who gets to decide who you become – everyone else, or you?
The answer comes roaring out of the speakers on lead single “Steal My Shimmer.” Born from a real-life encounter with a threatened male musician who smugly asked if her Gibson SG actually belonged to her father, Lucia flips the patronising comment into a towering, razor-sharp anthem. Driven by muscular riffs, powerhouse vocals, and a knowing wink, it’s a middle finger to anyone who has ever expected a woman to dim her talent to soothe someone else’s fragile ego.
Yet Lucia’s real strength lies in how effortlessly she balances that ferocious bite with raw vulnerability. Debut single “Hostage You Call Baby” confronts domestic abuse through a dark, cinematic alt-rock lens, gripping the listener with urgent, gritty vocals that shift from bruised honesty to full-throttle intensity. Later on the EP, she strips the very same track down to an intimate acoustic reworking, proving that Lucia’s guitar chops and commanding vocal presence can hold a room entirely on their own.
Elsewhere, her gutsy rock ’n’ roll reimagining of TLC’s 1999 classic “Unpretty” breathes fierce new life into a track about impossible beauty standards, trading late-90s R&B smoothness for snarling guitars that make the message hit harder than ever in the social media age.
The emotional anchor of the EP, however, is its bittersweet title track. Written right after packing her life into the back of a car to chase her dreams in London – carrying a farewell card from a loved one telling her she was “going to go far” – “Tough Act to Follow” captures the tug-of-war between heartbreak and ambition. The title carries a clever double meaning: while the person she left behind sets a high bar, the phrase gradually turns back onto Lucia herself as she steps boldly into her own identity.
Tough Act to Follow doesn’t play it safe for a second – and if this is just the opening chapter of her Rockstar Princess reign, the rest of the rock scene had better keep up.