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[00:00:00] How did you decide to become a musician?
[00:00:12] Well I thought it would be a nice idea
[00:00:16] to like change the scenery from Paris. I used to be in Paris
[00:00:23] and I thought that artistically I got like more needs
[00:00:27] I wanted to be more challenged and more stimulated.
[00:00:32] And I thought New York would be a good scene.
[00:00:35] I've never heard somebody leaving Paris because they wanted a change of scenery.
[00:00:38] I mean, in terms of scenery, like it seems like Paris is the place to be.
[00:00:42] No, I think artistically New York is much more crazy and complex and stimulating.
[00:00:53] I didn't think I was getting...
[00:00:57] I really started going into more experimentation sound-wise and artistically.
[00:01:06] And I didn't feel that Paris was giving me where I wanted to go.
[00:01:11] And indeed, coming to New York gave me much freedom and much more trust in my abilities.
[00:01:21] And designing sounds.
[00:01:24] Why do you think that is? Is it just the people that are out here to collaborate with?
[00:01:29] Yeah, there's definitely a little bit of everything here.
[00:01:35] There's a little bit of everything in everybody.
[00:01:38] In so many different directions and atmospheres.
[00:01:43] I don't think anything sounds too crazy.
[00:01:47] When I started experimenting and exploring and collaborating with different musicians here and different artists,
[00:01:56] yeah, I didn't think there were any limits.
[00:01:59] But I also collaborate with people from a little bit everywhere.
[00:02:04] It depends on the album.
[00:02:06] So I'm not just in New York.
[00:02:10] I think New York was also some sort of an interesting headspace for me.
[00:02:16] As I mentioned before, I'm in Queens and in terms of picking...
[00:02:20] Paris probably isn't bad for this either.
[00:02:22] But in terms of picking one place to be where you have immediate access to everybody from every part of the world,
[00:02:28] it's hard to do better than New York.
[00:02:32] Yeah, exactly.
[00:02:35] And yeah, I feel also like whoever comes here, whatever mindset they were on,
[00:02:42] I think there's something specific to just being in New York.
[00:02:46] And it's like being close to the ocean.
[00:02:50] I don't know. It gives this very special combo.
[00:02:54] There's also just this sense of hustle here.
[00:02:57] And I think a lot of that is very pragmatic too.
[00:03:00] I think that's just a result of how expensive it is to live here that you can't really slack,
[00:03:08] that you have to focus on your work, especially if that's the work that you're using to survive.
[00:03:15] Yeah, definitely.
[00:03:21] I feel like in some way Paris kind of spoils,
[00:03:28] France kind of spoils people and makes them comfortable.
[00:03:33] And probably the other way, the other opposite here makes people just search more in themselves
[00:03:44] and never ever really sit comfortably.
[00:03:48] You're always searching for more, you're always exploring,
[00:03:54] you're always challenged and challenging yourself.
[00:03:57] I'm from California originally, which is in a lot of ways much more laid back than it is out here.
[00:04:04] But I've been here for I guess about 20 years at this point.
[00:04:08] And it's like anything else where the grass is greener,
[00:04:14] where it also if you stay here for too long and you're constantly kept in that hustle,
[00:04:19] like you start to miss the slower pace of other parts of life.
[00:04:24] Yeah, that's where I am now.
[00:04:27] I'm starting to be like, OK, maybe I want to live in Istanbul or Cairo,
[00:04:35] which are other hustling cities actually.
[00:04:38] They're not much more relaxed.
[00:04:41] But yeah, I'm starting to like want to explore a different direction.
[00:04:48] Those are also much closer to home for you.
[00:04:51] Yeah, I do have this connection with Turkey, with the Arab world,
[00:05:00] with my country, with Europe that somehow makes me like always try to be on both sides.
[00:05:14] Do you think that to a certain extent that moving out there,
[00:05:19] that your music would be more focused on or that you'd be writing more Arabic lyrics?
[00:05:25] I don't know.
[00:05:30] It's hard to predict, honestly, because I think that I'm always I'm always writing
[00:05:40] or creating with the combination of whatever elements are around me and how I feel.
[00:05:49] I'm realizing more and more that like the way because I just got back,
[00:05:54] I was touring and my mindset is completely different since I landed.
[00:05:59] I feel like wherever your feet are touching, you get this like mix of inspiration.
