On her latest release, Responsible Friend, Elizabeth Ziman turns inward to explore what it really means to show up for the people we love. The album, released under her long-running project Elizabeth and The Catapult, is a meditation on caregiving, grief, restraint, and the quiet strength it takes to stand beside someone without trying to save them.
“Responsible Friend is an album about the ways in which we show up for one another,” Ziman explains.
“The first lesson I learned about caregiving is that I need to put on my own oxygen mask before I can help anyone else. The next lesson — and the one you won’t find in an airline seat-back — was that no matter how much I wanted to, I couldn’t take away anyone’s pain. I wasn’t there to fix anyone. I just had to accept them on their own terms.”
That philosophy anchors the LP. Across its tracklist, Ziman moves through intensely personal terrain: the passing of a family member, supporting a friend living with long COVID, and navigating a society saturated with conflict and injustice. “I realized that everyone I knew, including myself, was being asked to process an enormous amount of grief at an alarming pace,” she says. “Writing these songs became my way to surrender to those experiences and slow down enough to be fully present for the people in my life.”
The title track, “Responsible Friend,” captures the tension of a flirtation between two longtime friends who know better than to cross a certain line. It’s a study in restraint — the delicate balance between desire and preserving something meaningful. Though Ziman initially hesitated to write and release the song, it ultimately became the emotional cornerstone of the album. “I realized after writing it that ‘responsible friend’ was an unconscious theme running throughout the record — being responsible to others, to myself, and to the world at large.”
“I Love You Still” emerged after Ziman spent time in and out of the hospital with someone close to her. Rather than dramatizing the experience, the song settles into acceptance. “It took me a while to realize that the best gift I could give was to accept them exactly as they were, pain and all,” she says. The track embodies the difficult practice of letting go of control while holding on to love.
With “Learning to Drive,” Ziman uses her New York City upbringing — including the fact that she still doesn’t know how to drive — as a metaphor for the cyclical nature of adulthood. Growing up, she suggests, is not a one-time event but an ongoing process of making mistakes, setting boundaries too late, and acquiring skills you feel you should already have. The song carries humor and warmth, acknowledging that progress is rarely linear and that self-trust must be rebuilt again and again.
“50/50” takes a wider lens, grappling with the cosmic unfairness of the modern world. The song juxtaposes stark contradictions: one person getting high while another gets sober; one winning the lottery while another faces eviction; one going to college while another is sent to war. “It took me three years to write the lyrics because there was so much happening in real time that I wanted to include,” Ziman shares. The result is a dizzying yet grounded reflection on inequity and shared humanity.
“Bored of Myself,” originally written for 2020’s Sincerely, E, examines the loneliness that can accompany creative life. For an artist who spends much of her time alone with her thoughts, inspiration can sometimes curdle into isolation. Sonically nodding to the playful textures of Ram by Paul McCartney, the track balances self-awareness with melodic buoyancy, turning inward reflection into something expansive and relatable.
Some songs on Responsible Friend feel like joyful dedications; others read like letters Ziman wasn’t sure she wanted to send. Taken together, the album becomes a gentle act of resistance against a culture that demands constant acceleration. It is a call to slow down, to bear witness, and to remain present even when solutions are out of reach.
As the singer, songwriter, and creative force behind Elizabeth and The Catapult, Elizabeth Ziman has long been celebrated for her piano-driven compositions, emotional precision, and disarming honesty. With Responsible Friend, she delivers one of her most intimate and expansive works yet — an unflinching reflection on care, grief, boundaries, and the quiet, radical act of continuing to show up.
Elizabeth & The Catapult Tour Dates
April 08 – New York, NY @ Joe’s Pub
April 10 – Annapolis, MD @ Rams Head Live (with David Wax Museum)
April 11 – Philadelphia, PA @ World Cafe Live
April 13 – Vienna, VA @ TBA
April 17 – Nashville, TN @ Analog
April 24 – Los Angeles, CA @ Hotel Café
April 26 – Ojai, CA @ Ojai Arts Underground
April 28 – Berkeley, CA @ Back Room Music
May 01 – Seattle, WA @ Rabbit Box
May 14 – Exeter, NH @ The Word Barn
May 21 – Boston, MA @ Club Passim
For more information, visit elizabethandthecatapult.com.
→ Continue reading at NYS Music
