INTERVIEW: Robinson returns with new single and video 'Teenage Renegade': "There's moments you doubt yourself and worry about the unknown, but it's nice to know that fearless self is still inside."

Interview: Jett Tattersall

New Zealand born, now UK based Robinson (full name Anna Robinson) had a major global breakthrough in 2018 with her single ‘Nothing To Regret’. The ode to living with no regrets became a summer smash across the world, with more than 130 millions streams to date on Spotify alone.

Further hit singles followed, with streams in the tens of millions, and Robinson relocated to the UK to develop her craft. Returning to New Zealand just before the pandemic, she stayed in her home country for two years, releasing the EP Watching You during this time.

At the end of last month she returned with the single ‘Teenage Renegade’, her first new music in two years. A lush pop track awash with electronic and synth sounds backed with a pulsing beat, it gradually builds in intensity as the song progresses, as stripped back verses grow into powerful, passionate choruses. Lyrically, ‘Teenage Renegade’ is almost the cautionary companion piece to ‘Nothing To Regret’ and looks back at how much freer, braver and confident we are as young children before the knocks of adult life gradually strip that away from us. “I used to be so reckless / How could I forget this?…Don’t know where that girl has gone,” she sings.

“When we’re young, we often have a blissful unawareness of the consequences and do things without a second thought,” Robinson says. “But as we experience pain, loss and hurt, we start to walk through life more carefully, protecting our hearts. I wrote this song to remind myself that inside us all is a wild, joyful soul that needs to be free in all of our beauty. We are all teenage renegades at heart.”

Robinson has always been an artist that has expertly combined the feel good, euphoric rush of pop music with deep and meaningful lyrics that speak of universal truths. There is a special feel to her music that wraps around you and burrows into your heart and it is a joy to have new music from her once again. We recently caught up with Robinson to chat more about the creation of ‘Teenage Renegade’.

Hi Anna it is a joy to be sitting down with you today to chat about your new music, how are things with you?
So good. I feel so happy and excited to be travelling for my music again, which obviously was at an all time low over the COVID lockdown. It feels very almost surreal to be back and releasing music. It's amazing.

You have released one hell of a song with ‘Teenage Renegade’, talk me through this explosive nostalgia soaked joy.
It encapsulates that feeling when you're young, and you haven't really experienced the full extent of heartbreak and the things that scare you. You kind of just jump into life without thinking too much about it. I was capturing that feeling as you get older, and you do experience heartbreak and hurt and things that are scary. It makes you not want to open your heart as much to life. So I was reminiscing on that free self and trying to channel that to some parts of the anxiety you feel as you get older.

Even melodically the song swings from complete release to quieter, claustrophobic moments and so you get that fear, cynicism, and then the explosiveness of joy, which I guess comes from reflection. Where were you tapping into those feelings, those memories?
Especially for me, I love a good heartfelt story. Whenever I'm reading or listening to anything, I always connect the most to those moments where it's really heartfelt and you can understand what that person is feeling. So for me, the verses were a reflection of that really wild and carefree young girl who was just like, ‘I'm gonna make all my dreams come true’. It's almost a little bit of delusion, but you're just like, ‘I can do anything and I don't care how it works out’. It's that real, very brave approach to life. I was really probably just channelling that bad arse 13 year old who just did everything. As much as I still carry that within me, there's some moments where you can doubt yourself and worry about the unknown or things that you can't control. But it's nice to know that that fearless self is still inside.

I love that you say that, often when people make stories and songs about adolescence, it's not this fearless joy. It's broken turmoil of high school.
Oh yeah, I mean, that's chaotic in itself but I feel it's almost like you a kind of new to it all. Things do definitely knock you down in high school, but I always had that mentality where you just think you can do anything, which you can really it's just your mindset that changes.

The cynicism comes to protect us as we get older.
Yeah, it’s like ‘maybe you should think about the consequences of that, if you were to do that’. But it's a complete delusion when you like, ‘it's fine. It'll work itself out, and I'm just going to do it anyway.’

