Leilani Patao Is Careful With The Scissors
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Starting in 2021 at the age of seventeen, Brooklyn (via Los Angeles) based songwriter Leilani Patao put out a series of DIY self-releases, culminating in the acclaimed 2024 album, But What If? which earned, among other things, a feature on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. But despite this success, Patao grew increasingly disillusioned with the modern music industry and the systems surrounding it, as well as the constant pressure to turn art into content.
A year ago, Patao got rid of their Spotify subscription, bought an iPod, and committed to buying music directly from artists through Bandcamp and physical media. What began as a personal experiment quickly transformed into something larger: a complete reimagining of their relationship with music, community, and artistic independence.
“I learned that asking my friends what music they like and going to shows as much as I can is the best way to find new music," Patao explains. “I love paying artists for their music. I love going to the merch booth after the show, talking with whoever is there, and going home with a CD, or a shirt, or anything.”
That philosophy became the foundation for Daisy’ Patao’s acclaimed 2025 EP released via Audio Antihero. A project intentionally kept away from streaming platforms in favor of physical releases, direct support, and community-focused listening. Now, with daisy deluxe, Patao returns to expand the world of the EP with three additional songs, and remixes from tom the destroyer (Frog), Jeni Magaña (Mitski), Benjamin Shaw, and others.
“Daisy was new for me,” Patao writes. “A new sound surrounding stories I wasn’t even totally sure I wanted to share. But these three songs were made to be a part of the daisy songs, and I’m ready now.” The newly added tracks deepen the emotional and political core of the project, exploring heartbreak, trans identity, family history, and collective responsibility.
Lead single “kiddy scissors" is a tender portrait of queer and trans love, inspired by years spent cutting their girlfriend’s hair in dorm rooms and shared apartments. Built around warmth and emotional honesty, the song celebrates transformation as intimacy rather than spectacle.
“How beautiful it is to look inside yourself and discover what and who you want to be,” Patao says.
Elsewhere, ‘mundane descriptions’ documents the slow collapse of a relationship through the small details that accumulate, stairwells once filled with kisses, bouquets drying under homework, and snow melting on rooftops outside apartment windows. While looking out at the broader world, including the political landscape that we find ourselves within.
“You can’t cover your ears and call it peace,” Patao sings.
The release arrives after a year of immense personal and artistic growth for Patao. After graduating college, moving into their first apartment, strengthening ties within DIY music communities, and organizing around causes including Palestinian liberation, trans rights, immigration justice, and the intersections between them. The release acts as an extension of this work.
“I want to keep using my voice to create change, to make these safe spaces, to invite people to join me in calling on the music industry and the world to do better.”
For fans of emotionally vulnerable songwriting and indie pop that isn’t afraid to speak the truth, daisy deluxe is not just an expansion of an EP but a document of an artist learning in real time how to build a more human way of sharing music that covers passionate topics.
