Image via Molly Daniel
Ross Olson is still waiting on that Folk Implosion “natural One” mixed with “Stupid Girl” by Garbage mash-up.
Making great art almost always requires isolation. You need years of solitude, repetition, and a commitment to knowing yourself. For Nilüfer Yanya, the 29-year-old indie singer-songwriter from London, sitting down by herself with the guitar and the pen, “writing from this space inside” led to her most powerful creative expression.
Yanya’s childhood home in Chelsea nurtured this type of intimate self-exploration. With visual artists for parents, Yanya and her siblings constantly drew, painted, took photos and played instruments. Their artistic bond extended to Yanya’s music career: Molly Daniel, Yanya’s older sister, shoots and directs all her music videos, while their mother, Sandra, contributes to set designs. Youngest sister Elif even sings backup on tour with the band. As a child, Yanya traveled with her family to visit relatives in Cornwall. There, Yanya’s uncle Joe, a former funk musician turned session player and producer, helped the teenage Yanya put together her first demos in his home studio.
While Yanya’s first instrument was the piano, she became entranced when a guitar originally meant as a gift for Molly came into her possession. Guitar playing felt more fluid compared to the rigors of studying classical piano. She gravitated toward guitar-driven punk bands with male leads; The Strokes, The Cure, and The Pixies became early aesthetic and sonic influences. While attending the secondary school Pimlico in London, Yanya studied guitar under Dave Okumu of The Invisible, whose relaxed teaching style complemented her natural inclination to tinker with her instrument.
After a stint performing in small London clubs, Yanya released her 2016 debut, the Small Crimes. The EP showcased her melodic grasp and sharp songwriting. Her full-length debut 2019’s Miss Universe offered breezy electro pop (“Tears”) and anxiety-wrecked, first date nervousness (“Heat Rises”). Still, the 29-year-old looks back on the project with ambivalence. In her view, it was marred by too many ideas, collaborators, overwrought themes. In the years since, Yanya aimed for a body of work less conceptual. Her second full-length LP, 2022’s Painless, inched closer to this lean vision.
At the heart of Yanya’s desire to make an album of just the essentials is one of her most trusted collaborators, Will Archer, a multi-instrumentalist whose credits include Sudan Archives, Jessie Ware, and Amber Mark, For Yanya’s critically celebrated September album, My Method Actor, the pair locked themselves in studios across London, Wales, and Eastbourne to workshop ideas and limit outside interference. Describing their creative synergy, Yanya says she can feel Archer activating uncharted parts of her brain when she’s riffing on the guitar. When she sat down to write her new album, Yanya became fascinated with the concept of method acting and its relationship to songwriting and performing. She was taken with the idea of actors sinking into bare and formative memories, morphing the performer and character into one entity.
Early highlight “Binding” drifts along like the routine movements of everyday life. Sparse fingerpicking spills into a dam-breaking chorus where Yanya pleads for something strong to erase her trauma. Expansive string flourishes shade multiple tracks with rich timbres. Yanya and Archer crafted a body of work steeped in desire: for the aching pain to subside, for the comfort and security of love, and for a life spent really living.
I spoke with Yanya about her new album, how it feels to perform live, her family history, and how method acting techniques pertain to her songwriting process.
Is method acting something you’ve always been curious about? Did something prompt you to start researching and learning more about it?
Nilufer Yanya: I wrote it as a lyric. I didn’t really think too much about it at the time. It sounded good, made sense with the song. And then it wasn’t until I was trying to name the record that I came back to it as a way to tie everything in together. So I guess I was just reading about it around that time. It was interesting.
What part about it resonated as an artist and made you kind of want to explore the concept in a body of work like an album?
Nilufer Yanya: I think when I was reading about the theory behind method acting, it’s like you’re embodying a character because you’re using your own memories from your own kind of memory bank. These key memories that help you – you’re acting in a way that’s no longer acting. It’s a very seamless performance. You’re not acting, you’re just being the character. You’re also being yourself and you kind of become one. I found that really interesting, and I felt like I connected with that idea when it comes to my relationship with music and writing. And there were some other things in the album I was thinking about, like memories. And humans are just, we’re stored of memories of other people. And that’s kind of what makes us. The no-longer-acting idea, even when I’m writing from a character’s point of view, a made up character, I guess that character is still a part of me inside my head. And then when I’m performing on stage, I don’t have an act, a character or somebody to become. It’s just like I have to just really be myself. So there’s no like on off stage. It’s kind of like all the same thing.