That's true, you need the balance because the little old lady on your shoulder, she helps you up to a certain point but sometimes you need the teenager as well!
Yeah, that is the perfect combination, having that newfound wisdom that you get as you experience life but never forgetting or never letting go of that fearless self throughout your whole life as well.

Now talk me through the composition melodically because there's a lot of shifts in this song.
I'm a really big Kate Bush fan and I was channelling a bit of that storyteller-esque verses where it comes back down to a moment of reflection and then as the song builds I have those moments of great introspection, but then I love the opposite of that where I'm chaotic, and I love life and I love to experience things. I feel like for me that was the perfect blend where melodically it explodes into the chorus. That was essentially the feeling.

I love it. Talk me through your road into music. You were writing in high school, so you've always written songs, you've always had music around you. Tell me a little bit about where you started and how you got to be where you're at now.
I love that, I love reflecting because I always feel like sometimes I don’t do that and I'm like, ‘oh, yeah, I was 14 at one point in my life!’ I grew up in a very musical family. My grandmother was an amazing classical singer and she played piano by ear, she never really actually learned. There was always music in the house, so I grew up with so much immersion of sound. My mum knew I loved singing because I never stopped and she tried to teach me the piano because she was classically, professionally taught. But for some reason, I found it really difficult to pay attention and it was a kind of dead end moment. But I really came to find my own way of learning the piano and combining the storytelling. I loved writing poems, but I got into my teens and started experiencing those more intense feelings, it just made sense blending those two things. My music teacher really encouraged me to perform, but I was very shy. It was the polarising nature of being shy but wanting to be an artist, I was so scared to perform in front of people. But as time went on, and through doing it more, I really started to build that confidence.

I had this strong urge to move to America, because I watched a lot of Disney Channel and thought, obviously, that's how I'm gonna make my break, by being a Disney star. I found the number of Hollywood Records on the internet and made my poor mother call them and try and set me up a meeting! So she called them - my mum is so beautiful and sweet - and she just had this idea that it would be great for me to sing ‘Firework’ by Katy Perry down the phone! This poor receptionist had to listen to some 14 year old singing down the phone, she was really nice and gave me lots of encouragement and 14 year old me felt very inspired. I didn't move to America, but I feel my story panned out in a very natural way.

That's a beautiful story. I love the use of ‘Firework’ on the phone!
I feel like that was my mum's favourite song at the time. So she was like, ‘I love that ‘Firework’ song, it's so inspiring for the youth so do that’. But that was the fearless part of me, I was so shy but then I also had that part of me that was like ‘just do it’. And I did.

You have gone New Zealand, London, LA, New Zealand…you've travelled a lot producing, creating, songwriting, working with lots of people. Can you hear the collective sounds of all those cities within the music you're making?
Sometimes it can more the people that you're writing with. Obviously when you're from different places, you have very different experiences and the influences can be very different. You're bringing in what you've been surrounded by, and meshing it with other people from different parts of the world. It's incredible being able to collaborate with people from all over the world, you just learn so much about different parts of life. You might have one story, and someone might say something, and you haven't really thought about it like that. The two years that I took away from the industry over Covid was really amazing, because I just got to kind of be in my mum’s sleep out in New Zealand and immerse myself in every genre, there was nothing that was off limits, it was just a time to be really free. That's really helped for developing this 2.0 version of Robinson.

Gorgeous. Obviously, we've got ‘Teenage Renegade’, and we're dancing and we wanting to go back in time and hug our 13 year old girl selves. What else is coming up for you?
I feel like I've had this beautiful time where I've been able to really be with myself and slow down, which I keep saying is a really important thing that I didn't know before. I feel like 18 year old Anna would never slow down but 25 year old Anna is all about that. That's really allowed the music to flourish. When you sit with yourself, there's just so much room to be creative. I've written so much music, to the point I have just about finished an EP, the next single is all lined up and ready to go. So lots of music to come.

‘Teenage Renegade’ is out now. You can download and stream here.

To keep up with all things Robinson you can follow her on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok.