Bathed in light and smiling with confidence, Adéla stood before a tightly packed, sweat-drenched crowd at the Roxy in late October. “This is both the first and last time I’m performing in a venue this small,” she told the audience as they erupted in cheers. “Thank you.” During a 40-minute set, she shifted seamlessly between ballet-inspired pole routines, floor choreography, and a cover of a Britney Spears classic. Among the crowd were some of her earliest supporters and self-proclaimed Adéla stans: Troye Sivan, Rachel Sennott, and Demi Lovato, who just a few days later announced Adéla as the opener for her 2026 arena tour.
“Adéla is pure pop excellence. She’s not only a phenomenal dancer, but her voice and songwriting are equally powerful,” Lovato tells Rolling Stone. “She has this rare mix of confidence and originality that makes her unforgettable.”
It has been a whirlwind year for the 21-year-old rising artist, who first caught international attention last year on Pop Star Academy, the Netflix competition series that followed the creation of the girl group later known as Katseye. Adéla quickly stood out as one of the strongest dancers and a natural leader among contestants. To the surprise of many fans, she was one of the first to be eliminated. Now, she views that moment as a disguised opportunity — one that pushed her toward her solo path.
“I never pictured myself doing anything else,” Adéla says. “Even at the shows, it feels so natural. I know it might sound strange, but I’ve imagined it so many times that when I stepped onstage for the first time, I wasn’t nervous. It just felt like home.”
I meet Adéla on a warm October afternoon at a diner in Hollywood, where she orders pancakes covered in whipped cream. She walks in wearing a leather jacket, pink hair flowing over her shoulders, and bleached brows shimmering above dark sunglasses. Her phone screen glows with the album cover of Lily Allen’s West End Girl.
When I mention that my favorite track from the project is “Pussy Palace” — one of several songs where Allen reflects on her split from David Harbour — Adéla bursts into laughter and flips her phone around. It turns out that’s the song she was just listening to on her way to lunch. “I can’t believe he did that to her,” she says. “Because now we know everything — the lube, the sex toys, the Trojans. She told it all!”
Throughout our conversation, Adéla’s eyes light up whenever she talks about other pop artists. It’s clear she’s a student of pop culture, analyzing music and performance with precision. “Pop culture to me is what World War II is to middle-aged men,” she jokes. “You know everything about guns — I know everything about pop.” Naturally, names like Charli XCX, Madonna, and Ariana Grande come up as she speaks.
Growing up in Slovakia, Adéla knew from a young age that she wanted to be a star. “The first time I saw Hannah Montana, I said, ‘That’s what I’m doing,’” she recalls. Watching the Slovak-dubbed version, she didn’t realize the character was supposed to be American until her older brother told her. “That’s when I started thinking, ‘How am I going to get on Disney Channel?’” she says. “I started learning English by watching interviews with Demi, Miley, and pretending I was being interviewed on Ellen in my room. It was weird — nobody even knew I was doing it.”
Within a year, she had taught herself fluent English, mimicking the voices of her idols. She remembers writing down the address of Disney Channel studios as a kind of manifestation. “I told myself, ‘If I learn English by 15, I’m going to L.A. for pilot season.’ I had a plan,” she says with a smile.
That dream didn’t quite happen. Instead, she turned to ballet — a path her father encouraged and one more common for girls in Eastern Europe. Her talent took her far; she left home at 14 to train professionally, living in Vienna and London. “I thought, ‘This is how I’ll get onstage,’” she says. “Ballet is great because it’s clear-cut. If you work hard, you get better, and if you’re good, you get the big roles. It’s motivating.”
Still, her passion for pop never faded. Eventually, she moved to the United States to compete on Pop Star Academy, part of Hybe and Geffen Records’ global search for a girl group. Though she became a fan favorite, she was cut early. “We had no control over our image,” she says. “That experience taught me something really important — I’m not good at being told what to do. Some people thrive in that structure. I don’t.” She laughs. “But I made friends for life. We’re forever bonded by that experience. Nobody else will understand it.”
I remind her of the Netflix trailer introducing her as a contestant — bright-eyed, blonde-haired, ready for her big break. “I was such a baby,” she says, shaking her head. “I needed to be eliminated, cry for a bit, and live in a tiny apartment. Those things pushed me to fight for what I wanted.”
