INTERVIEW: Beckah Amani releases remarkable debut EP 'April': "There's so many good things happening and so many beautiful things to see, but also there's this undertone of chaos as well"
Interview: Jett Tattersall
Image: Maya Wanelik
Australian independent artist Beckah Amani is truly one of music’s superstars of the future. With a powerfully beautiful voice, and mesmerising music that brings pop, indie, folk and electronica together coupled with insightful lyrics that speak of issues affecting her generation, she is an artist you need on your playlist right now.
Born in Tanzania to parents of Burundian heritage before her family migrated to Australia when she was eight, Amani released her first single ‘Breathe’ in 2018, a stripped-back guitar ballad with folk leanings. It was followed in 2020 by the mesmerising song ‘Standards’, a blistering and heartbreaking takedown of the racism Amani suffered after moving to Australia, made all the more devastating by the gentle and beautiful vocal that delivers the message: “I put aside my heritage / Leaned into their privilege / Subdued my personality / So I could make them comfortable.”
After a break of 18 months, she returned earlier this year with ‘Lebeka Leka’, a bundle of hypnotic joy that saw Amani embrace a fuller sound, with pop beats intertwined with sounds from her native Tanzania and melodies tumbling over each other throughout the track. More singles followed - ‘I Don’t Know Why I Don’t Leave You’, which mixes piano with big-beat pop and the Afro-infused ‘Waiting On You’ - and today she releases her remarkable debut EP April.
April is a remarkable EP that mixes pop, folk and Afro sounds across its nine tracks and they all wrap themselves around your soul and refuse to let go. Alongside the already released singles and a orchestral version of ‘Standards’, the EP features two unreleased tracks as well as a spoken word interlude. ‘The Hills’ is a folky pop track with a ever changing tempo, and the EP title track and highlight ‘April’, is a gorgeous dive into subtle, restrained electronica which sees Amani explore the struggle of growing into your 20s and the emotional turmoil it can bring.
Also released today is the new single ‘Smoke And Mirrors’, produced and mixed by Matt Corby. It is a lush electronic-piano song on which Amani expresses her concerns around climate change. ”For many young people including myself, the climate change crisis is a very real and stressful reality,” she explains. “Particularly centred around our toxic and over consumption of fast fashion, the lyrics of this song details how we have fallen for ‘painted glitter and shiny little’ to the detriment of our environment and our future. The lyrics “smoke and mirrors” refers to the vagueness, misinformation, half truths and confusion that surrounds this issue and the fashion industries lack of activism for the sake of profits and “progress”.
April is an outstanding collection, and Amani weaves important stories through its nine tracks. By telling these stories of her heritage and her generation, she has found her grounding as an artist, and that is only going to make her a greater artist in the years to come. We recently caught up with her to find out more about the creation of the EP and her music career to date.
Beckah, first of all, it is an absolute joy to have a wedge of your time today, we are such fans of your work. How is the world treating you?
Oh, thank you! The world is treating me nicely. Things feel really good.
Let's talk about your beautiful debut EP April, which is such a collection. The title track is absolutely everything as well. Can you talk me through the significance of this track with regards to the collection as a whole?
Yeah, for me, the EP really was a way to reflect on how crazy it is growing up in the 20-somethings. As a young person, I'm at a stage where I'm discovering myself and discovering my heritage and how I relate to that. But also, it's an exciting time of figuring out what is love and what do I want out of it, but at the same time, there's just so much going on with the environment, there's just so many social issues. So it feels like a crazy, crazy, crazy time and I just wanted to capture what it feels like right now for a lot of young people growing up right now. It feels like family and friends are the only stable and real things that keep us alive and really looking forward to good things and dreams and all that stuff.
Oh, I love that. You mentioned your family, and of course the EP also has your gorgeous single 'Lebeka Leka' Can you talk to me a little bit about that track?
'Lebeka Leka' is really special. I'm quite an anxious person and something that my mum says all the time is, you know, ‘Lebeka leka. Like, let go of the stress, let go of the worry and things will happen the way they were supposed to be’. Going out there and chasing my dreams and stuff, I can easily be held back by being overwhelmed by anxiety. But my family always remind me of my worth and who I am. We're a family that has been everywhere and I grew up moving and stuff like that and it's always good to be reminded that just as my parents chased their dreams, they're also rallying behind me to go for it and not give in to the stress and the worries.
It's just it's such a big thing to hear about. The world's gotten uglier, it's gotten more beautiful in certain areas as well, but there's a lot of ugliness, too.
