"Nonchalance Needs To Die"

Nxdia Talks Queer Awakening, Representation and Oversharing Through Alt Pop

Interviewed by: Lucy Dover (@lucy_dover_)

Alt-pop artist Nxdia is done hiding. On their debut mixtape I Promise No One’s Watching, released on Friday 13 June, the Egyptian-Sudanese, Manchester-raised singer-songwriter cracks open a year of emotional chaos, gender euphoria, heartbreak and healing. Laced with Arabic, alt-rock edges, queer joy and diary-entry honesty, the project is both riotous and tender. It is a sonic self-portrait that holds nothing back. Ahead of the release, Nxdia sat down with The Sanxtuary to unpack the meaning behind tracks like Boy Clothes, Tin Man, and She Likes a Boy, share their love for kitchen-table collaboration, and remind us why vulnerability is the most radical act of all.

With your album, I Promise No One's Watching, you've kind of described it as a self portrait. Can you walk us through the moment during its creation where you actually felt either exposed or liberated?

 Oh, God, I know what it is. I think Feel Anything, when I wrote that, because obviously, I just kind of sat with it for a few months, listened to it, and was writing down the lyrics over and over, because I'm kind of obsessive with trying to make sure if I'm writing something sad, it's like, really true to how I feel. I think I just spent the last year feeling really reflective and feeling like there was a lot happening, whether it was really intense first time things I was experiencing negative or positive, and with Feel Anything , I just assumed in a very self centered way, that this was all just how I felt, and I was a bit too sensitive, and I was just a bit too I don't know… I just wasn't handling life in the same way as everyone else. But then Feel Anything, which opens the mixtape, the line “talked to Pheebs about adult life.” It was the first time I talked to my friend Phoebe green, who's actually an amazing artist from Manchester, and one of my best friends. But I talked to Pheebs on the balcony while smoking a cigarette, as the song says, believe it or not(!). and I was just like, “Oh my God, I feel this weird pit, and I'm manic half the time, so low and depressed the other time. I really I don't understand what's going on, because it's this euphoria, and it's not sleeping, and it's kind of being antsy, and then on the other side, I'm not leaving my bed for days.” So I was just like, what's happening? And they just looked at me, and they were like, “Yeah, I know, right”. I was like, you know?! what do you mean?! People go through this?! And I just started talking to all my friends, and I was like, what? you understand how I feel? I'm late to the part? I was lucky to have just started feeling this way now, because I'd felt anxiety before, but just not in that way. And it was brutal, but it was a beautiful thing to write, and it felt really needed. And when I saw the response from people who were, in turn, being honest, I just was like, I need to collate this last year where there's been some weird parasitic thing in my brain that's not my voice, and I'm trying to kill it. So I’m gonna make [the mixtape], because the person watching, the voices, are also me.

Is that why you called the mixtape I Promise No One's Watching, because it was all these private thoughts that you're now going to share with everyone?

Yeah. I feel like sometimes I’ll be in a room and I'll be like “wow, I'm being so weird right now. I'm just being such a freak whole time”. But I'm stood next to the water or something. I'm not doing anything. I'm not being weird. But I think, unfortunately, our thoughts kind of make up our worlds. And in a lot of ways, I just felt as though I'd built something in my head that absolutely wasn't a real reflection of me, which is the why the self portrait, I'm putting it in my room, because it watches me sleep! I wanted to write the mixtape and have it be called I Promise No One's Watching as an affirmation for myself, and an affirmation for other people.

I read a little bit about you and I saw that you've grown up between Cairo and then Manchester. I assume that shaped your view of the world. What aspects of both cities do you think feel strongest in your art and what lives strongest through your art?

So I think Manchester and Cairo are weirdly more similar than you'd imagine. I don't know how to explain it, but it's different, obviously in London whereas I think there's a culture in Manchester that's very friendly in a way. People are very… like you can just chat to anyone. You walk around. I'd bump into people saying, Good morning. It feels very Disney sometimes. I see these skits online where people are like “a northerner was found in London. Everyone distraught!”, But it's so true. Every time I visit, everyone's just chatting to you and it's slower in a way. But Egypt and Cairo’s fast. But in that same way, there's this heartbeat in the city, and there is just warmth from people, hospitality. People will go out of their way for you I think. They'll take the piss out of you as well. Absolutely, like, they do take the piss, but so do people in Manchester. I love that playfulness. I love that it feels, no matter if I'm in Cairo, or if I'm in Manchester, I feel like I'm at home, and I feel very lucky to feel at home in two places. People in Cairo are very warm and funny and open and passionate and in the same way, people in Manchester are very open and warm and kind.