[00:06:08] And it's hard to predict exactly which artistic and creative space you're going to be in.
[00:06:17] But it will definitely I will definitely be different.
[00:06:21] Yeah, I'm curious how specifically the language that you're writing in is a reflection of artistic space for you.
[00:06:29] Um, I was a little bit like struggling with that because I wrote in Arabic for a long time.
[00:06:44] I didn't start writing in Arabic right away.
[00:06:47] I was actually initially I was just doing covers and not being English and Spanish
[00:06:54] because I was yeah, I was mixing all these inspirations from the Cranberries,
[00:07:01] Sinead O'Connor, John Lennon, Led Zeppelin.
[00:07:05] And eventually I got into writing my own songs and I started writing in Arabic.
[00:07:12] And then after living in New York for a few years, I started missing actually singing in English and writing in English,
[00:07:20] which always felt a little bit like home, which is which may probably be a little bit surprising or, you know,
[00:07:31] like a Western media or audience.
[00:07:34] But yeah, English has English the English language has been a big part of my artistic life.
[00:07:44] So it kind of felt like a full circle moment, especially with one of Jeff Buckley's songs, New Year's Prayer.
[00:07:52] It's a song that I experimented with a lot.
[00:07:56] And like for once I felt that I really took it to a space that was mine and that was mine in a very,
[00:08:05] very authentic and deep way that I was like this is OK.
[00:08:09] This is me. This is my artistic identity.
[00:08:12] And that's when I realized that I was ready to explore with English.
[00:08:18] And then I had this like, OK, I don't want to write in Arabic anymore moment for a bit.
[00:08:24] And then eventually, like, you know, I went to Tunisia, which is yeah, which might explain explain why I started like reuniting with.
[00:08:34] All my multiple layers and facets, and I started writing in Arabic again and singing in Arabic again,
[00:08:42] you know, in a way where OK, it's not because it's expected of me.
[00:08:48] It's not because this is what I'm supposed to be doing.
[00:08:51] It's just something that is me.
[00:08:53] And then I went back and forth between experimenting with English, French and Arabic.
[00:09:00] And that's what made my new album what it is.
[00:09:03] I'm always curious about people singing in their non-native language from the standpoint of things like meter.
[00:09:12] You know, I think a lot about I don't know if you've read any Nabokov,
[00:09:17] but like he wrote when he wrote Lolita, he wrote it in English.
[00:09:22] I think it might have been the first thing that he wrote in English and different languages take on very different personalities
[00:09:31] when you're somebody who is very, I guess, for lack of a better term, poetical minded and someone who sort of thinks in poetry.
[00:09:44] Languages just sound differently and they lend themselves differently to music because of that.
[00:09:51] Yeah, well, thank you for thank you for saying that because I know that I had a lot of conversations about this with like people that were close to me.
[00:10:04] And I'm sure like a lot of my audience must have been disappointed.
[00:10:08] And there's a lot of like when you're an artist, you kind of belong to everybody.
[00:10:13] You belong to your label. You belong to your friends.
[00:10:16] You belong to your audience.
[00:10:19] And it's hard to explain to everybody that you first of all belong to yourself and your authentic self.
[00:10:27] And that's where you have to be in order for them to be able in order to give like pieces of you to the world.
[00:10:38] You have to start like by, you know, though I identify with a few artists that actually probably like did the same experience and that did it really, really well.
[00:10:54] Like I think about Azdin Alaya, the iconic designer who even though was profoundly Tunisian, but you wouldn't necessarily guess that from his work.
[00:11:10] And that's kind of where I was to me.
[00:11:14] Like I wanted to be able to be free and explore in any language.
[00:11:21] And it's true that what I discovered, I liked that I was able to grow from like I started with English and then I grew and I was mature.
[00:11:36] I matured artistically in a way where I found my own way to do my Arabic language experience because I wasn't trained in it.
[00:11:49] I wasn't trained to sing Arabic or like I had no idea about like any technical aspect of that.
[00:11:59] And because of that, I just took the Arabic language and just did my own sauce.
[00:12:05] So even to the Arabic speaking world, my Arabic singing was Western.
[00:12:14] So but when I decided to record my album in English in 2019 that came out in 2019, I found that my way of singing in English was more relaxed and more explorative in a way that I needed because the whole time I was singing in Arabic and writing in Arabic.