After leaving Pop Star Academy, Adéla decided to stay in Los Angeles. She earned her GED while living in the attic of her vocal coach, Dave Stratton, and joined any writing session she could find. “I was alone, really depressed, and completely lost,” she says. “I didn’t know what I was doing or where to go. And I didn’t know anyone.”
At first, she tried making indie rock music. “It was awful,” she laughs. “I came off the show thinking, ‘Forget pop, I’m going emo.’ But eventually, I realized, ‘Wait, I love pop music. That’s who I am.’”
Once she returned to her pop roots, things began to click. She started working with Liam Benayon, a protégé of songwriter Bonnie McKee, to develop her early material. Together, they created “Homewrecked,” a gritty electro-pop track about an imagined infidelity.
“When I met Adéla, I immediately noticed her natural instinct for pop,” Benayon tells Rolling Stone. “We were both obsessed with the genre — I introduced her to Madonna, and she showed me Beyoncé. The first thing that amazed me was her melodic sense and song structure. The entire post-chorus of ‘Homewrecked’ was her idea — she recorded it in one take. My jaw dropped.”
After “Homewrecked” came “Superscar,” which caught the attention of Grimes, who later appeared in Adéla’s “Machine Girl” video and called her a “future reigning popstar.” That same momentum carried into “SexOnTheBeat,” whose video featured Christina Aguilera. Add to that support from Demi Lovato and Troye Sivan, plus production from 100 gecs’ Dylan Brady and Blake Slatkin on her EP, and Adéla’s star power became undeniable.
“For a while, I couldn’t understand why so many cool people were backing me,” she says. “I had a bit of imposter syndrome. I always believed I was cool, but when other people start to see it too, it feels surreal. Like, okay — I guess I’m officially cool now.”
Her debut EP, The Provocateur, drew attention for its raw electro-pop sound and unapologetic imagery. The cover shows Adéla urinating against a wall, echoing Sophy Rickett’s 1990s Pissing Women photo series. In the “SexOnTheBeat” video, she’s seen pleasuring herself before breaking into floor choreography, completely uninhibited. In other visuals, she embraces the “girl group reject” persona, wearing a two-piece emblazoned with “Doesn’t Work Well in Groups.” With pink hair, full lips, bleached brows, and fearless sensuality, Adéla makes provocation part of her identity — and it works, even if it divides opinion.
“I get called ugly all the time online,” she says. “People love to comment on my appearance, which is funny because I actually think I’m beautiful. I like looking a bit unsettling. I think I’ve always made people react strongly — not because I want to be shocking, but because I’m curious. I ask questions, and that can annoy people. But that tension has always fascinated me.”
Adéla says that same curiosity is guiding her as she begins work on her first full-length album. “I’m organizing my thoughts,” she says. “I need to write a kind of manifesto to define what this project is. My EP showed people I can perform and create, but now I want to build an entire world. That’s the goal for the album.”
She recalls recently attending an Addison Rae concert and feeling inspired by the way Rae crafted a cohesive world around her music. “Everything made sense — the clothes, the visuals, the vibe, the colors,” she says.
Helping her build that next chapter is her creative director, Chris Horan — stylist to Charli XCX, Aguilera, and Lovato — who first reached out to her via Instagram when she only had a few songs released. Together, they developed The Provocateur aesthetic, leaning into Adéla’s ballet background with sleek leotards and avant-garde, otherworldly styling.
“I’m exactly where I’ve always needed to be,” Adéla says. “I love performing. It’s where I feel the most like myself. That’s when I feel truly understood — most connected to who I am.”
For her next era, she plans to move past the provocative energy of The Provocateur and focus on something more personal and introspective. “I want to take a closer look at myself and turn that into music,” she says. During her recent show, she performed two unreleased tracks, “Marijuana” and “NastyDirtyGross,” though she isn’t sure if they’ll make the final album. “Maybe ‘Nasty’ will be my ‘Medicine,’” she says, referencing the unreleased Harry Styles song he only performs live. “We get so caught up in promoting and releasing everything, but I don’t know if I want to follow that pattern.”
What she does know is that she wants to showcase her voice. “I don’t think enough artists are really singing anymore,” she says. “Only a few still do.” While she’s keeping the production details private for now, she promises the sound will surprise people.
“At my core, I’m just a pop girl,” she says. “I’m young, I want to sing, I want to dance, and I want to be honest. Those are my guiding lights — and we’ll see where they take me.”
Leave a comment