The Aces Talk Their New Single & Writing Their Queer Disco Album (Exclusive)

The Aces lead singer Cristal Ramirez remembers fighting with her younger sister and drummer, Alisa, about the direction of their 2025 album, Gold Star Baby.

Coming off 2023’s “more somber and angsty”I’ve Loved You for So Long, their record born out of the isolation of the COVID pandemic, the all-girl band from Orem, Utah, “really wanted to make something that celebrated our identities and celebrated our queerness,” Cristal, 29, tells PEOPLE ahead of the release of their new single, “Square One,” which is out today.

PEOPLE is exclusively premiering “Square One,” a song that’s meant to say “f— you and your new girlfriend,” and was born out of heartbreak.

“I was in a place emotionally when we were writing ‘Square One’ where although a lot of time had passed since a heartbreak, the smallest thing could trigger all those feelings again,” Alisa, 28, said.

“I felt really frustrated with the process of healing. I had to reckon with the fact that even though I so badly wanted to be moved on, I just wasn’t. You can’t snap your fingers and tell your heart to mend back together, it doesn’t work that way. So this song was finally me accepting that and sitting in those emotions.”

Despite its melancholic subject, the song still sits perfectly on The Aces’ Gold Star Baby, a disco album inspired by the artists that the Ramirez sisters’ parents raised them on — like Earth, Wind and Fire, Whitney Houston, the Bee Gees and The Commodores. But it took some convincing on Alisa’s part for Cristal to see her vision for the new record.

“I remember fighting with Alisa about it because she was so sure about it early on. She’s like, ‘We need to write a disco record.’ You’re bugging me, I haven’t even written three songs. Can I just write some music? I don’t know what it’s gonna be,” Cristal recalled.

“[Alisa’s] like, ‘No, I know we need to write a disco record. Like, it’s gonna be so sick.'”

And write one they did — out of the studio in 29-year-old guitarist Katie Henderson’s apartment.

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“[Alisa] had this whole kind of world in her head, and she had done a bunch of research on the history of disco and the movement of disco, and how it really was for marginalized people and and all this different stuff,” Cristal said.

“So she came to me and the girls and was like, ‘Just trust me, let’s like, go after this a little bit.’ And I mean, growing up on disco, it’s natural melodically for us.

“We were going through immense transition, but we would just show up every single day, and we would go to this little studio … and we would just write music.

“A song like ‘Jealous’ and ‘The Magic’ and all that stuff, we wanted to be those versions of ourselves. We were making this world that maybe in our reality we weren’t feeling, but we wanted in those moments because we were going through so much transition. We’re speaking in real time and singing about the way that we want it to feel and … what we wanted to explore.

“We really went after the concept and we’ve never done that before.”

Katie said that herself, Cristal, Alisa and bassist McKenna Petty, 29, coming together in her home was “so special.” They would show up, ready to work, at 1 p.m. “every day of the week” for “pretty much the whole year of 2024.”

“It also allowed us to just be very authentic and when Cristal and Alisa would get into lyrics, I think we would dive into more of like, what we would really say and more of our candor,” she said.

Katie added the new album was “very reminiscent of our first record.”

“There’s a lot of sonic similarities between our first record (2018’s When My Heart Felt Volcanic) in this record … like rhythmic disco, percussive guitar, and like the way [McKenna] plays bass.”

And what The Aces ended up with is a (respectfully) hot, sexy and sapphic album celebrating queer identity.

“We talk about this a lot. I think that you see sexuality expressed … especially for women, it’s always very feminine … and it’s always very one type of way, especially in pop music,” Cristal tells PEOPLE.

“You’re seeing more and more androgynous or masculine women expressing themselves sexually. And I think that that’s really kind of new. You see someone like a Towa Bird, or like … MUNA even … I think that we’re going through this time where we’re finally starting to see sexual expression in different types of identities, especially as women or queer people or however you identify. And so it feels … kind of like a movement in a way.”

Gold Star Baby is out now, with the deluxe version coming out in February 2026. You can listen to their new single, “Square One,” now here.

They’re currently on their world tour, which ends on Feb. 26 in London, U.K.