I Promise No One's Watching cover art

Is that how you wanted your art to be reflected as something that's warm and open and understanding?

 I want it to be as transparent I can. I think I live in a privileged position. Not every person who is queer and North African or any minority group or whatever, always has the ability to speak out or be transparent without fear and in reality, I think I feel kind of like a part of Manchester and part of Cairo, but also kind of a visitor, a fly on the wall. Because I look quite different, they assume I'm a foreigner in Egypt sometimes, even if I speak to them in Arabic and stuff like that. And I just appreciate kind of being able to see all that and be able to feel loved in my family and feel accepted in such a beautiful way. So I want to reflect that, and I want to reflect the wonderful and bad things about my life, because I think it's just how life is.

Speaking about wanting to feel welcome and wanting to feel at home, do you struggle and how do you navigate and celebrate your multicultural roots in predominantly Western Alt pop because I feel like that is very much dominated by white people? Do you feel it important to include Arabic in your lyrics to highlight this?

 I had a conversation with my friend when I was looking at my dryer underneath the cupboard under the stairs, and I remember talking because she sang in English and Spanish. And I was just like, “God, like, I wish I could put Arabic in my songs. I talk in Arabic and English all around the house and with my mom. And when I'm in Egypt, we all talk in Arabic and English, because it's just normal. I feel like there's this big part of me that's just not part of the music.”  And this was in 2019 and she was like “then do it.” And I was like, “Oh, we will. That's crazy”. And since then, I felt so much more excited about music. I felt so much more excited about sharing, but I'm also really excited about other artists that are coming through right now that are just fucking it up right now. They're killing it. Like Saint Levant recently with KALAMANTINA and the album. There’s Lana Lubany who's doing really cool stuff. There are Arab people who are coming through now, and they're fucking cool. They're really amazing people. And I feel like there's this wave coming in. The Middle East is the fastest growing place for music. People are getting connected. And at a time where I feel as though there can sometimes be a dehumanisation of people who look like me, I am so grateful to have more people to celebrate and have people coming to me and being like “you have no idea what this representation means to me,” because in my brain, I'm just representing myself. I'm not trying to be a mouthpiece for anyone, because it's not fair. We all represent ourselves, but if someone sees representation in me, God, that makes me feel so proud and like I'm doing something in any capacity that is good.

Photography by: Ryan Jafarzadeh

Who do you make music for? Do you make it for the people who want to feel represented? Do you make it for yourself? Who do you want to be your audience?

 In my brain, I just want to be as honest as possible, because I don't believe I'm any different from anyone else. I think the more honest you are, and the more, even though it's really gross, sometimes it's horrible and awful to sit in a room with people and be like, “hey, btw, not perfect. I know, hard to believe.” I think I really need to. I've kept diaries all my life, since I was four, and I'm always constantly reflecting, maybe too much and overthinking. So I need to make music that is as true to how I feel in the moment, even if that changes. Because no matter what, if I feel something, a million other people have felt it, and that's the way in which I try and make music: so that I can connect and sing something that I truly stand behind.

With the songs that have born from old diaries, is there ever hesitation to revisit your past emotions with your new music?

 Oh absolutely! Obviously! Would I leave my diary on a public bench? This is the thing at the end of the day. It's an extremely revealing thing, and I think you never know how people are gonna receive it. You never know if people are gonna appreciate it, or if it's even gonna resonate with them. It's so weird. I grew up with my friends and they're great and stuff, but I'll be in new situation, and I'll be like, “Oh my god, do you remember that old Wattpad phase we all had?!” And someone's like, “what Wattpad phase?” And I'm like, “Okay! I'm gonna try and become invisible. Can you still see me? Please say no!” There’s certain things I say so freely because I assume that everyone's understands. But I'm trying to think less about how vulnerable it feels. I think distance and time always helps, because you can get perspective, and you can distance yourself from that person and say, “Oh, that's not me anymore,” but the reality is it's always been you and it's always going to be part of you. We are all the different versions that we have been. So it is what it is.

One of the songs on the mixtape that stood out to me was Boy Clothes and you wrote that whilst undergoing top surgery, how did that experience with gender expression shape your relationship, both personally and artistically? Was it very cathartic to articulate your gender exploration through a song?

