Em Beihold

Em Beihold's uplifting keyboard pop combines a warm, slightly smoky delivery with spacious arrangements, concise melodic hooks, and good-natured attempts to navigate early adulthood. After emerging in the late 2010s with a pair of social-media sensations, "City of Angels" and "Groundhog Day," she landed in the Top 20 of the Hot 100 with her major-label debut, 2022's "Numb Little Bug," from her Egg in the Backseat EP. "Until I Found You," a collaboration with Stephen Sanchez, charted in the Australia's Top Ten later the same year. Collaborations with Meduza ("Phone") and Eric Nam ("House on a Hill") were among a series of bright singles to follow that also included 2025's "Brutus," a solo song that took a hard look at self-comparison.

Born and raised in Los Angeles, Emily Mahin Beihold took up piano at age six, later adding instruments such as guitar and ukulele to her repertoire. Inspired by artists including Regina Spektor, she went on to write and perform as a soloist, playing her first show in 2016 at the age of 17 and contributing a song to the soundtrack of the film I'm Not Here the following year. That song, "Not Who We Were," appeared on Beihold's first EP, Infrared, also from 2017. She gained more attention for a series of stand-alone singles to follow.

Released in 2020, her song "City of Angels" went viral on social media, leading to a second, even more popular viral single, May 2021's "Groundhog Day." The latter's bouncy piano pop generated tens of millions of streams across platforms. The back-to-back successes drew the interest of Republic Records, which released her song "Numb Little Bug" in January 2022. The big-label push got her onto the Billboard Hot 100, where the track rose to number 18 while also reaching the Top 30 in the U.K. By the end of February, "Numb Little Bug" had been featured in over 50,000 user-generated social media videos and had garnered over a hundred million streams. It was included on her second EP, Egg in the Backseat, in July 2022. A duet with Stephen Sanchez, "Until I Found You," from Sanchez's Easy on My Eyes EP, followed later in the year and reached Australia's Top Ten. Beihold toured with King Princess and the Jonas Brothers before returning with "Roller Coasters Make Me Sad" in early 2023. It was followed by collaborations with Lauren Spencer-Smith and GAYLE ("Fantasy"), Meduza and Sam Tompkins ("Phone"), and Eric Nam ("House on a Hill") by mid-year. The singles kept coming in the form of solo outings like the quasi-acoustic "Pedestal" and the more rock-inflected "Maybe Life Is Good," the latter of which was the namesake of her 2024 headlining tour. A single about envy, "Brutus," eventually arrived in July 2025. ~ Marcy Donelson