If you have yet to catch wind of [Amaal](https://www.instagram.com/amaalnuux), prepare to fall in love. The gorgeous singer, songwriter, and recording artist arrives with her own version of ambient, beat-driven R&B, inspired greatly by the legends such as Aaliyah and Destiny’s Child — an era of music that captures her soul full-heartedly. No matter what direction she goes, there will always be elements of that feel-good R&B we all know and love.
In describing herself, Amaal states she’s “a lover of music. I love reading, and I’m addicted to reality TV. _The Real Housewives_ and all those things, I’m up to date on it. Personality-wise, a girl's girl. It’s hard to describe yourself when someone asks, but people would say I’m loving and kind.”
Coming up in a household with her 9 siblings, Amaal grew up in war-torn Mogadishu where her family had no choice but to flee as refugees in the early 1990’s. After relocating to Toronto, Amaal discovered her own love and passion for music, albeit feeling confined and limited to the topics she could sing about. From there, she shifted her focus to creating songs that spoke volumes to our current times, from political and social unrest in Somalia to her own sentiments moving through this thing called life.
Fast forward to 2021, Amaal steps into the limelight wiser, bolder, more confident, and ready to take over the music industry once and for all. On the heels of her last two singles and visuals, “Heaven” and “Honey,” Amaal returns with her highly-anticipated new EP titled [_Milly_](https://amaal.lnk.to/Milly)_._ The project pays homage to her liberation as a female, chronicling her deepest thoughts and feelings about intimacy and female autonomy.
Flaunt caught up with Amaal via Zoom, who had just wrapped rehearsals in her hometown of Toronto in preparation for her shows in the new year. Read below as we discuss the inspo behind “Honey” and “Heaven,” why she named her sophomore EP _Milly_, what she does for self-care, her close relationship with her sisters, studio essentials, her fashion sense, and more!
**You’re in rehearsals right now, how excited are you to perform?**
I’m really excited, it's been a minute honestly. We’re going to be doing our shows hopefully starting February, so just starting rehearsals for it. We’ll have a show in LA, New York, then going to London to try to get some more Euro dates along that.
**“Honey” is such a bop, bring us back to when you recorded this.**
A little bit of the backstory with me and music: when I started doing music, I was really a lot more reserved in what I talked about. I didn’t feel comfortable to use my voice in the way that I wanted to, because I did receive a lot of backlash when I first came out. Doing music where I’m from is extremely taboo, it’s not something that’s a norm. I felt I couldn’t speak about certain things, what I was going through as a girl and in my relationships.
Thankfully in the last couple of years, a lot of that stuff was dissolved. I don’t care anymore, I’m making music truly for myself and it took awhile to get here. It’s a lot of work that had to be done. With this song in particular, I was feeling really sexy that day. I wanted to make a song where I’m finally talking about and reflecting on exactly the space I’m in right now. It’s a lot of bravado, it’s cocky. A lot of male rappers have records like that and I wanted to have a song like that. When I said “I got that honey, sweeter than money,” it’s playful but a lot of confidence.
**What inspired the music video?**
I wanted it to be me and all the Black girl magic. When you see me walking at times, you can see a little bit of the sparkles following me. Really whoever’s listening to “Honey,” it’s whatever your special something is. Whatever that beautiful talent is you have, that thing you bring to the world or you bring to your friends. For me, I really want to capture the magic that so many of us girls possess. You see it following me and I’m in this world, it’s a bit of sci-fi. I love sci-fi. I wanted this project in particular to have that be the forefront of everything, the creative direction.
**Talk about your newest single, “Heaven.” Who or what inspired this record?**
The producers on “Honey,” “Heaven” and some of the other records that’s going to be on this project were done by NickyDavey. They’re super talented. With this song in particular, it was another moment. I remember around 3am we were doing a record, and it wasn’t turning out the way we wanted it to. We took a break and he started playing this: just the background, the gospel choir almost. I started singing that part of it: “open the gates of Heaven.” I wanted to again make a song celebrating myself, celebrating the space I’m in right now. In our world right now, a lot of the music that’s out there can be a bit objectifying towards women. This song and how I feel is we’re divine. We’re heavenly, we’re beautiful, we’re holy. That’s really what this is, a celebration of our sexuality and our divine feminity.