[00:12:39] Somehow I didn't necessarily write in a way that was that fit my voice necessarily.
[00:12:47] I would just like imagine things and write things and then I would just sing them.
[00:12:53] And I didn't when I when I started like writing in English, I felt like, wow, there's this whole dimension in my voice where I don't need necessarily to go all these highs.
[00:13:07] I could like singing this like medium tones and really appreciate it.
[00:13:12] So I really loved having that experience.
[00:13:18] It's not like there is a shortage of the Arabic speakers of the world.
[00:13:23] You know, it's one of the top 10 most spoken languages.
[00:13:27] But that said, I I kind of understand why people get this sort of sense of ownership, especially somebody singing in in their native language in a way that has like broken through to even the you know, English dominated cultures that I can I can kind of appreciate that I guess from a fan standpoint of why why they feel
[00:13:55] this why they feel this sense of ownership and why it may be difficult for them when somebody makes a change like that.
[00:14:04] Yeah, I mean, like that's the story of my life.
[00:14:08] I'm always leaving somebody behind in my process.
[00:14:14] Yeah, I'm some I think yeah because for I just I don't know I I change everything almost from one album to another.
[00:14:26] It's not exactly true.
[00:14:27] I don't change everything.
[00:14:29] I feel like there's still like a big part of me and probably that's that's what makes me me.
[00:14:35] But I don't know.
[00:14:36] We'll see.
[00:14:37] Would you say that you're driven by change to a certain extent?
[00:14:42] I think so. I think I I'm I have a tendency to get bored quite often, like even in my in my own life and especially music wise.
[00:15:00] I feel that I constantly need stimulation and somehow I feel that's what I owe to people to stimulate them.
[00:15:10] And I might be wrong, but to me like if I if I bring the same.
[00:15:18] Reposition artistic reposition over and over.
[00:15:21] I don't think I'm being fair or I'm like doing what I what I'm supposed to do.
[00:15:29] So I don't know, like I might be like completely wrong, but I've always been motivated by just like, OK, let's let's let's like look for a different concept.
[00:15:44] Let's let's embark on a new sonic experience in terms of that pace of life and that impact that it had on the art that you make.
[00:15:54] How would you compare Tunisia to the other places you've lived?
[00:15:58] Tunisia is I mean, that's where I developed my first passion for everything.
[00:16:09] I think it was. A good and a bad place to be.
[00:16:15] A good because I think the the colors and the sounds and the weather.
[00:16:23] Just made it like really the special place that made me who I am.
[00:16:29] But at the same time, it gave me a lot of frustration and a lot of I lacked so many things.
[00:16:36] I lacked freedom. I lacked support.
[00:16:39] I lacked creative space.
[00:16:42] I lacked structure that really made me frustrated and probably made me lose a lot of the time that I wish I still had today.
[00:16:53] And probably that gave me a lot of like, you know, stubbornness and strength to face.
[00:17:04] To like face things and face, you know, every challenge that I've been faced with since I started this whole journey.
[00:17:16] When you say you lacked freedom, what did that look like?
[00:17:20] Yeah, I mean, like well as a woman, certainly like it starts with the family.
[00:17:29] So like, yeah, you start craving freedom just like to be able to, you know, go out of the house and whenever you wanted.
[00:17:41] But that was not really possible.
[00:17:44] For example, there were much more restrictions on me as a girl growing up.
[00:17:50] And then very quickly, you find the same things at school in the street.
[00:17:58] Because we were living under dictatorship.
[00:18:01] So it's just one dictatorship after another, you know, it starts with the political in the education, the way you're educated in whatever you're offered.
[00:18:12] So yeah, it's hard to overcome that.
[00:18:18] Like even later on, like, you know, it stays with you.
[00:18:23] With political discourse here, people tend to compare things to, you know, to dictatorships, to fascism like really quickly.
[00:18:29] They're quick to do that.
[00:18:32] And I wonder, like, you know, having grown up in a setting like that, whether you feel that, you know, people in the US where there are certain freedoms are maybe a little too eager to compare it to that or whether because of the level,
[00:18:47] relative level of freedoms perhaps that we experience here that they're that they can tend to miss some of the signs of maybe society moving in that direction.