Yeah You know, ‘April’ is a metaphor for really how the season we are in life is very much like autumn in Australia. It's like a bit cold, but it's a bit warm. The leaves are shedding which is really beautiful and it's just this whirlwind of emotions and beautiful chaos. There's so many good things happening and so many beautiful things to see, but also there's this undertone of chaos as well. It's kind of a mixture of everything.
I want to talk to you about 'Standards’. The song is it's a conversation that you're having with yourself, but it's a conversation that needs to be had with the world. It's delivered with the rage and the heartbreak, but also with such kindness. It's so beautiful, can you talk to me a little bit about the creation of that track?
It first started off as a poem in 2020. I just had to get my thoughts and feelings onto paper and out of my head and my heart during 2020, because it was a big time of reflection for me with the Black Lives Matter movement and so many people finally talking about racism and systemic racism, and just so many different stories. For me, it was like, ‘Okay, I've got so much to unpack that I've kept in since I was a child’. I read the poem to my brother, and he was like, ‘Bec, this needs to be a song’. So I went to the studio, and we didn't have a structure or anything, it was just sort here's the guitar, you've grown up listening to stories, with mum and dad, just channel that and let it out and see what happens. And that's why we did it. I don't know how to describe it, but for me it was very cathartic and very therapeutic. Putting it out there and sharing it and having so many people message and go, ‘hey, you've described the way that I've grown up feeling and to see it in a song and be something that I can easily share with somebody and go, 'Hey, this is how I feel'‘ has really meant a lot for me. It's a song that I listen to many, many times when I feel confronted, again by some of those feelings to be encouraged to be bold and know that I'm really worthy. It's an encouragement
It’s also for the audience that doesn't just need to be comforted by it, but also needs to be confronted with it, with their own, possibly subconscious, racism. The line, ‘Subdued your personality so I could make them comfortable’, you have to have this duel personality where you can't be yourself because you don't want to scare the white people and it’s like - fuck it's 2022 and we're still doing that? It's so sad, it's just shit.
It really, really sucks. I had so many conversations with people that I've grown up that I didn't realise struggle with it. We change so much of ourselves to try and fit in and to try and make sense to white people. And then it's like, ‘No, I am a grown up. I really don't have to do this’. I should be able to just go. ‘This is who I am, unfiltered’. And that should be okay. It's a reawakening of just going ‘okay, I have to be myself and be strong in that’. White people need to clue into the fact that a lot of people aren't comfortable with just showing up as themselves, and we really need to change that and have more conversations about it and just reflect.
You spend some time in the UK earlier this year, you've come from Tanzania as a child to Queensland. Can you hear the miles that you've done in the music that you create? Can you hear the influences from every place?
Yes, I think so. I feel like a big part of music moving around for me has been storytelling, and that's been really influenced in this EP in trying to scope out a narrative, but also musically. Tapping into my heritage where my parents are from in Burundi and then leaning into Tanzania and approaching it more in the vocal aspect and harmonising aspect of things, and being in Australia - a new language a new culture. Being exposed to so many different types of music, I definitely feel like I've grabbed what a different place has meant to me and really channelled it in the EP.
Gorgeous. You're a poet with this incredible, just insanely vocal skill, it’s like you've got a magical bird in your throat. Have you always sung or have you always written? Where did your musical journey originate?I've always been around music. My mum and dad were both into music growing up, my dad was a choir conductor as well. Music had always just been something that I did until like 11 when I really stopped it. I just stopped being a consumer, a participator in music and it became really personal for me. It started with Ed Sheeran. Me and my family were watching The X Factor and Ed Sheeran was a guest artist performing 'The A Team'. For me that song just awakened the love for songwriting. I didn't realise pop songs could sound like that, or a story could be told in such an interesting and cool way. I then started writing that day. It was very personal, it wasn't something that I was sharing or putting out anywhere. At 16, 17 my brother was like, ‘I think you've got a nice voice, you should try and pursue music’. That started my journey going into the studio and sharing my music a bit more, busking and all that stuff to kind of get confident. So it started with Ed Sheeran with the songwriting, and the curiosity of how do you put a song together and how you present it.
Your gorgeous EP April is out now, tell me what else is on the cards for you?
At the moment just really tour. Start playing this EP live, which I'm very excited about and seeing what it feels like to share them with an audience. Then I might be going back to London to finish up my album and that should be really fun and exciting.
April is out now. You can listen here.
To keep up with all things Beckah Amani you can follow her on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