Was there a character or persona you had in mind that you wanted to portray throughout this album?
Nilufer Yanya: It wasn’t like a character for the whole album. I’m just writing about different things, but also kind of similar things. So I guess it’s me. And sometimes I kind of imagine like, it’s you but you’re in a different kind of situation. Like, what do you feel around you? What do you hear? What do you see? “Method Actor” was a bit like someone who was quite down, quite stressed. There’s a lot of addiction going around, lots of violence. Like kind of in a place in their life maybe they can’t quite escape.
That’s super interesting because I feel like a lot of the album can be kind of gentle or contemplative. So it’s interesting to hear that contrast of violence and turmoil psychologically.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah and I think the music especially in that song goes from very soft to very hard. So you’re almost in this daze. Almost like calm before the storm. And it feels a bit like a monologue until these heavy distorted guitars come in and breaks it up. So it’s kind of like someone’s woken up.
Do you try to draw on those types of formative emotional experiences when you sit down to write new songs or is it more so going into a live performance?
Nilufer Yanya: I think when I’m performing it’s always a bit different. You don’t know where it’s necessarily coming from or going to come from. And that’s kind of what makes it interesting but also makes it hard because sometimes it’s like, there’s nothing there. I feel like the performance – maybe from the outside people can’t necessarily tell the difference but I can feel the difference. Also sometimes I think when something’s going really well and it just hasn’t really landed with other people. It’s also fine. It’s like just maybe more of a personal experience is happening underneath. But I think in order to write the song – that’s why I find it interesting because it’s like your memories, but then it’s like your own relationship and memories with music as well. And what sounds almost like trigger different parts of your memory and make you want to react in a certain way to the music. So it’s kind of hard to say where it’s coming from but it’s all definitely tied in to the music.
I read how you used to view performing as kind of an obligation or something you had to do as an artist. It seems like you’ve grown a lot in that area and have really gelled with your band. What’s contributed to that change?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it’s like, performing is always a bit of a challenge. And I think it’s like rising to the challenge a bit. Also realizing it’s a real privilege to be able to perform when people actually want to hear your music. I think having more of an audience to play to kind of shifts that as well because you see how much it really means to the people in the room. Those things I’m really grateful for. And then having a band as well. It’s like you really want to honor the other musicians in the band by doing hopefully as good a job as they are. It’s a whole like craft in itself.
For sure. I bet it’s incredibly powerful when you’re on stage and you can tell that people are really connecting in the moment like that. It’s probably a high you get in a way.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. And I had that the very first time I played my own show. I felt so ecstatic for like a whole 24 hours afterwards. It gets weird when you start to compare your performances and you can be your own worst critic. It’s like you feel like you’re not doing as good or you’re not progressing in the way you want to and you can kind of beat yourself up about it. You can also just view it as you’re always gonna give what you have. And people don’t necessarily complain.
It feels like you’ve gone through some bigger life changes over the past few years. You toured PAINLESS for almost an entire year, recently switched record labels, and I read that you also recently moved. Did any of these changes of scenery factor into the writing of the record?
Nilufer Yanya: I think so. The music was still made in the same place. Me and Will (Archer) worked together on this record in a similar way to the last record but in a more intense way. We kind of cut everybody else out of the picture and just focused on writing together. Which I’m really happy that we did. I think every change is always good. And I think I’m always the kind of person that gets quite content with things. So it’s nice to change it up because you had to.
That’s a good segue because I was gonna ask more about the recording process with Will. Was that the first time you’ve worked with one creative partner only on a record before?
Nilufer Yanya: That was the first time. Yeah.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
What part about it resonated as an artist and made you kind of want to explore the concept in a body of work like an album?
Nilufer Yanya: I think when I was reading about the theory behind method acting, it’s like you’re embodying a character because you’re using your own memories from your own kind of memory bank. These key memories that help you – you’re acting in a way that’s no longer acting. It’s a very seamless performance. You’re not acting, you’re just being the character. You’re also being yourself and you kind of become one. I found that really interesting, and I felt like I connected with that idea when it comes to my relationship with music and writing. And there were some other things in the album I was thinking about, like memories. And humans are just, we’re stored of memories of other people. And that’s kind of what makes us. The no-longer-acting idea, even when I’m writing from a character’s point of view, a made up character, I guess that character is still a part of me inside my head. And then when I’m performing on stage, I don’t have an act, a character or somebody to become. It’s just like I have to just really be myself. So there’s no like on off stage. It’s kind of like all the same thing.