[00:18:58] They probably do because like, yeah, they probably do because growing up in Tunisia, I, you know,
[00:19:13] we can't necessarily dress however you please.
[00:19:18] If you are a little bit too weird, then, you know, like just like there's so many layers that it's very hard to be able to be who you are.
[00:19:33] You know, and I wasn't like particularly eccentric, but I've always felt really different.
[00:19:42] And that wasn't like something that was easy to carry over there.
[00:19:48] And even just like being talented is not something that's necessarily welcome.
[00:19:56] Having like a good talent, having like aspirations, having ambitions.
[00:20:03] It can come down to that, you know, which is really ridiculous, but it's very true.
[00:20:10] So, yeah, people here must take it for granted to just like, you know, grow up and be able to like have aspirations and have dreams.
[00:20:19] And, you know, like growing up with the idea that you could basically be whoever you want, you know, that's like we're very far from that.
[00:20:32] Growing up in places like Tunisia.
[00:20:34] Do you feel like your parents were relatively or as supportive as they could be in that setting?
[00:20:42] Oh, no, they weren't supportive at all.
[00:20:45] You had mentioned, you know, I think your father playing a lot of classical music around the house.
[00:20:49] So at least there was some interest in art.
[00:20:55] Yeah, well, it's funny because I don't think I would have been the person I am having.
[00:21:00] I've been in contact with such good music from an early age, although I mean, like I don't make music that's very mainstream.
[00:21:10] So I don't know.
[00:21:13] Probably nowadays to be a successful musician, you have to be you have to grow up listening to Taylor Swift.
[00:21:19] And that way you can have you can have an idea how to make like, you know, three chord songs that, you know, that have hooks and whatever, you know.
[00:21:30] But you were listening to like some, you know, you mentioned like the Cranberries, for example, who they were obviously very popular when we were growing up.
[00:21:38] I don't think they would be nowadays.
[00:21:40] Their music is too sad.
[00:21:43] But so that came later.
[00:21:48] And still, like their music is very like, you know, you'd have songs that have many different parts, you know.
[00:21:56] But anyways, like, yeah, it's complex.
[00:21:59] Well, what I grew up with was Beethoven and Mozart.
[00:22:04] So this is this is the stuff that really probably like constructed and and and art,
[00:22:11] Tatum and, you know, the Haliah Jackson.
[00:22:15] So, yeah, this is the stuff that I really grew up with as a as a child.
[00:22:20] And that's later on, I went and searched for like in high school, I started listening to pop rock and metal.
[00:22:28] And yeah, and then I found another home for me.
[00:22:31] But I'm very grateful to the fact that my dad was really passionate of, you know, he had a good taste.
[00:22:42] So that was like in that.
[00:22:47] Yeah, that's like not that was something that he did naturally.
[00:22:50] But when he came, when the time came and I really developed a talent and I really wanted, you know,
[00:22:56] people to tell me like what I should be doing and or like, you know, to support me that that wasn't the case.
[00:23:02] This is me taking my kind of American privilege for granted.
[00:23:06] But it's always very hard for me to reconcile and understand how somebody in his case.
[00:23:11] So, you know, listening to like American jazz music or gospel music and some of the examples that you gave,
[00:23:18] but then doesn't isn't able to extend that to to your own talents and your own ambitions.
[00:23:24] Yeah, I mean, yeah, like somehow we lived in a society where like your daughter doesn't just become a musician or a singer, you know.
[00:23:36] And yeah, and some I mean, both my parents come from like a rural place.
[00:23:42] So even though like we grew up in the capital, I think for them there and even though my dad like spent like over 10 years in Paris
[00:23:53] and like he was part of all these like communist and anarchist movements,
[00:23:59] I think at the end of the day, like when it's you know, he didn't really have much much, you know,
[00:24:06] like for them you had to go to school and then just like follow the classic path.
[00:24:13] So they really didn't have any idea even how to like, you know, help or support.
[00:24:19] They just wanted us to just be like everyone else.
[00:24:22] What I will say is, you know, having spoken to a lot of musicians or artists whose parents weren't supportive.
[00:24:31] This isn't like this isn't always the case.
[00:24:33] Sometimes parents are just are just bad parents.
[00:24:35] But I think in most cases it comes from, you know, a relatively good place of like we want you to we want you to sort of live the like most comfortable or easiest life you can.
