The LA-based artist fuses soft-pop and folk in her candid new record, I Don’t Know How But They Found Me!. Here, she talks stereotypes, jamming with Justin Bieber and why finding a label is a bit like dating...
INTERVIEW: Miranda Bardsley
PHOTO: Bao Ngo
I Don’t Know How But They Found Me! is your second album. How have you grown between your first record and this one?
“This album is about me being a lot more self-assured and comfortable in who I am and especially in my taste. There was a lot of growing up that happened between my first record, [2022’s] Are You Happy Now?, and this one. That first album was a story of my coming of age, and this one is about breakups, relationships, things I hadn’t experienced before. It really establishes me as a firm adult.”
How have you built up that confidence in your taste?
“I’ve had a lot of people try to categorise my music into something that it isn’t. When I was first playing shows people would be like, ‘You’re like the Cranberries, but soulful,’ and I’d be like, ‘You just mean I’m Black and you’re confused.’ I don’t get that anymore, but I continue to be one of the only Black women in this space, so people are like, ‘Oh, it’s soul or R&B,’ which it definitely isn’t. I think my early work was overcompensating a bit in response to that. I used to insist on making sure my music sounded like my influences – my producer would send me stuff and I’d be like, ‘This doesn’t sound like Kacey Musgraves or Phoebe Bridgers!’ and he’d say, ‘Well, you have to sound like you.’ I now have the confidence to pay homage to the people I admire without doing pastiche. I’m very happy with how my career has been going, but I do wonder if things would be different if I was white. But there is positive movement happening, and every day I’m finding cool, Black artists who I’m blown away by.”
When you posted the LP’s lead single, Massachusetts, online, it went viral; Justin Bieber shared it and you ended up hanging out together and jamming. Can you tell us about that?
“I didn’t actually want the song on the album originally because we’d figured out the tracklist and I didn’t think it was that good! But when it went viral, I thought, ‘OK, this is resonating with people.’ I finished it alone in a hotel room a few weeks later, but even then, I thought I’d just play it at live shows. A month later, Bieber posted it! He followed me and I messaged him like, ‘You’re everything,’ and he was like, ‘You’re everything.’ So I gave him my number and said if he ever wanted to write, to let me know. I didn’t hear from him for a year, obviously, busy guy. But [a year on], we end up jamming the whole day at his with his producers and instrumentalist friends. We’d start stuff, stop for a break to eat, talk, shoot around on the basketball court. After about seven hours I was like, ‘I think I have to go home.’ He was so sweet, I hope that something from that day turns into something, but I don’t know – and I don’t know if he knows!”
You’re signed to Dead Oceans. Did you always want to go down the indie route and how has that relationship been?
“My parents don’t work in the music industry so all I knew were the big labels. I’ve had friends sign to majors and have had positive experiences… it really is like dating – one person might be like, ‘They sucked,’ and another might be like, ‘They’re my soulmate.’ But I’m a slow-burn artist, and I knew that if I went with Dead Oceans they would give me the space to turn up the gas in my own way, and make a bigger cultural moment with this album. I have an amazing team.”
KEY RELEASE: I Don’t Know How But They Found Me!
LABEL: Dead Oceans
MANAGEMENT: Armand Troy & Kristin Gregory, Family Business
INSTAGRAM: @jensenmcrae