Was there a character or persona you had in mind that you wanted to portray throughout this album?
Nilufer Yanya: It wasn’t like a character for the whole album. I’m just writing about different things, but also kind of similar things. So I guess it’s me. And sometimes I kind of imagine like, it’s you but you’re in a different kind of situation. Like, what do you feel around you? What do you hear? What do you see? “Method Actor” was a bit like someone who was quite down, quite stressed. There’s a lot of addiction going around, lots of violence. Like kind of in a place in their life maybe they can’t quite escape.
That’s super interesting because I feel like a lot of the album can be kind of gentle or contemplative. So it’s interesting to hear that contrast of violence and turmoil psychologically.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah and I think the music especially in that song goes from very soft to very hard. So you’re almost in this daze. Almost like calm before the storm. And it feels a bit like a monologue until these heavy distorted guitars come in and breaks it up. So it’s kind of like someone’s woken up.
Do you try to draw on those types of formative emotional experiences when you sit down to write new songs or is it more so going into a live performance?
Nilufer Yanya: I think when I’m performing it’s always a bit different. You don’t know where it’s necessarily coming from or going to come from. And that’s kind of what makes it interesting but also makes it hard because sometimes it’s like, there’s nothing there. I feel like the performance – maybe from the outside people can’t necessarily tell the difference but I can feel the difference. Also sometimes I think when something’s going really well and it just hasn’t really landed with other people. It’s also fine. It’s like just maybe more of a personal experience is happening underneath. But I think in order to write the song – that’s why I find it interesting because it’s like your memories, but then it’s like your own relationship and memories with music as well. And what sounds almost like trigger different parts of your memory and make you want to react in a certain way to the music. So it’s kind of hard to say where it’s coming from but it’s all definitely tied in to the music.
I read how you used to view performing as kind of an obligation or something you had to do as an artist. It seems like you’ve grown a lot in that area and have really gelled with your band. What’s contributed to that change?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it’s like, performing is always a bit of a challenge. And I think it’s like rising to the challenge a bit. Also realizing it’s a real privilege to be able to perform when people actually want to hear your music. I think having more of an audience to play to kind of shifts that as well because you see how much it really means to the people in the room. Those things I’m really grateful for. And then having a band as well. It’s like you really want to honor the other musicians in the band by doing hopefully as good a job as they are. It’s a whole like craft in itself.
For sure. I bet it’s incredibly powerful when you’re on stage and you can tell that people are really connecting in the moment like that. It’s probably a high you get in a way.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. And I had that the very first time I played my own show. I felt so ecstatic for like a whole 24 hours afterwards. It gets weird when you start to compare your performances and you can be your own worst critic. It’s like you feel like you’re not doing as good or you’re not progressing in the way you want to and you can kind of beat yourself up about it. You can also just view it as you’re always gonna give what you have. And people don’t necessarily complain.
It feels like you’ve gone through some bigger life changes over the past few years. You toured PAINLESS for almost an entire year, recently switched record labels, and I read that you also recently moved. Did any of these changes of scenery factor into the writing of the record?
Nilufer Yanya: I think so. The music was still made in the same place. Me and Will (Archer) worked together on this record in a similar way to the last record but in a more intense way. We kind of cut everybody else out of the picture and just focused on writing together. Which I’m really happy that we did. I think every change is always good. And I think I’m always the kind of person that gets quite content with things. So it’s nice to change it up because you had to.
That’s a good segue because I was gonna ask more about the recording process with Will. Was that the first time you’ve worked with one creative partner only on a record before?
Nilufer Yanya: That was the first time. Yeah.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
Was there a character or persona you had in mind that you wanted to portray throughout this album?
Nilufer Yanya: It wasn’t like a character for the whole album. I’m just writing about different things, but also kind of similar things. So I guess it’s me. And sometimes I kind of imagine like, it’s you but you’re in a different kind of situation. Like, what do you feel around you? What do you hear? What do you see? “Method Actor” was a bit like someone who was quite down, quite stressed. There’s a lot of addiction going around, lots of violence. Like kind of in a place in their life maybe they can’t quite escape.