[00:24:48] And this obviously like setting down that this path, especially in this context is, you know,
[00:24:54] you're setting yourself up for potentially a really difficult life.
[00:24:58] I probably wouldn't encourage my kids to be musicians.
[00:25:02] You have a daughter, right?
[00:25:06] Yeah, I have a daughter and son.
[00:25:09] Yeah, I I'm assuming that when you're talking about, you know, where where you're living now and where you're living next,
[00:25:18] I mean, that must that must play a really big role in it in terms of, you know,
[00:25:23] what sort of cultures and what kind of circumstances you want to raise your children in.
[00:25:30] I certainly want to raise them in New York as much as possible because I still think that this is the place where
[00:25:38] everything is possible.
[00:25:40] And even though like I really now dislike the US a lot and the harm they're doing in the world,
[00:25:53] I still feel like New York is still like this bubble of super
[00:26:01] like interesting social movements and cultural movements.
[00:26:05] And I feel like you could as a child, you could grow to be an amazing adult here.
[00:26:13] I've been here for a while.
[00:26:15] I wasn't I was still in California during 9 11.
[00:26:19] But, you know, I moved here close enough to that having happened that I do see.
[00:26:26] I do see a lot of really unfortunate echoes happening right now.
[00:26:30] And it's clear that people didn't necessarily take away the right lessons from having been through this the first time.
[00:26:43] Yeah, and especially I was talking to.
[00:26:49] I'm Jewish and I was interviewing somebody who is Jewish last night.
[00:26:52] And we were talking a little bit about this, about did you see the the Jonathan Glaser speech at the Oscars
[00:27:02] where he was how it's how it's difficult but important to speak to like specifically people in
[00:27:18] in Gaza speak to what they're what they're going through.
[00:27:25] It's and it's such a it's such a polarizing issue in the US that I think a lot of people just don't talk about it.
[00:27:35] Just don't discuss it at all.
[00:27:36] But you strike me as somebody who is like seeing just incredible suffering
[00:27:41] and feel like you've got this this position where people are listening to you
[00:27:47] and that you want to use that to speak out for the people who can't necessarily speak for themselves.
[00:27:55] Absolutely. Like what's happening right now is I am like to me it's like so unprecedented.
[00:28:02] Like I know there's many parts in the world where bad things are happening.
[00:28:08] We don't we don't necessarily talk about them.
[00:28:11] But I feel like right now we're just you know like it's like as if you now with social media
[00:28:18] is if you open your window and you see somebody like you know raping somebody or beating up somebody
[00:28:23] or just like you know shooting at somebody randomly and it's so brutal.
[00:28:30] It's so violent.
[00:28:31] And to know that like this country is complicit like without even like needing to be complicit like is just beyond me.
[00:28:41] And I don't know I was I was I was raised like to dislike places like Saudi Arabia or the Emirates
[00:28:49] where like you know freedoms are like you know to this day like you know there's freedoms for women and whatever.
[00:28:57] But like one of my friends was like why should we dislike those places?
[00:29:01] You know yes we have freedom in the U.S. inside and then look how much harm the U.S. has been doing in the world
[00:29:07] like all these years and especially right now like why should we why should we just like you know
[00:29:14] you know like dislike those places and like the U.S. or live in the U.S. like versus going to live in those places.
[00:29:21] So I am struggling a lot right now with that and of course to know like you know that my taxes are going to something so so awful.
[00:29:32] And I'm really struggling with that even though I see like so many people that are doing amazing things
[00:29:40] amazing like civil actions amazing solidarity that is like not as much seen anywhere else.
[00:29:48] So it's like this whole contrast you know like I love being here because I love the protests.
[00:29:54] I love what people are how people are gathering together like you know and the Jewish community especially like in New York and the U.S.
[00:30:03] like it's really beautiful to see people okay like I'm speaking I'm speaking up you know.
[00:30:09] And it's unlike anything else in Europe or in other places in the world.
[00:30:15] So this is like two contrasts you know.
[00:30:18] I was reading an interview that you did not too long ago and you said not even paraphrasing you said music can change the world.
[00:30:25] And I understand I understand cynicism around that or skepticism around that.
[00:30:31] I've certainly had my fair share but I also feel like at the same time that that is something that you have to believe like you know what I mean.
