You may have noticed Mahalia on the recently announced Falls Festival 2018/2019 line-up, nestled between artists like Hobo Johnson & The Lovemakers (who you should also get to know ASAP, by the way), CHVRCHES, Interpol, Soccer Mommy and, uh, TOTO (can't wait to bless the rains down in Africa).
But who is Mahalia?
The 19-year-old English singer has been in the music business since she was the ripe old age of 13, supporting artists like Rudimental, Ed Sheeran and working with Little Simz, so while we're only just getting to know her here in Australia... the neo-soul/alt-R&B singer has actually been doing it for years now.
Given that she just dropped her new EP, Seasons, last week, here are a few of the many things you should know about Mahalia.
she starred in the film Brotherhood
The third in the Hood film trillogy, Mahalia starred as Thea in the 2016 film Brotherhood, directed by Noel Clarke. She also contributed an original song to the film called 17!
her new EP Seasons is based on the five stages of a relationship
Mahalia tells Complex, "With this project, I'm kind of in a phase now where everything I talk about has to do with relationships and love and how I feel about guys and myself and all that kind of stuff. My whole life, I've always written when I felt something deeply about something or somebody. And so I've always referred to it as 'seasons' of my life, you know? Like, 'That was that season, and now this is this season. That guy was in that season.' And so with this EP, I wanted to do a five-track—or five-stage—idea of a relationship."
her musical influences are diverse
Growing up listening to reggae because of her Caribbean roots, Mahalia told i-D, "I’m Caribbean, so my parents used to play a lot of reggae in the house, a lot of Bob Marley and the Wailers. It’s going to inhabit my sound, in one way or another." Now, her neo-soul influences come from loving artists like Erykah Badu and India Arie, but growing up she went through heaps of musical phases. At 13, she loved Lily Allen, Kate Nash, Corrine Bailey-Rae, Adele and Amy Winehouse.
She tells MTV, "I was really into indie bands when I was 14. I wanted to get on stage with The Arctic Monkeys and The Kooks and rock out. I used to sing along to the Bombay Bicycle Club album in the shower all the time! I SO wanted to make music like them. I went through a huge James Vincent McMorrow and Bon Iver phase around the same time. I remember all my mates said, ‘Why are you listening to that, May?’ But, I loved it. I listened to Bon Iver's For Emma, Forever Ago every day on my walk to school.
"As I've gotten older, it's kind of changed. I've been listening to loads of great female soul singers. People like Lauryn Hill, India Arie, Erykah Badu, Jill Scott, Angie Stone, Floetry and so the list goes on... but, I love my R&B and hip hop now that I'm a bit older. I'm a sucker for the new Frank Ocean album. I think it's beautiful. He's a genius. I love me some Drake, too. His voice could send me to sleep. I've been listening to Chance The Rapper every day for the past two years. I'd love to work with him."
she wrote her first song at age 8
While we were playing with Pokemon, Mahalia was penning her first song at age 8 on a guitar called My Angel. As i-D writes, Mahalia says, "I remember being a kid and writing a song called My Angel when I was about eight or nine. To this day, my brothers still mock me for it! I really started writing songs when I was 12. I had this big crush on a boy in my middle school and I remember having all these feelings literally bunched up inside me."
she was signed at 13 but wanted to go to college first
Signed to Atlantic Records at 13, Mahalia wanted to take her time being a teenager, sit exams and study. She did her GCSEs and studied dance at a performing arts college, then focused all her energy into music.
Mahalia's Seasons EP is out now, and you can catch her at Falls Festival this year!
