What do you do at 13 years of age, when you and a friend decide to prank your parents? You dye your hair green! Right? Well, this was very much the case for Sony, RCA artist Au/Ra and four years later her hair is still very green. A teal like shade in resemblance to the ocean, Au/Ra simply fell in love with the colour and kept it ever since. With long locks flowing beyond her hips, definitely a bold but brilliant move from being a naturally fair blonde. Au/Ra’s hair is truly stunning and quite frankly, so is she.

Green represents the trees and nature, which Au/Ra is very much used to seeing around her. The 17 year old singer-songwriter of German decent, was born in Ibiza but grew up on the island of Antigua in the Caribbean, in fact she still lives there. Attending an international school and having an abundance of Canadian friends, developed Au/Ra’s American sounding accent however, her love for plantain, specifically with salt fish and Susie’s Hot Sauce solidifies her authenticity as a true island girl.

Bubbly and friendly, with big smiles and a very enthusiastic energy, Au/Ra arrives at the Sony Music studio for our shoot and interview. She’s literally just wrapped a separate ‘My Style’ shoot with ASOS, which she found lots of fun and thankfully, she’s still excited to shoot some more. Although still a teen, she’s most definitely beyond her years, which is extremely apparent in her music but also with the maturity she holds, amongst a room filled with much older people. “Can we put something a little more chill on,” requests Au/Ra. I ask her what she would like to listen to, “I dunno, maybe Frank Ocean,” she replies and so, I fill the airwaves with Channel Orange.

Top by Artica Arbox (The Lobby), Skirt by Manon Planche (Dyelog), Shoes by DONNANT DONNANT and Jewellery by The Great Frog

Two outfits and a good few snaps later, we wrap the shoot and Au/Ra and I move on to our chat for the interview. I ask if she enjoyed the shoot and she said it was lovely. “At first I wasn’t very comfortable on camera but I feel like it’s gotten better now. I’m more into it for music videos and stuff,” shares Au/Ra as we talk about photo shoots in general. Au/Ra’s music as well as her videos are extremely powerful, she’s most definitely a story teller, visually as well as verbally. “Sometimes I write songs and I can already see the visual in my head. I can kind of see them as like movies, TV shows, Anime’s or stories,” states Au/Ra.

Most would coin Au/Ra as a pop artist with an alternative and electronic edge. Her songwriting is therapeutic, very much emotional commentary for todays youth. From feelings of displacement to lack of mind control and despair, she speaks about it all and in the most sincere and honest form. Au/Ra’s vocal performance is also absolutely incredible, eerie but with the crispest of tones delivering easy listening music similar to artists she herself is inspired by, “I’m listening to a lot of Lana Del Ray, she just released her new album (Norman Fucking Rockwell) so I’ve just been in all those emotions, it’s been great,” shares Au/Ra, she also mentions The Neighbourhood too, “I’ve really grown up with those two, they are still releasing music and I’m still growing up with them and it’s really cool.”

Growing up with parents in the music industry, most would think it would have been a given that Au/Ra ended up being a singer herself but honestly, it came from a place of rebellion. Her mother a songwriter and her father, German producer Torsten Stenzel, did not want Au/Ra to be involved in such a harsh industry. “There is this whole stereotype about people with parents in the industry, pushing them to do music but my parents quite frankly, were doing the opposite. They were like ‘no, the music industry is really tough, you are gonna have to sacrifice everything, don’t do it.’ And I still did it,” explains Au/Ra. “I definitely rebelled and I didn’t think I could do it to be honest. Then somehow it worked out, through YouTube videos and gaining a small following.” She released an array of covers, most of which have now been removed however, if you dig deep enough, you can find a young and blonde Au/Ra, singing her heart out to the camera. “I did one reggae cover of ‘Royals’ by Lorde, it got 3million views and that’s what Ellen found,” shares Au/Ra, which she admits she has not mentioned to anyone. When Ellen DeGeneres team gets in touch, it’s a pretty big deal and very much the case for then, 11 year old Au/Ra when invited to appear on Ellen’s show however, her parents kindly declined the offer. “I was freaking out and they were like, ‘no no no it’s not the right time for you to do this’,” explains Au/Ra. “I’m so glad that they didn’t let me go on because I wasn’t prepared, I would not have been prepared for that.”