[00:30:39] That you need to feel like you can make a difference in order to make a difference.
[00:30:43] Absolutely I mean I like that you say you have to believe you know because you know at the end of the day we do have to believe in something in order to create something in order to you know make the world a better place.
[00:30:57] It starts with believing and unfortunately some people believe in the wrong things or like to believe or like to make us believe in the wrong things.
[00:31:08] But I truly believe that music can change the world because you know it's like music is connecting me and you.
[00:31:15] Music has connected me like I performed for the Kurdish people three days ago.
[00:31:23] Like I made 15,000 new followers in three days and to me they're not just numbers they're just people who loved to see me perform for them.
[00:31:34] And to see me perform I also performed some songs in Kurdish and to see the impact that that just that to me I just sang a song.
[00:31:44] To see how much impact it had like I was going through my messages and seeing how much like people felt empowered people felt seen so music can change the world but you know we are fighting against things that are like terrible and horrible and strong.
[00:32:02] But like imagine we didn't have music you know imagine and that's why I don't want to take music for granted and I want to pursue this thing where like music is not just you know it's not it's not just something that you know you hear in the background.
[00:32:19] Music is in the foreground music is fighting music is a message music is a tool music is a weapon.
[00:32:29] And that's why like at the end of the day I don't know like how much successful I can be but I know that the things that I believe in and believing in the right things has connected me in the most beautiful ways to other people.
[00:32:49] And that's gonna matter much more than just like making numbers you know I mean I hope.
[00:32:56] You specifically have to believe it because you've seen it.
[00:33:00] You were you were there firsthand.
[00:33:02] Yeah I mean I've been I've been through dictatorship I've been through racism.
[00:33:09] I so like you know I went I've been to Palestine I've been to Algeria I've been to Iran.
[00:33:17] I've been in Europe I have been to Kurdistan recently and somehow like even even when I don't want to be political like everything turns to be political like to move around to have access to audiences to be able to tour to be on theaters like yeah.
[00:33:42] Everything is political so I might as well just use it to be to be to be the voice of truth and to be the voice of freedom and to be the voice of compassion.
[00:33:55] You played in Iran.
[00:33:57] I am what I'm reading off of here it describes it as a highly illegal all women performance how did that how did that specific circumstance come about.
[00:34:07] So I think we got away with it because he was part of a documentary and I think it's a very important the documentary like especially like recently when things started blowing up again in Iran.
[00:34:21] Because to me like it's all it's all about women you know like the world has always tried to shut like women's voices and you know in Iran like you cannot be a solo singer female solo singer you could you could be on stage but you'd have to have like male voices kind of cover your voice.
[00:34:45] And I feel that's even worse than being forbidden from being on stage because you can't be who you are you can't be your own thing you can't be your own project.
[00:34:58] So it was a little a little bit like you know a little bit of way the whole little when the whole little window of hope in the midst of the darkness that we created during that time for the audience work for each other or the Iranian musicians specifically specifically for the female Iranian musicians.
[00:35:22] To to to live those little like happy moments and be on stage together and like experiment like that fear in all of those like you know emotions are we going to perform are we not going to perform.
[00:35:35] Are we going to be kicked out of the country are we going to go to jail are we going to have problems like I know I created like a problem when I like wrote something on my social media and then like everything collapse and we all started crying.
[00:35:51] Eventually the performance ended up happening I wish that this movie that could be streamed somewhere it's called no land song.
[00:36:00] And I feel like it resonates nowadays more than ever because we still you know as women we're still fighting for our space and it's not just in Iran it's like worldwide you know like.
[00:36:12] You know like when you see that in the Supreme Court this like how many eight judges now it's one woman and eight men.
[00:36:20] It's nine there's three see there's one two four I think there's four one of them is conservative.
[00:36:27] Yeah.
[00:36:32] Okay but it has been nine men for a long long long long time in a way that most of the women in politics nowadays they just thinking like man you know like.
[00:36:44] When I start saying things like if we had a matriarchy matriarchal system like I'm sure many many many many things are going to go for the better.
[00:36:54] And people would be like yeah but we had Margaret Thatcher you know that didn't go for the better.
[00:36:59] Which is like Margaret Thatcher just another guy.
[00:37:02] One example yeah the one example.
[00:37:06] She might as well have been Reagan right.
