Empress Of on Dream House, Blood Orange & Going to Her First Hardcore Festival Alone

Hosts Fidel Martínez and Suzy Exposito sit down with Lorely Rodriguez –aka Empress Of– indie pop singer, songwriter, and producer, for a conversation about identity, resilience, and her new album Dream House, made while simultaneously rebuilding an actual house in Altadena alongside her mom. Lorely traces her path from growing up Honduran-American in Altadena, absorbing her mom's music and community at home while privately obsessing over jazz as a teenager, to catching Lady Gaga at the Avalon before anyone knew who she was, to moving to New York and falling into the indie music scene that would define her early career. She also talks about the afternoon she met Blood Orange walking down the street and how they made Best to You, a song that now apparently plays at quinceañeras and first communions. She talks about the emotional weight behind Dream House. How she wrote a song for her mom about building her a home without ever telling her, and what happened the day her mom stood in the house and said she had finally built her dream house. She also opens up about what led her to start listening to hardcore music, going to her first Sound and Fury festival alone in LA and why Knocked Loose became an unlikely form of catharsis. Plus: Why she thinks LA is a hard place to date. Produced by Los Angeles Times, L.A. Times Studios, and Sonoro. 🎙 De Los Podcast drops new episodes every week on YouTube and all major podcast platforms. Subscribe so you never miss a conversation. From the Los Angeles Times and Sonoro comes the De Los Podcast — a weekly conversation where music, pop culture and Latinidad collide. Hosted by De Los editors Fidel Martínez and Suzy Exposito, the show pulls back the curtain on the stories, people and cultural moments shaping the Latino experience in the U.S. and beyond. Every episode is a front-row seat to conversations with the artists, actors, filmmakers and thinkers who are moving the culture forward — not just talking about it. Guests include Leslie Grace, Sen Dog of Cypress Hill, Xolo Maridueña, Fabrizio Guido, producer and singer Empress Of, among others. Think of it as the cultural conversation that major American media rarely makes room for — a space where Latinos get to talk, unfiltered, about what they create and who they are. Produced by Los Angeles Times, L.A. Times Studios, and Sonoro. New episodes every week — available on YouTube and all major podcasts.