UNAPOLOGETIC had been in my orbit for a while, but by the time I really started getting integrated into the fold fr in 2022/2023 I was on the other side of a lot of painful endings, feeling very wounded and wary of trusting people. I worked as IMAKEMADBEATS's assistant for a year, and found myself surrounded by music and very kind, creatively curious people everyday. It reignited my love for singing and songwriting, but more than that it helped me find my way back to myself after who I thought I was had come apart completely.
It was really hard to start singing again. Singing was my first love. I just knew that’s what I wanted to do even when I was very young. Like before I could talk really, I was singing constantly. But as I got older, by like my teens, I just got really ashamed of my voice. I didn’t like how it sounded. I didn’t think others would like how it sounded. It was too deep. It was too unpolished. So I just kinda stopped doing it.
Slowly I moved away from this more vulnerable art form for me and pivoted to poetry and spoken word, where I felt a lot of comfort in my ability to hide myself in dense language that can’t be easily parsed.
I didn’t realize how much I had missed singing until I came back to it. I don’t know if I would have ever come back to it at all if it weren’t for Mad, and UNAPOLOGETIC. Sitting in a studio every day lit a fire in me. I started songwriting every day. I would record demos on my phone and send them to Mad. Over time, a cohesive sound and style started to develop. It was a slow and sometimes frustrating and painful process. Both getting my voice back and getting used to being vulnerable again. I’m forever grateful to have been brought back to my first love. Music.