Sofia Isella’s “Above the Neck” Goes Below the Surface

If anyone can write a song that doesn’t pull its lyrical punches, it’s Sofia Isella. If you need proof, look no further than the name of the tour she’s currently wrapping up: YOU’LL UNDERSTAND, DICK. The singer/songwriter/producer’s latest alt-rock slam poem “Above the Neck” is guttural, visceral, witty—quintessentially Sofia Isella.

The track and its grotesque artwork is equal parts hypnotizing and unsettling, the perfect combination to tackle the infantilization and objectification of women’s desire—“You’re twelve looking twenty, or you’re twenty looking twelve / And you’re tight, and you’re baby, and you’re sexy about it.”

“Above the Neck” acknowledges the misogynistic fantasy of a woman who exists solely to please men without also getting pleasure from it (“Because cluelessness is easier to get off to”), the retaliatory subversion by women using it to their benefit (“They’ve learned that the closer you look like to a kid / The more money you get from a forty-two-year-old piece of shit”), followed by men expecting that on-screen dynamic in real life (“There’s no button to push for third base”). It’s a sick, twisted, complex cycle that Sofia Isella expertly condenses into three minutes and forty-five seconds. Thematically, this track is in conversation with Sabrina Carpenter’s ‘Man’s Best Friend’ and its ensuing debates about the patriarchal gaze and performance.

A pulsing synth opening the song disorients the listener, priming them for Sofia Isella’s spoken delivery of the lyrics accented by a sparse drum beat, keeping the listener’s focus on the words’ meaning. The track breaks from its detached lyrical delivery into a moaning chorus backed by searing electric guitar—“Sex is everywhere / And if it’s not, then somebody will put it there.” Yes, this track sounds sexy . . . or are you just projecting your own desire onto it?

Sofia Isella is currently wrapping up her YOU’LL UNDERSTAND, DICK. tour abroad in Australia, then is slated as the special guest for Florence + the Machine’s EVERYBODY SCREAM tour in April for their shows in D.C., Boston, NYC, and Philadelphia. Next, she’ll embark on the HER DESIRE, THE NEMESIS headlining European tour in spring 2026.

Find Sofia Isella’s upcoming tour dates here, and listen to “Above the Neck” below.