Indigo De Souza has been making music since they were a child, and busked on the streets of downtown Asheville, North Carolina as a preteen. Born in 1997 to a white American artist mother and a black-Brazilian musician father, De Souza moved to a rural Appalachian mountain community after their parents’ divorce. Raised by their single mother who glued naked Barbie dolls to her flaming red pickup truck and protested various government actions in a conservative town of 2,000 people, Indigo felt like an outsider during their childhood. As they entered their teens and early twenties, they pursued music and navigated abandonment that triggered intense sadness and anxiety. Music became their primary form of emotional coping and creative expression, and they released their first recordings in 2016.
In 2018, their first studio album, I Love My Mom, was reissued by Saddle Creek, building their grassroots fanbase. Their second album, Any Shape You Take (2021) marked a turning point in De Souza’s career, earning Best New Music from Pitchfork. Following its release, they toured nationally and globally. All of This Will End (2023), their third album, also received strong critical praise with Atwood Magazine calling it “nothing short of brilliance.” De Souza regularly fills beloved venues and is known for their emotional and vulnerable live performances.
De Souza’s rise as an indie star coincided with a deterioration in their mental health, culminating in a 2023 diagnosis of borderline personality disorder. The diagnosis offered a framework for healing. Today, their music career, mental health journey, activism, and personal value system are inseparable. They prize community, empathy, and tapping into Wise Mind. Their lyrics draw directly from their life experience, while their work beyond music centers on mental health awareness and support.
They bring to their professional life the same drive to connect, understand, and communicate deeply that shapes their personal relationships. Now based in Los Angeles, they continue to evolve—finding stability through DBT, community, and creative growth—while building a body of work defined by emotional intensity and radical self-examination.
