FKA twigs — the English singer, dancer and actor Tahliah Debrett Barnett — is out with a brand new album, Eusexua.
Jordan Hemingway
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Jordan Hemingway
There is a particular feeling behind the brand new album from FKA twigs — the English singer, dancer and actor Tahliah Debrett Barnett — a sense she first encountered at underground raves in Prague, in the summertime of 2022.
“The sensation that tradition was alive,” she says. “Nobody has their telephones out, all people’s dancing. You recognize, if one thing superb occurs on the evening, you do not movie it. It is only for the folks there that actually expertise it.”
It was such a definite feeling that she finally gave it a reputation, which she would additionally use because the title for her new album: Eusexua.
As FKA twigs defines it, “eusexua” can come up from a mess of experiences: “It is pure presence. It is a second of nothingness. Or it is the second earlier than a extremely unimaginable thought. I’ve skilled ‘eusexua’ when kissing somebody I do not know rather well, however I actually like. So it is this ego-less presence which is simply full of this type of tingling readability.”
At all times a multi-disciplinary artist, the music discovered on her new album is only one expression of FKA twigs’ exploration of this amorphous feeling. Final September, she carried out a “durational art work” at Sotheby’s in London referred to as The Eleven, comprising meditational actions meant to ease the physique’s expertise of “eusexua.”
A couple of days earlier than the discharge of Eusexua, FKA twigs sat down with All Issues Thought-about host Juana Summers to speak concerning the origin of the mission, its sonic influences, and the way her relationship to her personal physique has modified lately.
This interview has been evenly edited for size and readability.
Interview highlights
Juana Summers: I need to speak slightly bit about your time in Prague. I do know you have been there in 2022 and also you have been taking pictures a film. And I ponder — you’ve got had this very transformative, significant expertise there — what was it about that point in your life that made you so open to that, that allowed you to obtain that, after which to translate it into the brand new music that we’re listening to from you?
FKA twigs: I imply, I feel I would had a number of troublesome occasions, personally, in so many elements of my life. Like, so many issues had simply come and tied in a knot. And to compound that, I felt, for me, personally, I used to be battling the world round me as a result of we would simply come out of COVID. And it was a time [when] everybody had turn into so targeted on being on-line and the concept of being, I suppose, perceived. So I feel that is a part of the impetus for me wanting to search out one thing in the other way — a second of full freedom, a second of uncooked human expression, beating, thudding. I do not know. Like, I used to be simply, like, ahh! It is like I simply needed one thing actual and I needed one thing imperfect that was good, really.
FKA twigs says “eusexua” can come up from a mess of experiences. She instructed NPR, “It is pure presence. It is a second of nothingness. Or it is the second earlier than a extremely unimaginable thought.”
Jordan Hemingway
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Jordan Hemingway
Summers: I do know that you’ve got additionally been exploring the inventive outlet of “eusexua” other than music. Final yr, you had a efficiency artwork piece operating in London. It is referred to as The Eleven, and I do not assume that I might be capable to do it justice attempting to elucidate it to our viewers. So are you able to simply describe that piece for listeners?
FKA twigs: So “The Eleven” is a motion and way of life methodology that I created together with “eusexua.” And it concentrates on 11 elements of life which you can select to work on to make your life simpler, extra manageable and extra able to expertise “eusexua.” So it is a motion meditation. So say, for instance, if my intention was to not be on my cellphone, not be on social media, I might do that motion meditation for 11 minutes within the morning to infuse my day with my intention. So I feel “The Eleven” is a approach of self-contracting and holding your self accountable to doing these issues and to creating these enhancements. And it is an actual, tangible approach of protecting observe of your self.
Summers: I am actually fascinated by the physicality of it and the best way that it sort of ties into your relationship with your individual physique. And it made me marvel, how has your relationship together with your physique modified over the previous couple of years and the way does “eusexua” match into that?
FKA twigs: Yeah, I imply, it is modified a lot. I have been dancing since I used to be 7 or 8 and I’ve been skilled since I used to be 12 years outdated. I’ve been dancing, myself within the mirror, , judging, bettering. My physique’s been in a lot ache. I’ve had continual ache for the previous few years and I’ve needed to, in some ways, work on that and heal myself. So I’ve had to take action a lot work on that, and I really feel prefer it’s in really a great place. I really feel good. I really feel like I’ve taken management of one thing and I’ve modified it.
Summers: I need to look ahead slightly bit, if we will. You’ve gotten your new album. You’ve got simply introduced the massive Eusexia tour, and I feel nobody shall be stunned to know that you’re going to carry it again to Prague, the place the inspiration got here from. How do you’re feeling about bringing that music again to the place the place you had this transformative expertise that you’ve got described that actually created this second of understanding, this sense for you?
FKA twigs: I really feel a bit shy. Extra shy than even, like, New York or LA or London or one thing. Nevertheless it simply felt actually vital for me to go and, like, honor what that place gave me. And I would like to have the ability to share what I’ve created off the again of getting an expertise and being welcomed into that tradition so deeply a number of years in the past.