[00:37:10] Exactly so like we're not we're not we're not out of the woods yet you know and I'm sorry to call the woods but you know you know what I'm saying.
[00:37:19] Forgive the kind of ignorant question but I'm curious like so that's I didn't know that specific law as far as you can sing on voice you can sing on stage but a man has to be singing with you is there what is the justification for that specific rule is there is there a reasoning behind it.
[00:37:34] Yeah because the voice of a woman is very dangerous you know like.
[00:37:41] The voice yeah the voice.
[00:37:43] The voice of a woman like you know and there's actually in the mood I would I will send you the link.
[00:37:50] There's a there's a very inch the very interesting scene in the movie in the documentary where the the.
[00:37:59] Sarah the composer was like was initiative was to do this movie she goes and speaks to one of the more laughs and she asked him like what why why why does it like with the female boys.
[00:38:12] That makes you also you know just out he's like well and he doesn't even look at her at all the whole time he's talking to her he never looks at her and is like yeah because the voice of the woman you know it could be like really like drive for desire you know.
[00:38:29] And it's all about the desire like you know just let people live.
[00:38:35] Yeah it's that thing of putting your own issues onto somebody else because you're afraid of what that might make you do.
[00:38:43] Yeah because yeah women women are powerful and somehow we're still like oppressed because of that power.
[00:38:53] And when worldwide I don't believe that the oppression of women has ended at all in the in the western countries in Europe and you know look we just got me to how like was it three years ago.
[00:39:08] And there is immediate backlash to it that's the other thing too is it was it's not like it came and then was allowed to just breathe for a little while just immediate pushback.
[00:39:17] Exactly exactly and yeah and it hasn't happened at all like in many other places like France it's kind of starting to happen.
[00:39:25] And we haven't really talked much specifically about the new album but it's a very it strikes me as a very deliberate effort on your part to put together a collection of contributors like top down like production everything everyone on this record was was a woman.
[00:39:45] What why why was that important and what do you feel like that lent to this specific project.
[00:39:51] So I started like preparing working on I started like creating the idea of doing a new album and I know that the label back then wanted me to work with this guy.
[00:40:02] And then I thought like but why do I why does it always have to be a guy.
[00:40:06] Why like you know.
[00:40:10] So I'm like you know what I'm just going to try to work with women and people started telling me but you're not going to work with women just to work with women and then I realized if I hadn't had that just idea I would have had to work with women.
[00:40:23] And people started telling me but you're not going to work with women just to work with women and then I realized if I hadn't had that just idea I would have given up because every time I started looking for collaborators it's much easier and faster.
[00:40:41] So I was like it can be that there's this specific area in life where guys are better than women or more intelligent and that's where I really my stubborn side really got the best of me.
[00:40:56] And decided like to try and go and find these women and I think that this work is very important because as women we have the tendency to look at each other as rivals and it's very true.
[00:41:12] We have the tendency of not trusting each other and when I started this adventure it's true I came with like the idea that when I was with the guy behind you know the computer in the room I feel more confident and safer.
[00:41:28] And eventually like I was very happy to break that idea because every woman I worked with was so intelligent was so bright.
[00:41:38] Was so intuitive and I did feel like really supported in ways I wasn't before.
[00:41:48] I did feel this like beautiful sorority, beautiful like I don't know we all felt it.
[00:41:57] I don't know how to exactly describe it but we all felt that this movement even though I believe this is the first time that anybody succeeded in doing like a hundred percent woman made album.
[00:42:12] It's wild.
[00:42:13] It's wild and I feel when I was doing it I was like oh my god the world is going to be so excited you know to welcome this experience and actually no.
[00:42:23] I don't feel that people are really like of course there's people like oh my god this is really exciting this is amazing but I don't see the welcoming that I was planning or that I was envisioning.
[00:42:38] So I feel that yeah women's works and women's words are not that easily embraced unfortunately.
[00:42:50] And which is why this work becomes even more important to me.
[00:42:55] I hope that you know like a few months from now a few years from now like other women can like look at this and like wow we're actually stronger together and we need to be stronger right now because as we are seeing the world I think the world needs women right now more than ever.
[00:43:25] I have the best.
[00:43:27] My blood is freedom.
[00:43:29] Will you.
[00:43:33] Will you.
[00:43:35] Will you.
[00:43:37] Will you.