 Unbelievably cathartic I love Boy Clothes so much because I've spent my whole life wearing boy clothes, or sometimes wearing really, really feminine clothes, or trying to. So the thing with the top surgery was it happened so quickly. I'd had these conversations. I talked about having a reduction from when I was 14, I'd always felt like they weren't actually a part of my body. It wasn't even like I hated them. It felt like a skin tag in a way that it doesn't make sense. It feels like something that just was never part of my body, and not in a not in an overwhelming way. It was in a very peaceful way. And I remember I'd put in a holiday in my calendar, and I'd written Boy Clothes the day I was going to fly to Morocco with some friends. And it was beautiful because I put in a holiday, later on in the year, and the only surgery date they had available was on the 18th of November, which was the first day of the holiday I'd put down anyway. And then when I was writing Boy Clothes, I was writing with Orlando, and Danny, my babies! I love them so much! And Danny's a fellow northerner, extra points! I think I just was so excited, and I'd cried during that holiday because I turned to my friends and they were like, “oh, we'll help we'll look after you. Don’t worry about it. We've got you.” Like, it's so good to know that you'll feel like yourself. And everyone around me just knew that I'd feel like myself. And then that Boy Clothes music video, where I was just changing, and the clothes fit how I wanted them to fit. And everything was so good, even though I'd only had the surgery four months prior, it felt euphoric, I was gonna say eu-fucking-phoric, I looked in the mirror the day after the surgery, and I was like, Yeah, that's what I look like. I've always looked like this.

Speaking of queer awakening and gender exploration, when you wrote She Likes a Boy, did you know that it was gonna have the reception that it had? Did you have this good feeling when you wrote it?

 You know what it was? I had a good feeling when I wrote it, because it had been haunting me. Talking of diaries, it was a diary I had from when I was, 13 or 14, or something. And, God, it was painful! It was so painful reading that back, because I just wanted to be just wanted to be like, “you're gay. You're gay! Everyone knows!” And it's so crazy because I'd been accused of being a lesbian, like a witch or something, at school, and I was always like, “damn, why does everyone think I'm a lesbian?” Like, it was crazy and they knew before me which is hilarious.  But yeah, when I wrote She Likes A Boy, it had been going on in my brain over and over. I'd written it down in the diary somewhere, and it just said, “she likes a boy.” And I was just like, “she likes boy. She likes boy. She likes boy. I'm not boy.” And then I had dreamt about it. It kept going through my head, like a fucking hamster wheel. I needed to get it out. I called my manager and I was like, “Laura, this is annoying the fuck out of me. I'm gonna write this song.” And I went in with Dom, and I was like, “I'm written a song called She Likes A Boy and we're gonna do this today.” And he was like, “nice to meet you. Yes, we will. That's cool.” He was so game, because he's the coolest guy ever, and we have the same birthday, and I love him. But I posted the first video in a little bull hat, not expecting anything, obviously, because I was wearing a fucking bull hat. And then it just got like 30k views. And I was like, “oh shit. Okay, maybe this is really cool.” And then I posted it again, just singing to camera, and it got 4 million views. And I was like, “oh, okay, I'm going on holiday in a week, so let's hope I can fucking do this and finish it and share and spread the word.” And obviously we're here now, and that's beautiful.

Photography by: @takenbytay

From listening to all your songs, (I loved all of them, by the way) Puppet was is my favourite one, but there's one song that really stood out, in my opinion, in terms of vulnerability and also just the way it sounded compared to the others, and that was Tin Man. And could you walk me through, if you feel able to, what the song's about and why you chose to have it as the final song on the mixtape?

 Thank you. I'm really glad that you like that, by the way, that means a lot. But I think with Tin Man, I have these recurring thoughts and these patterns in relationships, or when I've been dating, where I'm so… I hate it when you're so self aware but so unable to, fight your nature in a way, and that's how I felt for a long time with being quite fearfully avoidant. I find it really difficult to talk about hard things, like even Feel Anything was super difficult for me to release, Because, in a way, I want to always be like, “yo. I feel amazing, by the way. So suck suck suck(!), whatever!”.  I want to maybe perpetuate this optimism and the good things. And I feel like this is something that we all do. You want to be seen as doing well. You want to be seen as being happy and fulfilled in life. That's kind of what we're all striving for. I think with Tin Man… I understand when I'm doing things that are self destructive, and I understand that when vulnerability comes into play, it makes me super uncomfortable, and that's regardless of if it’s coming from me or someone else. I'm so good when someone's sad, I'm so great at comforting them, but then when it's me, I'm just like, “this is the most embarrassing thing in the world, and if you look at me or touch me while I'm crying, I'm gonna explode, and you're coming with me.” So Tin Man was really, for me, important to acknowledge the whole understanding that the only thing you're pushing away is love in your life, and more kindness and more joy and more happiness. And there's worse things than something not working. It's not trying and not bothering in the first place, and not knowing how it could have gone or what could have happened, because then you have to live with that for the rest of your life. I don't want to have regrets.

you're speaking a lot about, not oversharing, but sharing a lot with your music. You're going to be doing a lot of live shows this year. Yeah, how do you prepare mentally for that type of performance when you're having to lean into that type of emotional honesty? Because I can imagine that being quite tricky?