It seems for most artists, especially those that write their own music, releasing covers becomes a stage they grow to dislike and Au/Ra very much went through the same scenario, “I used to be kind of ashamed to say that I used to do that (covers), which is ridiculous,” admits Au/Ra. “I feel like that’s such a different part of my story but in the end it’s part of it and if I didn’t have that, I wouldn’t have ended up here.” Although Au/Ra’s father had some friends that took an interest in his daughter’s talent, the success on YouTube definitely made the right people pay attention. “Obviously my dad, being in the music industry, he knew some people but to be quite honest, without the YouTube videos, I would have never gotten any recognition for me to even have a chance to meet anybody from Sony,” explains Au/Ra. “Somebody that my dad knew, e-mailed him and said ‘oh my gosh your daughter’s voice is incredible, could we meet up?’ It wasn’t even like my dad reaching out to people, which is the weirdest thing. Suddenly these opportunities started to come to me. We ended up flying out to New York and meeting a bunch of people and one thing led to another.”

At this time, Au/Ra was signed to an indie label and had already released a few singles outside of her deal with Sony, RCA. “I was actually signed to an indie label before that called Loudmouth Music, who I’m still with and they were really the first people who gave me a chance, which was really cool,” details Au/Ra. “I got the indie experience and now I have a really cool experience with Sony, which is awesome. I’m really happy with them.” On her new major label deal with Sony, RCA Au/Ra released the single ‘Outsiders’ and her first music video in November 2017. “I was that kid at school that was into things that other people weren’t really into,” shares Au/Ra on her experiences to why she wrote this song. “I’ve been very influenced by Anime and by that culture for a while and I was listening to different genres of music, like a lot of rock music and people in the Caribbean, especially my friends, they don’t really listen to that kind of music. They listen to pop and dancehall and reggae, which I listen to also but I started developing this appreciation for the more Emo side of things.”

Au/Ra’s follow up single ‘Panic Room’ is probably her biggest single to date, having amassed over 14 million views on YouTube and reaching the top 40 in the UK singles chart. The video showcases an intense scenario in a hospital, with the staff seeking refuge in a locked room. Au/Ra who comes across in the video as a patient in need, is actually the dangerous trigger but by the time we find that out, it’s already too late. “Panic Room was basically about anxiety and that feeling of being trapped in your own head,” explains Au/Ra. She further explains that the video resembles ones mind, a place that only we ourselves can control but then at times, we can’t control at all. “Everybody can have these thoughts that are fighting each other. I have dark thoughts, that happens. It was really talking about that place that you sometimes go to, when you’re too controlled by anxiety, everybody does at some point and it sucks.” Au/Ra also shares that she felt a lot of anxiety during school and the song was her way of explaining how she was feeling however, not by telling people how to fix the problem. “Just explaining how something feels is enough and then you acknowledge it and you’re like yea, everybody feels like that, it’s OK. Then you just kinda accept it.”

In October 2018, Au/Ra released her third music video Emoji, along with her EP entitled X Games, with a track and video of the same title released earlier this year. Emoji is very much about the differences between communication on and offline, leading to the deflection of reality and only wanting to deal with the fabricated versions of a relationship. The visual however, portrays the message from a completely different angle, showcasing Au/Ra as a robot who thinks they’re human. The robot then realises they’re not a human and starts to malfunction, “it’s really a metaphor for building up a façade of yourself and realising that it’s not who you really are,” states Au/Ra. “It’s kind of like being afraid to be who you really are and then freaking out when you realise that you are not the person you’ve been portraying.”

Assassin is another extremely powerful track and visual, which ultimately portrays the battle, one has with self. “You have different versions of yourself sometimes,” shares Au/Ra. “Parts of you that you don’t like, that are toxic and detrimental to yourself. Sometimes you do have to kill those thoughts and those things off because they are just not good for you. It’s that voice in your head, that if you look at yourself in the mirror you’re like ‘I look ugly.’ No, that’s the root, it’s self sabotage, that’s what it is and it’s not good.”

