Fresh Finds is Teen Vogue's new franchise dedicated to highlighting the badass female artists, musicians, and filmmakers you need to know.

After making her critically-acclaimed debut Psychopomp, Michelle Zauner aka Japanese Breakfast apparently considered quitting music to pursue a career path that was more aligned with what her late "tiger mom" would have wanted her to do. That led to a brief foray into the world of advertising, but, thankfully, Michelle didn't stray too far from music for long — as she's just released Soft Sounds From Another Planet. We, for one, are glad to see her back (and better than ever) with a gorgeous record that is some of the coziest, nostalgia-inducing music you can think of. So ahead of the release, we took a second to chat with Michelle about everything from her Korean-American roots to overcoming everything from imposter syndrome to emotional abuse to grief, and how you can turn all this negativity into something truly magical. Read our interview with her below:

Teen Vogue: How did you get started making music? And where this particular project come from?

Michelle Zauner: I started writing music when I was 16. I had like a solo project and I had an all girl band in college for a couple of years. Then I was in a band called Little Big League for about three or four years. Then my mom got sick, so I moved back to Oregon to care for her, and I kind of put the band on indefinite hiatus. Unfortunately, she passed away, and while I was in Oregon, helping take care of the house and being a support system for my dad, the only way that I could have something for myself was if I made my own record. So I kind of carved out some time to do that. That's how I made Psychopomp.

TV: So is it fair to say that Japanese Breakfast is a project birthed from healing or like grief and trying to reckon with that?

MZ: Totally. I mean, I started doing some lo-fi demos under this name. Then when that happened, I decided to put out this record under my name. It was surprisingly successful. I've been in touring band for like five years and it just wasn't happening for me, and then this is the record that did really well finally.

TV: Yeah, I know. It's like a cool record and project. I've just always wondered about the name, Japanese Breakfast.

MZ: I think I just wanted something that sounded kind of curious, like something that sounded really American and well-known, like breakfast, and combining it with something that I think American people just associate with something exotic or foreign. I thought it would make people curious, like "What is a Japanese breakfast?" Japanese Breakfast is quite like beautiful and I really enjoy it. I think I was just looking at pictures of it one day and was just like, "Oh, I'll just release this album under this name."

TV: I don't know why Japan's always the go-to reference point when Western people talk about Asia though. Do you it's just because Japan is such a weirdly fetishized thing to Americans?.

MZ: Yeah, it's so true. I think that I grew up feeling that way too, because when I grew up there was no Korean popular culture in America. So I grew up relating to Japanese culture quite a bit because it felt like the closest thing I had. I think I kind of put it off of that. It's frustrating because a lot of people just assume that I'm Japanese, even though I'm very vocal about being Korean. I wanted to try to bring my identity and my culture to light with the "Everybody Wants To Love You" video, and I talk quite a bit about my culture.