When she first broke out on the scene, Julia Michaels showcased a vulnerable, inward-looking lyrical perspective underscored by a dreamy and romantic musical style. And while her new single—“Heaven II,” released November 8—doesn’t wholly abandon those lyrical and musical values, it moves forward as a bold statement of liberation, signaling the start of a new chapter for the pop singer-songwriter.
Julia Michaels’ path through the pop music world hasn’t followed a traditional script. The Davenport, Iowa native got her start as a singer at age 12, but as she entered her teenage years, Michaels established herself primarily as a songwriter. By her 20th birthday, Michaels had written several television themes as well as songs for Ross Lynch, Selena Gomez, Fifth Harmony, Demi Lovato, and even Creed’s Scott Stapp.
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Working behind the scenes in those days, Michaels developed a reputation as an in-demand collaborator, lending her lyrical creativity to projects that often involved multiple writers. “Sometimes it would be an artist, two songwriters and a producer,” she explains. “And maybe the producer would have someone on the side making guitar loops. And all of a sudden there’s eight [credited composers] on the song, and you’re like, ‘How did that even happen!?’”
(Credit: Blythe Thomas)
Michaels knows how the business works, and she’s an enthusiastic and effective participant in those kinds of writing sessions. But she says that her favorite writing situation is when the work involves her plus an artist and a producer. “I work with a lot of the same people that I’ve known for years,” she says. “Any time I get to work with people who understand me, I understand them. When we’re not regimented, we can go into a room and try all different kinds of things.”
While her skills writing songs for other artists remained razor-sharp, Michaels inevitably began writing for herself, crafting songs that expressed her own perspective. Her debut single, 2017’s “Issues” explored emotional themes; anxiety and fear of the unknown are at the core of the downtempo pop song. “Issues” peaked at No. 11 on Billboard’s Hot 100 and was nominated for Song of the Year at the 60th Annual Grammy Awards.
More singles followed. Both as a solo artist and in collaboration with big names including Gomez, One Direction’s Niall Horan, and Keith Urban, Michaels has released more than 30 singles to date, and created nearly as many music videos. One of her highest-profile endeavors was writing and recording “Heaven,” a song featured on the soundtrack of the 2018 film Fifty Shades Freed. Though Michaels’ approach to songwriting had long been based on personal experience, “Heaven” began a turn toward more mature lyrical content. The single charted in 20 countries, and Michaels promoted the song with a live appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
But all was not quite well. “I was feeling a bit stuck in place,” Michaels admits. She says that her record label at the time guided and influenced her in some directions that didn’t always comport with her own ideas about creative expression. Michaels eventually parted ways with that label, announcing her independent status in an August 2024 Instagram post.
Julia Michaels’ first indie release is “Heaven II.” But the song is neither a remake nor a sequel to her 2018 release. “When I wrote it, I didn’t want to call it anything other than ‘Heaven,’” she explains. “But I couldn’t call it ‘Heaven,’ now could I?” Michaels says that the new song is the product of her new-found independence. “I got to write a song where I felt liberated and free,” she says. “I wrote it with friends of mine who understand what it means to be an artist.”
Michaels takes ownership of the fact that the kind of music she had been writing contributed to her briefly finding herself stuck. “When you [write] songs that are on the vulnerable side, you can end up boxing yourself in a bit,” she observes. “Your label can start to view you as typecast, and anytime you steer away from that, it’s like, ‘Whoa! What are you doing?’”
Still, listeners need not worry that Julia Michaels will abandon her thoughtful and emotion-filled approach to songwriting. “I am a vulnerable person,” she says. “That is not news. Everybody knows me as someone who wears her heart on her sleeve.” But going forward, that kind of writing will be but one of the tools at her disposal. “I’m not one-dimensional,” she says.
“Heaven II” showcases Julia Michaels’ multidimensional artistry. The song’s lyrics are bracingly direct in their sauciness; the song oozes liberation of most every kind: sexual, artistic, emotional. The accompanying video doubles down on the forthright edginess of Michaels’ lyrics, depicting the singer surrounded by outré characters: a contortionist, a ball-gagged man in bondage, and lovers of every kind. Michaels’ placement at the center of the carnivalesque milieu speaks volumes: I’m very much at home with all this, it seems to say.
Michaels’ confidence regarding her new approach shines through not only in her music, but in conversation as well. “You never know what people are going to think, how they’re going to react,” she observes. But she believes that an artist has to make a conscious decision to be true to her or his creative impulses. “And I’m so grateful to make music that is rooted in self-expression,” she says. “For me, that’s one of the points of making music.”
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