 I mean, in the moment, you just have to, in the moment you're there. I write all my songs, you know, and sometimes I have some lovely writers that will join. But Tin Man, for example, I wrote it. And even Boy Clothes, with me and Orlando the dynamic’s amazing, because he understands and he'll push me in a way which is a beautiful thing. And I think, that's such a thing I'm very grateful for. But yeah, with all of these things, even Puppet, like… Listen, I don't make the fucking first move. I'm not a flirty gay. I'm not out here being like, “Hello ladies,” That's just not me at all. So for me to sing these things, I’m like what would I write If I didn't give a fuck what anyone was thinking, or would I write if I was writing in my diary and all that stuff? So singing it live, I'm so excited. I've never done Tin Man live. I think Body On Me feels so beautiful live. Every time I write a song now, I try and envision what it would be like if I was singing it with a lot of people. And I'm not saying that when I get to festivals, I don't always go “there's gonna be seven people out there.” But recently, in the past two years, it's not been seven people, it's been a lot more, and that's been a beautiful experience. So I'm so excited to try and be more and more vulnerable, because I think people need to see it, and I think people need to feel it. Nonchalance needs to die. It needs to get killed. I hate it.

One of the shows you're doing is Brighton Pride. Do you think it's important to have a queer audience listen to your music more than anyone else? Is that the audience?

 I want people to feel connected to something. And a lot of the things I've explored do follow themes of queerness, and I think it's really important and beautiful that queer people are connecting with it. And I get a lot of messages from people, whether they're out or not, whether figuring it out or not. You know what I mean? And that helps them, and that makes me feel useful in a way that makes me really happy. But also, I think it allows an understanding as well from people who aren't queer to just see an insight and visibility on things that aren't necessarily as mainstream, because everyone thinks Pride is super mainstream because a couple of companies put Fucking rainbow on their logos, when, in reality you’re gay all year round, you're queer all year round, and… all the implications of being queer I think it's important for everyone to be aware of it so I appreciate and I want as many queer people in the audience. I want us to celebrate. I want it to feel like a party. I also want other people. I want straight people. I want people from different backgrounds, different socioeconomic class or anything, to feel and see music for what it is, and try and understand that, even if they don't personally connect with it.

If you could build your own Sanxtuary, sonically or visually, what would it look like? What would it sound like? What would it feel like?

 I think maybe growing up in Egypt like I feel most at peace when I'm by the beach, because we'd visit every summer, and there's beaches everywhere, and there’s sand everywhere.I don't know if you’ve heard! But I feel really at peace by the beach. I think my idea of a Sanxtuary is being able to hear the sea, having a big window where I can look out and watch people and sit on a windowsill that's wide enough to just read and do all that. I think having music in the house and instruments and people. I like kitchens, not literal kitchens, but places where people can meet and collaborate, and communal spaces where you can hear other ideas. Because there's so many people around me who are just so fucking smart and so creative, and the way they see the world is so beautiful to me. The idea of being in a space where I could just have the people that I love come in, see the sea, not have any plants, because I kill them every time, have my cat Rex, and my mum there and my brother, because I love them so much.

What music would you have playing?

So much! I love the album and I'm gonna love it till the day I die: Racine Carree by Stromae. It was, I think, his second album. He produced it. The things he wrote about... He wrote the song called Tous Les Memes, which means “all the same.” Have you seen the video? How ahead of its time! I was watching that with some friends the other day, because I was like, how ahead of his time. This man who I think is married to a woman, But it's this person who's like, performing masculinity and singing from a female perspective. I just think it's so beautiful, and it makes me really want to learn French, and I'm annoyed that I didn't pay more attention at school. But yeah, I'd probably be playing that album, because it's one of my favourite ever.

That's everything I have! Thank you! And good luck with the with the album, I'm so excited for the mixtape to come out.

Thank you. I really appreciate that!

You can listen to Nxdia’s new mixtape, I Promise No One's Watching, here!