SPOTLIGHT: VINCENT LIMA
Credit of Blue Shutters Music LLC / Island Records. Protected under fair use.
Meet Vincent Lima and tune into his brand new album “To Love A Thing That Fades”
On September 19, 2025, indie-folk musician Vincent Lima released his debut studio album, To Love A Thing That Fades, a sweeping 15-track journey through love, grief, and the fragile beauty of holding onto what inevitably slips away. For Lima, the album is more than just a collection of songs; it’s the closing chapter of the mythic story he’s been unraveling since his 2023 breakout “Orpheus.”
Recently Played had the honor to kickback with Lima to talk about the project,, he begun the conversation by describing his state of mind in one word: grateful. “I feel like it’s been received, and that’s a beautiful feeling,” he told me. “I’m feeling unquantifiably grateful, I think is the thesis of that.”
What sets Lima apart in a crowded landscape of folk-inspired singer-songwriters is his willingness to wrestle with vulnerability. Asked how he developed his distinct style, Lima reflected on his influences. “Originality is hiding your sources,” he mused. “It’s like letting influences in and speaking your own truths (…) and then one day you just realize you’ve created something that feels super original. I still don’t think I’ve cracked the case on what I am, and I think any good artist never answers that question. You’re always sort of a student of the world.”
Listening to To Love A Thing That Fades, that sense of constant learning is clear. Songs like “Dance Here Slowly” and “Captured” carry the fragile intimacy, while the ambitious “The End of Eurydice” places him firmly in the tradition of storytellers like Hozier and Cat Stevens, artists he openly cites as inspirations.
The album’s centerpiece, “The Fire,” has already emerged as a pivotal piece to the album’s puzzle. Stripping away romanticized notions of love as salvation, the track replaces them with the stark reality of love as risk, loss, and companionship through the flames: “Love isn’t rescue, it’s someone to lose,” he sings, his voice burning as fiercely as the metaphor itself.
Lima admitted that much of the album was shaped not in the studio, but in conversation with audiences on tour. “I was telling the myth of Orpheus at all the shows and most of these songs hadn’t been written yet,” he recalled. “A friend told me, ‘You should trust that people want to hear what you have to say.’ In slowing down and sharing more, I started saying things that caught me off guard. I discovered a lot of the album while talking about it to strangers on tour.”
Releasing a debut album in today’s music climate comes with its own weight. For Lima, the challenge has always been balancing personal expression with outside expectations. “I think it’s really important to have a really big why that belongs only to you,” he explained. “Orpheus was the song that brought me back to that why. There are so many bad things about being a musician mentally, tickets, streaming numbers, comparison. The why needs to be more important than all those things.”
Lima frames his progress against himself, not against the competition. “I had nothing going on for years and years. Now I can compare against the old version of myself. There will always be people making you feel small, but then you meet the artists you admire, and they’re peers now.”
Even with his first full-length now out in the world, Lima is already looking forward. “My biggest goal is always going to be to feel the sense of creative pride and fullness of the album I’m working on,” he told me. “Hopefully that well doesn’t dry up until album four or five at least.” However, he’s not without big-stage dreams: “I’d love to headline Red Rocks one day, sell it out, play the Gorge, Radio City. To feel a room of 3,000 people experiencing all these things together—I can only imagine how grand that would feel.”
Before our conversation ended, I asked Lima what advice he’d offer to aspiring artists. His answer was as humble: “De-stigmatize the concept of writer’s block. If nothing’s coming out, it’s not your time, but that doesn’t mean your time isn’t coming. When I can’t write, I make sure to consume other art. Everything you take in comes out.”
That same philosophy captures the spirit of To Love A Thing That Fades, an album born from grief, reflection, and the bravery of staring at what others might turn away from. For Vincent Lima, nothing is unworthy of love, not even what’s slipping from view.
Listen to “To Love A Thing That Fades” here.
Vincent Lima will be headlining The Troubadour in Los Angeles on December 1st.
