Nxdia: Music was always in my mind. I was a bit of a loner as a kid growing up in Cairo – I got on with everyone, but I also spent a lot of time alone, writing, playing pretend and humming. I didn’t always know how to articulate how I was feeling or processing the world around me, but I always found that writing, pen to paper, the words flowed out so much more and helped me to make sense of stuff. My journals and poems became an escape for me. I’d listen intently to the music mum would play me – she was an activist, still is – songs like ‘Behind the Wall’ by Tracy Chapman, ‘Mercedes Benz’ by Janis Joplin and Donia Massoud’s version of ‘Betnadini’. These were songs I really remember, loved and connected with because of her. While we were still in Cairo, I discovered big pop artists like Britney Spears and Katy Perry, and I became so obsessed. I’d put on shows for my mum, completely immersed in the feeling of pop.
Then we moved to Manchester and I remember feeling even more like a loner. There were things I didn’t understand culturally, people were friendly enough, but everything around me had changed. I’d literally never seen so much rain in my life. I’d gone from having my entire family nearby and food I’d grown up with in our flat in Cairo, to a completely new place, it was a huge change.
The humming and the whirring words in my head intensified. I still kept my journals and wrote poems to try and figure out my feelings. I’d write all these little songs on my ukulele and eventually a bit on a classical guitar, then I started to do YouTube covers and originals. I wanted to share music, but I didn’t know how. It was just my way of understanding my inner dialogue and the new world I was in. I’d watch so much slam poetry, struck by how people would play with words, it was like a new world was opening up. Then one day when I was singing a song I’d written under my breath, a girl called Safiya shoved her ear in my face. “What are you singing? What song is that?” I told her it was just one I’d made up, and she smiled wide and went “Oh, you should be a singer!” and there the seed was planted. It had never occurred to me that you could just want to be singer.
As I started to dream, I imagined a community where I fitted in. And actually, starting my journey into music immediately brought me a sense of connection I hadn’t had before, it made me feel less like a freak, less like I was doing life wrong. I felt like there were people out there who knew what I was going through so intimately, because they were singing things that felt like they’d been cherry-picked from my brain. Marina and the Diamonds was huge for me, her Family Jewels album and Electra Heart meant so much to me, the self-reflection, the darkness in big pop and clever writing. My Chemical Romance had me reeled in for the drama – so much conviction and theatrics in their performances and music – their song ‘Mama’ had me like: “Fuck yeah, we’re all going to hell.” And P!nk meant the world to me in a different way – she was tomboyish, straight talking and so kick-ass, I thought she didn’t give a fuck and was just doing everything her own way. She was not what I had in mind in a pop star. She was so free, so liberated – I wanted to feel that freedom so bad.