Medicine, I think is one of my most favoured tracks by Au/Ra, depicting a story of struggle which although they may try, nobody other than ourselves can fix the problem. The video showcases Au/Ra trapped in a glass box and over time, the box becomes overfilled with medicine, causing Au/Ra to drown. This visual along with Panic Room and Emoji, Au/Ra came up with the concepts herself. I shared my intrigue with the fact she’s able to have such a thorough understanding of such in-depth feeling and emotion at such a young age, “Young people are going through so much already,” explains Au/Ra. “School and your family life, pressure of exams, you start getting into your first relationships and that’s all happening at that time, it’s a lot of pressure, in like one decade of your life.” Speaking on the song specifically, “I wrote that at a time where I was going through some really tough stuff at home and I think everybody does at some point in there life, whether their parents are divorcing or they’re not getting along with somebody in the household,” shares Au/Ra. “It can happen and it sucks. Just knowing that nobody else could do anything about it, that’s just how it is and I needed to get over it myself and fix myself.”

Au/Ra’s most recent video ‘Dance In The Dark,’ is a pretty cool visual. Au/Ra dressed in all white, resembles the light whilst everyone else dressed in black resembles the darkness. Ultimately she ends up joining the dark side, as she ends the video dressed in black as well. Au/Ra’s styling in this visual is great, especially the all black offering, its definitely eye catching.

With such powerful messages and the ability to translate her experiences and inner feelings into such great songs, I ask Au/Ra what she feels her purpose is, having been given a platform to share such in-depth commentary through her own experiences and observations, “It’s something I think about a lot,” admits Au/Ra. “I think with every song, I just hope that people can feel as though they are understood in some sort of way, I think that’s really special. I’m very proud of the connection that I have to my fans. They call themselves green beans, which is hilarious and very cute.” That is actually very cute indeed. “I want to hopefully make them feel better, in a way that they feel understood by the messages in the songs,” continues Au/Ra. “If you can actually make a difference with music that you put out, you should.” I completely agree with Au/Ra and again, this adds to the reasons why I feel as though she’s way beyond her years, perhaps an old soul. “As much as I also write songs about my personal experiences, course I need to write about a boy that’s been getting me in my feelings and all that stuff, of course,” states Au/Ra. “Any artist needs to write about that stuff as well but I also much rather prefer to write things that I know can actually help someone in any sort of way and help me along the way as well.”

The audio for Au/Ra’s latest single ‘Stay Happy’ has just been released and it’s a really beautiful song. As we were speaking ahead of it’s release, Au/Ra shared with us what the song is all about, “It’s a lot about questioning if there is a short cut to stay happy,” details Au/Ra. “There’s all these small moments and sometimes it’s hard to know whether you’re actually in them or not and it just feels weird. I just wanted to write something that kind of says that, cause I went through a phase when I was kind of neutral all the time. I wasn’t happy, I wasn’t sad I was just kinda numb and it was weird. I think I’m past that now, it comes in and out but a lot of people feel like that sometimes, you just don’t know how to feel. It’s like does anybody ever just stay happy?” It’s a legit question to ask, don’t you think? I guess with life, it’s all about balance and happiness wouldn’t exist if we were unable to also feel sadness. I ask Au/Ra what she does to try and stay happy and she tells me, “I talk to my friends and family a lot, I try to remind myself of the things that I can be grateful for and appreciate things more. I think that keeps you grounded and yea, keeps you happy. Listen to a lot of music, write a lot more, cry, eat chocolate,” she laughs.

Au/Ra is quite simply a pretty incredible young human. She’s very sweet and holds such great wisdom for a girl of only 17 years. She’s enjoying this journey and totally thriving in it. She’s been given the opportunity to be herself authentically, as well as bring her creativity to life, “I love it and I really enjoy all of this so much and the fact that I’m able to be so involved in everything I do across the project, it’s really cool,” shares Au/Ra. “I work with people who really respect my ideas because at the end of the day, I am 17 and I started doing this when I was 13.

‘Stay Happy’ by Au/Ra is out now and available to stream on Spotify, along with her ‘X Games’ EP.

CREDITS

Photographer - Mike G Smith (Smith Town Studios)

Stylist - Quinton Faulkner

Hair + Make-Up - Lucy Thomas

Special thanks to Sony Music, RCA

Au/Ra releases her new single 'Stay Happy' and we find out how she does this and much more