That’s super interesting because I feel like a lot of the album can be kind of gentle or contemplative. So it’s interesting to hear that contrast of violence and turmoil psychologically.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah and I think the music especially in that song goes from very soft to very hard. So you’re almost in this daze. Almost like calm before the storm. And it feels a bit like a monologue until these heavy distorted guitars come in and breaks it up. So it’s kind of like someone’s woken up.
Do you try to draw on those types of formative emotional experiences when you sit down to write new songs or is it more so going into a live performance?
Nilufer Yanya: I think when I’m performing it’s always a bit different. You don’t know where it’s necessarily coming from or going to come from. And that’s kind of what makes it interesting but also makes it hard because sometimes it’s like, there’s nothing there. I feel like the performance – maybe from the outside people can’t necessarily tell the difference but I can feel the difference. Also sometimes I think when something’s going really well and it just hasn’t really landed with other people. It’s also fine. It’s like just maybe more of a personal experience is happening underneath. But I think in order to write the song – that’s why I find it interesting because it’s like your memories, but then it’s like your own relationship and memories with music as well. And what sounds almost like trigger different parts of your memory and make you want to react in a certain way to the music. So it’s kind of hard to say where it’s coming from but it’s all definitely tied in to the music.
I read how you used to view performing as kind of an obligation or something you had to do as an artist. It seems like you’ve grown a lot in that area and have really gelled with your band. What’s contributed to that change?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it’s like, performing is always a bit of a challenge. And I think it’s like rising to the challenge a bit. Also realizing it’s a real privilege to be able to perform when people actually want to hear your music. I think having more of an audience to play to kind of shifts that as well because you see how much it really means to the people in the room. Those things I’m really grateful for. And then having a band as well. It’s like you really want to honor the other musicians in the band by doing hopefully as good a job as they are. It’s a whole like craft in itself.
For sure. I bet it’s incredibly powerful when you’re on stage and you can tell that people are really connecting in the moment like that. It’s probably a high you get in a way.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. And I had that the very first time I played my own show. I felt so ecstatic for like a whole 24 hours afterwards. It gets weird when you start to compare your performances and you can be your own worst critic. It’s like you feel like you’re not doing as good or you’re not progressing in the way you want to and you can kind of beat yourself up about it. You can also just view it as you’re always gonna give what you have. And people don’t necessarily complain.
It feels like you’ve gone through some bigger life changes over the past few years. You toured PAINLESS for almost an entire year, recently switched record labels, and I read that you also recently moved. Did any of these changes of scenery factor into the writing of the record?
Nilufer Yanya: I think so. The music was still made in the same place. Me and Will (Archer) worked together on this record in a similar way to the last record but in a more intense way. We kind of cut everybody else out of the picture and just focused on writing together. Which I’m really happy that we did. I think every change is always good. And I think I’m always the kind of person that gets quite content with things. So it’s nice to change it up because you had to.
That’s a good segue because I was gonna ask more about the recording process with Will. Was that the first time you’ve worked with one creative partner only on a record before?
Nilufer Yanya: That was the first time. Yeah.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
That’s super interesting because I feel like a lot of the album can be kind of gentle or contemplative. So it’s interesting to hear that contrast of violence and turmoil psychologically.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah and I think the music especially in that song goes from very soft to very hard. So you’re almost in this daze. Almost like calm before the storm. And it feels a bit like a monologue until these heavy distorted guitars come in and breaks it up. So it’s kind of like someone’s woken up.
Do you try to draw on those types of formative emotional experiences when you sit down to write new songs or is it more so going into a live performance?
Nilufer Yanya: I think when I’m performing it’s always a bit different. You don’t know where it’s necessarily coming from or going to come from. And that’s kind of what makes it interesting but also makes it hard because sometimes it’s like, there’s nothing there. I feel like the performance – maybe from the outside people can’t necessarily tell the difference but I can feel the difference. Also sometimes I think when something’s going really well and it just hasn’t really landed with other people. It’s also fine. It’s like just maybe more of a personal experience is happening underneath. But I think in order to write the song – that’s why I find it interesting because it’s like your memories, but then it’s like your own relationship and memories with music as well. And what sounds almost like trigger different parts of your memory and make you want to react in a certain way to the music. So it’s kind of hard to say where it’s coming from but it’s all definitely tied in to the music.
