When Lorely Rodriguez, better known by her stage alias Empress Of, first burst onto the music scene, it was a colorful introduction so to speak. Originally releasing a series of one-minute demos cleverly-titled Colorminutes via Youtube, the Cali-native’s debut serves as a powerful introduction to her ethereal voice, diary-like songwriting, and layered production. These 15 tracks also took a stance beyond the singer’s enticing vocals, because you learned exactly what Empress Of is truly about in less than 20 minutes. “I didn’t want people to just focus on me and my image as a female electronic artist,” says Rodriguez. “I wanted it to be about the music.”

More about the music, less about the woman behind it. To add to the mystery, Rodriguez created color-coded backgrounds for each of the one-minute videos to “let people figure it out for themselves.” Since Empress Of’s Pantone-heavy debut, Rodriguez has applied the same statement of discovery and self awareness in her work, which comes together when she states her own self-assured idols, the “real divas.”

“I used to sing a lot of Celine Dion alone in my room and pretend I was her,” Rodriguez admits. “And Mariah Carey, obviously.” No one can deny the fact that Mariah didn’t mind mixing her physical image and the voice, but with Rodriguez’s powerful voice and message, Empress Of might be the right kind of diva.

Not long after releasing Colorminutes and its follow up, Systems, Rodriguez performed her first live show at Brooklyn’s 285 Kent venue (RIP), where Terrible Records co-founders Chris Taylor and Ethan Silverman took notice from the crowd. Shortly after, she joined the independent label’s roster and quickly found herself packing for the trip that would change her life… and inform her debut LP.

The now viral story tells of how Rodriguez discovered herself as an artist while recording Me, her debut LP, while living alone in a remote Central Mexican village—and the transformation shows. The album opener “Everything is You” flirts with love and obsession while “How Do You Do It” gets as close to a club banger as Rodriguez will allow. But the highlight is “Kitty Cat,” which disguises itself as a love song at first listen, but quickly reveals itself as an anti-catcall anthem. Rodriguez purrs lines like “Don’t kitty kitty cat me like I’m just your pussy” before defiantly proclaiming “Let me walk away” in the chorus. But there’s always more to every empowering story, and additional details have been released in the form of Rodriguez’s recently-released track “Woman is a Word.”

“I didn’t want to make a super feminist record because being a feminist is just another aspect of being an electronic musician…of being who I am, says Rodriguez. “There are so many different stories to ‘me.’”

While Rodriguez has taken a much-needed stance on street harassment while being hailed as “Björk unleashing her inner Beyoncé” by music critics, her most memorable accomplishment occurred recently when she returned to Mexico to perform for the same city that helped birth Me. “To go back to Mexico and have three thousand people sing that songs that lived inside my brain and computer is a full circle feeling,” says Rodriguez. “It’s very surreal and hard to explain, but it felt really special.”

Positive reviews and overwhelming audience reactions aside, what does Rodriguez hope you “figure out” about her music? It’s quite simple, really. “I don’t want you people to listen to my music with something in mind; I want you to take away what you want to take away,” says Rodriguez. “So if you want to dance, dance to my music. If you want to cry, cry to my music. If you want to wash your dishes…”

You get the idea. “Do whatever you want to my music,” Rodriguez says. “I’m not trying to impose something on someone.”