As the star of Pose, Loot, American Horror Story, and Transformers: Rise of the Beasts among others, Michaela Jaé Rodriguez is no stranger to the spotlight. But now, the Golden Globe-winning actress is stepping from in front of the lens to in front of the mic for her latest endeavor.
Rodriguez is set to release her highly anticipated debut album 33 on September 26, 2024. Over the course of ten genre-hopping songs, Rodriguz, under the stage moniker Michaela Jaé, explores themes of self-discovery and resilience through the eyes of a cloned humanoid woman navigating an alien planet.
“I’m super excited that I finally get to have music out as this is a new sound and a new era for me,” Michaela Jaé tells ESSENCE, exclusively. “I’ve always loved pop and R&B music, and I’ve always dreamt of how it would sound if I mashed the two together, and I feel like I succeeded with that, along with a story that will hopefully last the test of time, when regarding the past, present and future.”
The announcement comes simultaneously with the release of “Green Lights,” her latest single in the series of the story she’s telling with her experiential project.
“I wrote this song for all the girls out there who felt like they kept stopping at a green light, they never took it and just sat there and waited until it turned red,” she says. “Don’t wait at a green light, take it, it’s green.”
“I’ve always been very intrigued by ‘chosen ones’ like Neo from The Matrix or Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender,” she explains of her album’s extraterrestrial theme. “Their arcs are so reminiscent of the divine stories in the Bible or in the Quran.”
In the album, she embodies a character preordained for greatness, that speaks to her own lived experience, affectionately named Michaela Jaé 33F7.
“I want to create a deeply flawed but resilient hero that young people can look up to.”
33 will release on September 26.