I read how you used to view performing as kind of an obligation or something you had to do as an artist. It seems like you’ve grown a lot in that area and have really gelled with your band. What’s contributed to that change?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it’s like, performing is always a bit of a challenge. And I think it’s like rising to the challenge a bit. Also realizing it’s a real privilege to be able to perform when people actually want to hear your music. I think having more of an audience to play to kind of shifts that as well because you see how much it really means to the people in the room. Those things I’m really grateful for. And then having a band as well. It’s like you really want to honor the other musicians in the band by doing hopefully as good a job as they are. It’s a whole like craft in itself.
For sure. I bet it’s incredibly powerful when you’re on stage and you can tell that people are really connecting in the moment like that. It’s probably a high you get in a way.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. And I had that the very first time I played my own show. I felt so ecstatic for like a whole 24 hours afterwards. It gets weird when you start to compare your performances and you can be your own worst critic. It’s like you feel like you’re not doing as good or you’re not progressing in the way you want to and you can kind of beat yourself up about it. You can also just view it as you’re always gonna give what you have. And people don’t necessarily complain.
It feels like you’ve gone through some bigger life changes over the past few years. You toured PAINLESS for almost an entire year, recently switched record labels, and I read that you also recently moved. Did any of these changes of scenery factor into the writing of the record?
Nilufer Yanya: I think so. The music was still made in the same place. Me and Will (Archer) worked together on this record in a similar way to the last record but in a more intense way. We kind of cut everybody else out of the picture and just focused on writing together. Which I’m really happy that we did. I think every change is always good. And I think I’m always the kind of person that gets quite content with things. So it’s nice to change it up because you had to.
That’s a good segue because I was gonna ask more about the recording process with Will. Was that the first time you’ve worked with one creative partner only on a record before?
Nilufer Yanya: That was the first time. Yeah.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
Do you try to draw on those types of formative emotional experiences when you sit down to write new songs or is it more so going into a live performance?
Nilufer Yanya: I think when I’m performing it’s always a bit different. You don’t know where it’s necessarily coming from or going to come from. And that’s kind of what makes it interesting but also makes it hard because sometimes it’s like, there’s nothing there. I feel like the performance – maybe from the outside people can’t necessarily tell the difference but I can feel the difference. Also sometimes I think when something’s going really well and it just hasn’t really landed with other people. It’s also fine. It’s like just maybe more of a personal experience is happening underneath. But I think in order to write the song – that’s why I find it interesting because it’s like your memories, but then it’s like your own relationship and memories with music as well. And what sounds almost like trigger different parts of your memory and make you want to react in a certain way to the music. So it’s kind of hard to say where it’s coming from but it’s all definitely tied in to the music.
I read how you used to view performing as kind of an obligation or something you had to do as an artist. It seems like you’ve grown a lot in that area and have really gelled with your band. What’s contributed to that change?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it’s like, performing is always a bit of a challenge. And I think it’s like rising to the challenge a bit. Also realizing it’s a real privilege to be able to perform when people actually want to hear your music. I think having more of an audience to play to kind of shifts that as well because you see how much it really means to the people in the room. Those things I’m really grateful for. And then having a band as well. It’s like you really want to honor the other musicians in the band by doing hopefully as good a job as they are. It’s a whole like craft in itself.
For sure. I bet it’s incredibly powerful when you’re on stage and you can tell that people are really connecting in the moment like that. It’s probably a high you get in a way.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. And I had that the very first time I played my own show. I felt so ecstatic for like a whole 24 hours afterwards. It gets weird when you start to compare your performances and you can be your own worst critic. It’s like you feel like you’re not doing as good or you’re not progressing in the way you want to and you can kind of beat yourself up about it. You can also just view it as you’re always gonna give what you have. And people don’t necessarily complain.
It feels like you’ve gone through some bigger life changes over the past few years. You toured PAINLESS for almost an entire year, recently switched record labels, and I read that you also recently moved. Did any of these changes of scenery factor into the writing of the record?
Nilufer Yanya: I think so. The music was still made in the same place. Me and Will (Archer) worked together on this record in a similar way to the last record but in a more intense way. We kind of cut everybody else out of the picture and just focused on writing together. Which I’m really happy that we did. I think every change is always good. And I think I’m always the kind of person that gets quite content with things. So it’s nice to change it up because you had to.
