An Interview with Singer/Songwriter and Ivor Novello: Rising Star Award Winner Amahla.
Amahla is a singer songwriter who entered 2020 being nominated for the Ivor Novello: Rising Star award, being assigned with Nile Rogers as her mentor. In the same year she wrote a song called ‘Bold’ for Fearne Cotton’s ‘Happy Place’ album. Along with setting up her own song writing circle, where she welcomed her fans to join her on zoom to discuss and interact with different writing techniques. We discuss the impact that the pandemic has had on her music career, and what the future holds for Amahla.
We spoke over zoom, Amahla breaths authenticity with every word, she was sat at her desk with her hands wrapped around a cup of tea, looking very content. We spoke first about Covid-19 and how it has impacted her music, she explains that “it has changed the traditional route of breaking artists” and that normally an artist would release songs and perform live shows to grow a following. Amahla had support tours and festivals lined up for 2020, but she says that now “everything is sort of on pause”.
She released a song called ‘Apathy’ in 2019, which is a song about self isolation. Amahla released a music video for the song during the pandemic, which features her sitting alone in her bedroom, which I’m sure was very relatable to many people during lockdown, isolating alone at home. Amahla also wrote a message below the video that reads:
“It’s okay to feel overwhelmed as long as we make the small steps to turn apathy into action. I’m sending you love, strength and solidarity during this period of self isolation.” — Amahla
Amahla says that though 2020 was a tough year as a musician many great things happened, such as being nominated for the Ivor Novello: Rising Star Award. She tells me about her reaction when she was told in February (2020) “Listen, I was on the floor (laughs)” … “when they told me, I was like this isn’t real, this is crazy!”. Amahla met Nile Rogers for the first time in February, before the first Lockdown in March (2020), she would have spent a lot of time with him through the course of 2020 at Abbey Road Studios, however due to Covid-19 it has been spent mostly over the phone.
The positive outlook Amahla has is contagious, I am amazed by how she has not allowed the pandemic to impact her love for music. She tells me that she has still had the opportunity to work with some artists on a couple of tracks. She also explains that she has learnt a great deal from Nile Rogers about “what it means to be a really successful black executive, what it means to be an entrepreneur, what it means to own what you create and innovate”. She also highlights that “we’ve had lots of discussions about race particularly because of the black lives matter protests that happened last year and his activism and I think that those are really invaluable conversations and discussions that I think will form what I do in my life and that’s been really important”. It is evident in the way she talks about Nile Rogers that he has had a huge impact on her as a person and influenced her music.
Amahla was approached by Fearne Cotton during the pandemic in April (2020). She explains that she had been chatting with Jamal Edwards (who founded SPTV) about one of her songs. He told Amahla how much he loved the song and that he had sent it to friends, Amahla said she responded “like ah thanks (laughs) and then he said one of the people he sent it to was Fearne, and she loves it, and I was like what! (laughs) that’s so weird but thank you! And then like a week later she reached out to me and was like can you write and record a song for this album, and I was like yeah! Yes please!”. So Amahla wrote the song ‘Bold’ that features on Fearne’s ‘Happy Place’ album alongside other artists such as Emeli Sandé and Luke Sital-Singh. Make sure to go and listen to the album and Amahla’s song ‘Bold’ below.
The music Amahla’s produced in the past is highly social commentary and socially political focused. However, living through a global pandemic has led her to change her tone, she is trying “not to write ballads, I’m trying not to write sad songs, I’m trying not to write about the end of the world (laughs)”. Instead, she is focusing on writing in a positive light, which she says has change the way she sings and the tempo of the music, which she says writing in a new style has helped her in becoming a better songwriter.
We discussed whether she had written any songs about the feelings and emotions she has felt throughout the pandemic, “Yeah loads, but those have mostly been slower, just because it is overwhelming and just like, piano chord. Overwhelm. Stress (laughs). Really emotional, but yeah, I have, and I think because we’ve been in our houses, we’ve been overthinking everything”. Amahla tells me that she is hoping to release new music this year and that she is writing an album, but she explains “I think the pandemic songs will be on that instead of the EP’s because it allows me to create a bigger concept and a bigger story” … “It’s what we lived through, it’s what shaped me and what shaped my state of mind”.
Amahla expresses what she misses most pre pandemic “I miss performing live, that’s what I love, that’s what I do this for, everything else to me is just faf (laughs) like music videos and social media and all that stuff, all I want to do is write the songs and perform them, that’s all I’ve ever really wanted to do”. Amahla says that she is hoping to play two shows this year and tells me how much she misses playing live, explaining that it helps her to write better songs and to improve them “I normally play my songs loads and loads of times live before I record them, I’m like ok they’re falling asleep during this middle 8, so I’m going to rewrite the middle 8”.
We talk about life at the moment, I tell Amahla that I am in my final year of University, sitting with the uncertainty of what to do when I leave. Amahla relates to this exact feeling telling me:
“I wrote river when I was in the same position as you, I was just about to graduate, and my best friend was like I’m getting married I was like what! And my other friend was doing a master’s in architecture at Oxford, I was like okay. I’m going to be a singer”
and that ‘River’ “was definitely out of that like I have no idea what I’m doing with my life and social media is like horrible and everybody has these plans and I have no idea what I’m doing, but it will be okay”. River is also my favourite of Amahla’s songs and perhaps it is becuase I resinate with the feelings that she is singing about.
During the pandemic Amahla set up an online song writing circle, which she hosted every Friday over Zoom. She explains that it is very relaxed, they cover a different style every week, they look at the “language, expression and nuance of a song”. Amahla tries to get people to listen to artists they usually wouldn’t, such as Taylor Swift, who she says is “a fantastic song writer, whether you like it or not you sort of have to break down, how does she manage to engage 15-year olds constantly for 10 years, when I was 12, I was listening to her and now there are 12 year olds listening to her, something that she is doing right that means she is continually connecting with her audience”. She explains that they cover artists from the 30’s and 50’s, because she loves the music they created in that particular period of time. So, if you are interested in song writing, make sure to go and check out Amahla’s song writing circle on a Friday.
Amahla tells me who her favourite up and coming musicians are, she expresses her love for EMIKO’s music, “I know him personally, I met him over the last few years, just playing similar gigs, he makes soul music too, and he’s really really good”. She also says that Jaz Elise is another artist that she is currently listening to. Amahla says that she also discovered Mickey Guyton when watching the Grammy’s, she is a country singer. Mickey Guyton performed a song called ‘Black like me’ which was in honor of the Black Lives Matter protests. Amahla voices how beautiful Jaz Elise’s performance was, saying, “Miranda Lambert was after her, and I love Miranda Lambert but Mickey Guyton really sung like really sung and she’s really really cool and new”. Make sure to go and check out those artists and watch Mickey Guyton’s Grammy performance which is below.
We end our conversation talking about Amahla’s new music, she says that she is planning on releasing a new song at the end of April. She tells me that the new music was produced during pandemic “with a new producer, so that was something that has defiantly been new, I’ve been working with new producers, which has changed my sound a bit, it’s defiantly cooler! (laughs)”. Listen out for Amahla’s new music, she is one of the greatest up-and-coming singers I have come across in the last two years, so I can’t wait to see how far she goes and grows as a singer!