**Where did you shoot the music video?**
We shot it an hour outside of LA. Looks like Joshua Tree Park a little bit, we got a place that could somewhat reflect that. Again, I wanted to invite people into this world. For me I grew up a particular way. In the last couple of years, I’ve had to do a lot of deprogramming and removing ideologies and thinking that didn’t belong to me. A lot of it had to do with me as a woman, my sexuality and how I present myself. I thought “Oh if I was to create this world, what would it look like?” That’s what it was: this liberating, empowering place where women are able to be exactly who they want to be. Express themselves the way that they want to. That little magic place, it’s my world. It’s our world.
**These singles lead into your sophomore EP, _Milly_. Why the title _Milly_?**
Milly is my nickname. The best way that I can describe it is growing up when me and my friends would go out, we always felt scared about “oh my god if we’re seen at this party, it’s going to go back to our community.” If my brother heard about where I was or my cousins, it’d honestly impact our reputation. This is a very real thing where you’d end up being on the receiving end of bullying and your name being tainted. Even though you’re doing absolutely nothing, it’s really sad but that was reality.
So a lot of us girls, we adapted aliases and nicknames. Whenever we went out, we’d go by our nicknames. It gave us this sense of privacy but also to be anonymous, to make the mistakes that we wanted to make without judgment and the fear of it coming back to our neighborhood. It was a time where I was really able to discover myself. It’s not really an alter ego, it’s an extension of who I am. It’s a part of me that I felt I couldn’t speak about for so long, or I couldn’t share with the world. I had to hide it.
That’s really what this project is. During the creation process, I wanted to live in that space. I wanted to feel brave and I wanted to feel free to sing and write about exactly what it is I wanted. It’s crazy at the beginning when we first started recording, I remember saying “oh I can’t really say that” or “I can’t really sing about this.” Day by day, it started slowly going away. I was letting the walls down. That’s why I’m really proud of this project: it’s the beginning of showing myself to the world for the first time, while I’m learning about myself at the same time.
**What do you do for self-care?**
I love my Sunday’s, that day’s super important for me. I adopted it during this quarantine, I had it before but it wasn’t as consistent. It’s a day where I really try to meditate, do my prayers. It’s my hair care day, I take care of myself from top to bottom. It does a lot for me. It feeds me. On the flip side, I love watching a movie. Watching my favorite show or listening to podcasts, or watching a documentary. It doesn’t have to be so deep as well, it can be something mindless that's playing to get my mind off of things that are stressing me out. The biggest thing is my family, my sisters. I love being around them, they're my everything.
**How many sisters do you have?**
We’re 8 girls. We’re a big family. I was with them yesterday, they’re my medicine. They feed me, I feel so safe around them.
**What do they think of the music?**
Oh they’re so supportive. They’re my biggest fans. It’s hard though: I love going to them, but I can’t always go to them for advice because they love everything. They’re biased, I need to go elsewhere. They’re always like “this is dope. This is good.” I need to hear the truth.
**3 things you need at the studio at all times?**
Throat Coat Tea, it’s so good. Throat Coat and honey is one, then really good vibes. I know that’s not a thing necessarily. Good vibes, positivity, then another thing is a blanket because it gets cold in the studio. I find myself taking off my sweater, putting it back on. So something cuddly. \[laughs\]
**How would you describe your fashion sense?**
It’s two extremes. It could be very masculine: oversized pants with a tight top, a jean jacket or a leather coat. On the other side is really sexy, so a mini-skirt with a beautiful tank top. But it’s on the extreme: both masculine and feminine.
**What‘re you most excited for next?**
To be able to start performing. I didn’t realize what a blessing it was to have that opportunity. For it to be taken away just like that, it really was depressing. On the flip side, it helped you. This year forced you to find other things to fall in love with and to also feed you. Other than that, I really look forward to getting back to performing live.
**Anything else you want to let the people know?**
Thank you for supporting me. I say this a lot but it’s my career and journey, the ones that have been on it with me. It’s been a bunch of ups and downs (for a lot of people I’m sure in this world). A lot of it had to do with sometimes things that were outside of my control. No matter what, people have been consistent and have always been supportive. They’re there to listen whenever I have something to release. I appreciate the consistent support and I want to do better. I want to have a lot more consistency moving forward.
_Milly_ is available to [stream now](https://amaal.lnk.to/Milly).