That’s a good segue because I was gonna ask more about the recording process with Will. Was that the first time you’ve worked with one creative partner only on a record before?
Nilufer Yanya: That was the first time. Yeah.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
I read how you used to view performing as kind of an obligation or something you had to do as an artist. It seems like you’ve grown a lot in that area and have really gelled with your band. What’s contributed to that change?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it’s like, performing is always a bit of a challenge. And I think it’s like rising to the challenge a bit. Also realizing it’s a real privilege to be able to perform when people actually want to hear your music. I think having more of an audience to play to kind of shifts that as well because you see how much it really means to the people in the room. Those things I’m really grateful for. And then having a band as well. It’s like you really want to honor the other musicians in the band by doing hopefully as good a job as they are. It’s a whole like craft in itself.
For sure. I bet it’s incredibly powerful when you’re on stage and you can tell that people are really connecting in the moment like that. It’s probably a high you get in a way.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. And I had that the very first time I played my own show. I felt so ecstatic for like a whole 24 hours afterwards. It gets weird when you start to compare your performances and you can be your own worst critic. It’s like you feel like you’re not doing as good or you’re not progressing in the way you want to and you can kind of beat yourself up about it. You can also just view it as you’re always gonna give what you have. And people don’t necessarily complain.
It feels like you’ve gone through some bigger life changes over the past few years. You toured PAINLESS for almost an entire year, recently switched record labels, and I read that you also recently moved. Did any of these changes of scenery factor into the writing of the record?
Nilufer Yanya: I think so. The music was still made in the same place. Me and Will (Archer) worked together on this record in a similar way to the last record but in a more intense way. We kind of cut everybody else out of the picture and just focused on writing together. Which I’m really happy that we did. I think every change is always good. And I think I’m always the kind of person that gets quite content with things. So it’s nice to change it up because you had to.
That’s a good segue because I was gonna ask more about the recording process with Will. Was that the first time you’ve worked with one creative partner only on a record before?
Nilufer Yanya: That was the first time. Yeah.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
For sure. I bet it’s incredibly powerful when you’re on stage and you can tell that people are really connecting in the moment like that. It’s probably a high you get in a way.
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. And I had that the very first time I played my own show. I felt so ecstatic for like a whole 24 hours afterwards. It gets weird when you start to compare your performances and you can be your own worst critic. It’s like you feel like you’re not doing as good or you’re not progressing in the way you want to and you can kind of beat yourself up about it. You can also just view it as you’re always gonna give what you have. And people don’t necessarily complain.
It feels like you’ve gone through some bigger life changes over the past few years. You toured PAINLESS for almost an entire year, recently switched record labels, and I read that you also recently moved. Did any of these changes of scenery factor into the writing of the record?
Nilufer Yanya: I think so. The music was still made in the same place. Me and Will (Archer) worked together on this record in a similar way to the last record but in a more intense way. We kind of cut everybody else out of the picture and just focused on writing together. Which I’m really happy that we did. I think every change is always good. And I think I’m always the kind of person that gets quite content with things. So it’s nice to change it up because you had to.
That’s a good segue because I was gonna ask more about the recording process with Will. Was that the first time you’ve worked with one creative partner only on a record before?
Nilufer Yanya: That was the first time. Yeah.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
It feels like you’ve gone through some bigger life changes over the past few years. You toured PAINLESS for almost an entire year, recently switched record labels, and I read that you also recently moved. Did any of these changes of scenery factor into the writing of the record?
Nilufer Yanya: I think so. The music was still made in the same place. Me and Will (Archer) worked together on this record in a similar way to the last record but in a more intense way. We kind of cut everybody else out of the picture and just focused on writing together. Which I’m really happy that we did. I think every change is always good. And I think I’m always the kind of person that gets quite content with things. So it’s nice to change it up because you had to.
That’s a good segue because I was gonna ask more about the recording process with Will. Was that the first time you’ve worked with one creative partner only on a record before?
Nilufer Yanya: That was the first time. Yeah.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
That’s a good segue because I was gonna ask more about the recording process with Will. Was that the first time you’ve worked with one creative partner only on a record before?
