SOFT LOFT – BIO
New album ‘Throw The Dice’ out September 4, 2026 ([PIAS] Recordings)
A wise person once said, ‘Don’t grow up, it’s a trap’. Growing older might be inevitable – a thing, in fact, to embrace. But what if we decided to write our own trajectories? What if we cast aside, once and for all, the outdated narratives of what we ‘should’ be achieving and instead followed our own paths towards what felt honest and true?
These are the ideas that Zurich-based quintet Soft Loft are exploring with the sumptuous indie-pop of second album Throw The Dice. Written as vocalist Jorina Stamm headed towards 30, it’s a record that balances the band’s bright and brilliant musical ambition with the relatable lyrical focus of life at a turning point. “I’m waiting for the moment when life will all add up and make sense, but I don’t know if we ever really get there,” says Jorina. “It kind of feels like a scam that we get to a certain age and say, ‘OK, we’re adults now’ and we don’t even know what it means. Am I going to feel like an adult by 40? Or by 50?”
Stamm might still be wrangling with some of existence’s big questions, but Soft Loft have been forging their own confident path since beginning the project in 2022. The band – completed by drummer Lukas Kuprecht, bassist Marius Meier, keyboardist Sarina Schmid, and guitarist Simon Boss – had all known each other and played together for years (Lukas and Jorina even grew up on the same street). But having spent time honing their craft under different names, the advent of Soft Loft marked a distinct level-up in intention. “It was more focused. It was the start of saying: ‘We’re going all-in with music, and we want to give this our everything’,” Jorina reflects.
Zurich has been good to the band, but their ambitions have always been far bigger than just staying in Switzerland. With debut album, 2024’s The Party And The Mess, they set out their MO from the off: to aim high and dream big with everything they create. Case in point? Working on that record with Grammy-nominated producer Gianluca Buccellati (Lana Del Rey, Arlo Parks, The Marías). “We didn’t want to just use who was around. The music scene in Switzerland is very small and we want to break out of just being content with what you think you can achieve in your country,” Jorina says. “Starting the project, we really tried to just reach for everything we wanted. Working with Gianluca opened a lot of doors for us – mentally as well. Turns out, you can just ask someone if they want to work with you and maybe they’ll answer.”
It’s an impressive foundation that Soft Loft are now building up to the sky with Throw The Dice. Making their debut gave them the confidence to really believe in their instincts and follow their heart, leaning into the nuances of their songwriting with even more conviction. Working with Gianluca was a lesson in getting to the core of what makes Soft Loft unique. “If you don’t aim for perfection, you’re more honest and you play more of what you feel. And I think that’s what brings the tension on this album, because then you let loose,” says Jorina.
Recorded in France’s Black Box Studios, produced by the band alongside LA-based engineer Sean Cook and mixed by Grammy-winning producer and engineer Craig Silvey (Arcade Fire, Florence + The Machine), Soft Loft’s second delivers a delicious mix of instinctiveness and freedom, but also a grand sense of musicality. Opening track ‘Where Is Mr. Raccoon’ features a beautiful string arrangement put together by Marius – a classically-trained jazz musician, meanwhile future singles ‘F U WANT IT’ and ‘Gravity’s Pull’ find Jorina grappling with the record’s central themes of identity over insatiable, giddy melodic earworms.
Influenced by modern maestro’s of open-hearted feeling, from Big Thief to Sam Fender, Sharon Van Etten and Lizzy McAlpine, the key to Soft Loft’s magic is in the balance. Lead single ‘Caught’ delivers with a widescreen sensibility that bursts out of its anthemic chorus: a cathartic purge that urges the listener to be bold and “go and find the stuff that you really want”. ‘Gravity’s Pull’, meanwhile, channels Fender’s self-questioning storytelling with a lyric that directly explores what it is to get older whilst pursuing your musical dreams. “Do you want to get married and have this very normal kind of lifestyle, or do you want to go out and tour?” questions Jorina. “I’m not going to feel old just because I have an age on my ID.”
There’s spirited sass on moments like these that stick two fingers up to expectation. ‘Wednesdays’ was inspired by the iconic “on Wednesdays we wear pink” scene from Mean Girls. On Soft Loft’s version, however, it doesn’t matter if the cool kids want you to sit with them or not. “It’s about realising that you don’t have to depend on other people to be happy and you can work on yourself and grow stronger. It’s nice to have people around you, but it’s not other people that make your happiness,” says the frontwoman.
Elsewhere, the vocalist explains, the quintet “wanted to be brave enough to keep it very simple sometimes”. The folky, acoustic ‘Wrists That Won’t Be Mine’ and the delicate, Olivia Rodrigo-recalling closing ballad ‘Told’ strip everything down to its most intimate ingredients. “We really like having those very small songs that are just guitar and vocals too,” Jorina nods. “We don’t ever want to put stuff on there that we don’t think is needed.”
Both of these softer tracks are crucial to the story of Throw The Dice. ‘Wrists That Won’t Be Mine’ gave the album its title: a nod to surrendering to life’s complexities and giving it your best. “It’s about finding peace with people dying and living without people because we can’t really control anything about our lives,” Jorina says. “We can make decisions, but it’s just a big gamble and you never really know what’s going to happen next.” It feels appropriate, meanwhile, that ‘Told’ is given the chance to close the album. Its central lyric – “We won’t get back all the childhood we had” – offers a poignant summary of all that’s come before. “It’s just saying: don’t overthink things that are over, because you still get to decide what you want in your life,” Jorina explains.
Throw The Dice is a tribute to self-acceptance and following your heart, made by five friends who’ve worked hard to reach for their dreams. It might still be filled with a lot of questions, but in making it, Soft Loft have given themselves a lot of answers too. As Jorina concludes herself: “With every release, we’re getting closer to what we want to be.”
