Meeting with Willow Smith: “I am very inspired by my mother”

July 2021. To celebrate the release of his fourth solo album, Lately I Feel Everything, Willow Smith performs a fiery concert broadcast live on Facebook. The performance, bewitching and electric, increases in intensity as the songs progress until the end of the set, where a young woman with a rock look, equipped with a clipper, joins Willow Smith’s group and begins to calmly shave. the head of the singer. The scene is hypnotic. While the hair twirls on the floor and the boosted notes of his tube resound Whip My Hair (2011), Willow Smith, seated on a stool, continues to play the guitar with Olympian calm. This surprising gesture, both punk and liberating, speaks volumes about the inner strength and fiery temperament of the young 21-year-old artist, who, a year earlier, had locked herself in a cage for twenty-four hours. glass from the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in Los Angeles during a performance on the theme of anxiety.

The name of Willow Smith, singer with devouring charisma, actress (I am a legend in 2007) and soon to be a novelist (she will release a book in October on an African warrior projected among the Vikings, Black Shield Maiden), first evokes a powerful heritage. Her father, Oscar-winning actor and singer Will Smith, embodies a laid-back seduction that reached its climax in the 90s with The prince of Bel-Air, Men in Black and the pipe Miami. His mother, Jada Pinkett Smith, actress of stunning beauty (seen in the cult film Menace II Society and the sagas Scream, magic mike and Matrix), ex-singer of a metal band (Wicked Wisdom) and former close friend of the legendary rapper 2Pac, has often shown herself to be heroic. She has indeed openly mentioned her alopecia (disease causing hair loss) and pointed several times to the racism inherent in her environment.

With such a volcanic heritage, there was a good chance for the fairies of creation to lean over Willow Smith’s cradle. But the young artist is much more than the marriage of her parents’ talents. From the age of 9, the little girl released a single (certified double platinum) in which she explained that she wanted to be free: Whip My Hair. In the clip, she rocked her hair with the charisma of a pop superstar. Signed to Jay-Z’s label (which compares her to Michael Jackson), Roc Nation, she said, during an interview with Oprah Winfrey granted in 2011: “Shake his hair means being yourself, not worrying about what other people think. You just have to do what you think is good for you.”

Since then, the American has collaborated with Nicki Minaj and Avril Lavigne and released several ambitious alternative albums, evolving from vaporous R’n’B to melodic rock mixed with pop and punk. In her cathartic lyrics, she often lays bare, talking about her doubts and hits of the blues. In the very human talk show she co-hosts, Red Table Talk, broadcast on Facebook, Willow Smith continues to fight for what she believes in. Just like on his social networks. The young woman followed by more than 10 million subscribers on Instagram does not hesitate to put her energy at the service of many causes such as ecology, inclusiveness, social and racial justice, feminism, family support Zambian women affected by AIDS and the fight against human trafficking. Sensitive and committed, the one who is releasing a new album, <coping mechanism> this Friday, September 23 defends freedom of expression, all ways of loving (she came out polyamorous and bisexual) and open speech on mental health.

So many ideals that make Willow Smith a generational icon, and explain why Mugler, an avant-garde fashion house that advocates the possibility of being oneself to the point of exuberance, chose her as the face of its new juice, Alien Goddess Intense Eau de Parfum. On the occasion of the launch of this olfactory invitation “to all women to embrace the extraordinary”, the artist, muse and magnetic alien goddess told us about her plans to change the world and her love for rock, the emblematic music of revolutions.

NUMBER: You’re a singer, musician, actress, co-host, with your talk show mom and grandma Red Table Talk. Does the music come before the rest?

Willow Smith: As music comes from deep within me, it is arguably the purest form of expression out of all the ways I express myself. But I feel that all my activities are going in the same direction and I find them all very inspiring.

Can you tell us about your single Maybe It’s My Fault, released last June?
This song represents two dominant parts of my personality. I like to mix melodic sounds with harder instrumentation. A gentle nature with something angry, a more chaotic energy. Lyrically, the song is about the fact that as human beings, we should think more about the fact that we have a responsibility for our own emotional discomforts. When we feel bad, we often try to point the finger at someone or something else. We tell ourselves : “He shouldn’t have done that.“But a lot of times, you might first ask yourself what could have been achieved on our side to make the situation less complicated. And so that things are, in the end, more harmonious and peaceful.

You started with rather R’n’B songs, but today your sound is very rock…
I’ve always been drawn to rock, even before making music. My mom used to sing in the metal band Wicked Wisdom, and she took me with her on tour and in the studio. She was a real activist and she perfectly embodied this rock revolution of the 2000s. [une musique appelée nu metal, qui fusionne hip-hop, grunge et rock]. It influenced me a lot to see her “perform” and I tried to reproduce this energy in my own way. I am very inspired by my mother.

What attracts you the most in rock?

This music has always been the vehicle for change. At several points in history, we can see music in general, and rock music in particular, become the soundtrack of a revolution. And I’m very grateful to participate, at my level, in this.

You experiment a lot in your songs, notably by inviting the avant-garde musician Yves Tumor on your new album. How do you manage to create sounds that sound new?

I think it’s important to stay vulnerable. There is always a new level of vulnerability that can be reached at home. Rather than wanting to be different, we can ask ourselves how to be more honest. The question that’s bothering me right now is:How could I be more myself?”

Do you feel comfortable with Gen Z’s role model and icon status?
I just love the fact of communicating and expressing myself, and that it touches certain people, inspires them. I think it’s great when people think I’m special or interesting, and I’m grateful to them. I feel at the service of these people and I want to do everything possible to continue to be so.

What does the Mugler brand and the new Alien Goddess Intense Eau de Parfum represent for you?
Mugler is an iconic brand, and has been for a very long time. And I find any form of art that manages to inspire for so many years, regardless of the Zeitgeist, unbelievable. Mugler redefines beauty and femininity in a magnificent way. I also really like the combination of the words “alien” and “goddess” in the name of the perfume. I have always been magnetized by the cosmos, the history of female archetypes among the Greeks, represented as goddesses [Artémis, Athéna, Perséphone…] and by the history of the Earth. I am very interested in spirituality. I always try to make music that includes the notions of grounding and connecting with the Universe.

Is your music influenced by what is happening in the world today?

As human beings, we are influenced by our environment, and so we will express how we feel about that environment. But we also try, as artists, to bring something that doesn’t yet exist in this environment, a difference. And that’s what makes music so special.

How essential is it for you to use your art to help others?
What really makes sense in owning a platform is to try to raise your spirit thanks to it, to educate yourself and to push, perhaps, others to educate themselves as well. their turn. What motivates me is trying to learn all the different ways to make this world a better place. [Willow Smith s’intéresse à la physique quantique, au chamanisme et à la Bhagavad-Gita, un texte hindou fondamental]. I would like to encourage others to think more about the Earth and what it has been through, to heal themselves from within and then try to heal the world, the outside. We are currently living in incredibly difficult times, especially for the climate and for human rights. I invite people to talk about all this, but also about what feeds them. I also invite them to open their hearts to nature and to others.

<coping mechanism> (MSFTSMusic/Roc Nation Records) by Willow Smith, out September 23. Black Shield Maiden (ed. Penguin) by Willow Smith and Jess Hendel, available October 2022.