Nilufer Yanya: That was the first time. Yeah.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
Was the song-building process similar to PAINLESS where you started with the music, and added melodies and lyrics later?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it’s kind of nice because we’d already created this formula for us to like base the album around. We didn’t know if it was going to work the second time around. But basically we’ll have a loop or something like a guitar with drums, or something quite sparse. Even if it’s like bass and guitar and drums or something small or long. And then I’ll just start writing over that. And then kind of form a song out of that. So it kind of worked the same way for this record and it felt like PAINLESS was kind of like a blueprint for this album.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
Was it even more exaggerated than PAINLESS since it was just you two?
Nilufer Yanya: We knew that from the start as well. It was like you don’t have to think about other things. You don’t think ‘oh, what about this person?’ You just don’t really worry about it in a way which is nice. We only had to trust each other’s ideas and opinions in order to finish something. It’s like the closest to working alone, working with just one other person. So I think that works really well for both of us, because we’re both a bit sensitive about our ideas and quite passionate about the song itself so it’s so much nicer to know that it’s only one other person whose opinion counts. It feels like a safe space.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
You’ve been working with Will for a long time, dating back to your first record. I know you talked about trust. What else do you think works so well with your creative partnership?
Nilufer Yanya: We both bonded over guitar at the beginning. That’s how we kind of started writing together. We’d have two ideas. One of his ideas, one of my ideas and kind of fuse it together and create a song. Sometimes he’d help me translate something I was hearing. Also I think a lot of the guitar riffs – it’s almost like he’s in my head and writing them out from like a part of my brain I didn’t know was there. I feel very connected. I love his music. The ideas that he comes up with, I just think his production’s really cool. It’s just really nice to be in awe of someone else’s ideas. Also feel like there’s space for you to have your own part in it.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
You guys seem creatively telepathic.
Nilufer Yanya: I think you have to be a little bit. I didn’t really think that’s how I wanted to work. I was kind of very content writing by myself before I met Will. But now it’s like, I don’t know how to write a song without him, almost. It’s a bit weird.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
Did you want the sound of the record to reflect that insular, solitary nature of how you guys recorded it?
Nilufer Yanya: Not necessarily. I don’t hear it like that. I felt like PAINLESS is a bit too claustrophobic. Does that make sense? And this one is a bit more expansive, like sonically has more room. The ideas feel a bit more like fully fleshed out.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
It’s interesting like we kind of touched on earlier. But “Like I Say (Runaway) and “Method Actor” feature some of that heavy, crunchy guitars in the choruses we’ve seen in some of your past work. But a lot of the album feels melancholic at times. Was that purposeful or was it just kind of the way these songs grew and manifested?
Nilufer Yanya: It’s probably not too purposeful. I think it’s a bit inevitable though because it’s like, when you’re creating an album and you know you’re writing an album you kind of naturally factor in a bit of balance. A bit of a respite from the intensity. So it’s nice to be doing something really big or like really rocky or like really crunchy and then make something soothing. And I think it’s a natural kind of reaction to making something a bit more aggressive that you want to have also a space for something calm.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
We touched on the different collision of sounds, and I really like how diverse the instrumentation is on the project. There’s some really beautiful string arrangements on a number of songs. I really like some of the ambient synths, and “Method Actor” has that pedal steel on the outro. How do you go about stitching these disparate parts together in such a uniform way?
Nilufer Yanya: It was difficult actually because Will had the idea for the strings when we were writing the song. He does like quite a lot of string arrangements but obviously it was programmed so it’s then translating that. We got violin and cellist to play in the parts, but then it’s like, you kind of are always adapting them and changing them to actually make it work. But those parts were kind of already pre-decided. And then this pedal steel was like the very end, like the very last thing that we put on the record. And it’s actually quite a lot of it throughout the album. So it’s a nice, like tying together different sonic worlds.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
I read that the “Method Actor” video was shot all in one take. Reading things like that makes it sound like the process was seamless. Were there any challenges your team faced behind the scenes while filming?
Nilufer Yanya: It was actually pretty seamless. It’s like the most easy way you can make a video. We wanted to make more visualizers as opposed to music videos. We didn’t really have a big team. We just kind of picked the location, and was like ‘okay, let’s shoot it here tomorrow,’ kind of thing. So I’d say the most difficult thing was just making sure no one walks into the frame. I mean we had a plan but it was quite an ad-hoc decision. Like we didn’t know until we flew to Spain, we didn’t really know what exactly it was gonna look like. So it’s a lot of just bouncing off the surroundings. And we scouted the area for the right kind of set up. Kind of like just using what you have.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
Your sister directed “Like I Say” right?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah she directs pretty much all my music videos actually. So we’ve worked together like that since the beginning. It’s really nice. Another really nice working relationship to have in a creative way.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
I’m sure there’s head butting behind the scenes or creative differences but it sounds like it doesn’t spill over into full blown problems.
Nilufer Yanya: I mean definitely you have disagreements but I think it’s a very rewarding process overall. It’s actually really nice to make things this way like with people I really know and trust. And it’s nice to grow together. It takes a lot of the small niceties out of it. Like you can just be real about what you want it to look like, or what you think it should look like. I know a lot of artists might always work with someone different, like each visual they’re making. I feel like that’s quite hard. So I feel like I kind of lucked out early on. I think that’s a good way of looking at it because it’s like I found somebody I really want to keep creating things with.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
It’s been covered quite a bit how your family has contributed to your art. What was it like growing up in a household where everyone was creatively gifted and pursuing their own artistic passions?
Nilufer Yanya: I think it was nice. It’s hard to think about it on the outside especially when I feel like I’m very much still in that space. I think it’s probably just helped me take creativity and making things seriously. And seeing how people have created their work and built their life around it. Seeing that and understanding that from a young age really helped me do that in my own life. It’s a weird thing because you never know if it’s really what you want to do or if it’s all just like what you know. I didn’t love school too much. I was always a lot happier just like making something or creating something by myself. I did piano for a long time. But always practicing and learning another piece of music sometimes felt rewarding, but didn’t feel as rewarding as it did when I would sit down with the guitar and just like make something up and write from this space inside of you as opposed to just going at it for hours and trying to improve. I think I really learned to enjoy that side of me.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
Did growing up in a house like that contribute to you speaking about the importance of teaching arts in schools and starting the Artists in Transit nonprofit with your sister?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah definitely. Artists in Transit was a good example of using what we know to connect with other people. Hopefully give some of that to other people, because it’s like something that we have always seen as really valuable to have.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
You’ve talked about how growing up in a mixed background you kind of just wanted to be considered being from London. As you’ve gotten older, how has that changed? Do you enjoy exploring both sides of your family history?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah I do, definitely. I think it’s one of those things that’s so interesting once you grow up a bit, and you start learning a bit more about a family and everyone’s own relationship within the family and you start understanding things a bit more. I feel like exploring my own cultural identities within a family is also like, it’s not as light-hearted as learning about someone else’s culture. It can feel quite loaded in a way. It’s just like an ongoing process and part of my identity and something that’s always going to continue happening.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
I feel like it’s pretty common when you’re younger to not be super interested in your family tree. And then you get older and want to learn more and you connect more with yourself in the process.
Nilufer Yanya: I think I was always interested because I was always fascinated. Like ‘how can my family come from such different places?’ And then you realize ‘oh, definitely not the only one.’ London is full of people from totally different places. And just learning about history more and empires, colonialism. I think it’s because everything’s tied together. Then it gets into politics and everyone’s totally different world views.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
Did you go to Barbados recently? Was that your first time?
Nilufer Yanya: Yeah it was. It was so much smaller than – I mean my mom always said it was small but I never realized how small of an island it is. There’s really not a lot of space. It’s beautiful and the people are lovely and everyone’s so polite and friendly. I really enjoyed being there. But it’s crazy because it’s such a touristy location. But then it’s like, all the people that kind of own the beaches or the big land or hotels – they’re kind of still the people, the same families that would have owned plantations. There’s still not a lot of talking about the history and [people] who were taken from their homes and transported here and worked and worked and worked until they died. We did quite a bit of history as well because my aunt has an ongoing project to do with enslaved peoples and memorials in the UK. It was a lot to take in but it was really, really interesting. I loved it.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.
How have you seen Artists in Transit grow from when you guys first started it?
Nilufer Yanya: I feel like it hasn’t necessarily grown as in, expanded. It’s more, we realized the things that we can do and what we’re good at doing and how to be impactful in that way. So right now we’re doing a series of summer art workshops in London. Different artists will come in every week and work with the children or work with whoever’s showed up basically to create things. That’s kind of where we’re at right now. We wanna keep going. We don’t want to stop when things get too complicated or difficult. I think it’s kind of trying to find a way to make it sustainable.