Rolling Stone caught up with Tinashe ahead of her 2024 Coachella performance.
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00:04 >> All right, Tanashe, let's just go ahead and get into it.
00:06 I feel like we have a lot to discuss.
00:07 >> Yeah. >> There's so much.
00:10 So you just released Nasty.
00:12 >> Yes.
00:13 >> So that's off of Quantum Baby, which is going to be your follow up to BB Angel.
00:18 >> Yep. >> Tell us about the formation of the song
00:20 and what this says about this new part and installation of your trilogy.
00:25 >> Well, I'm excited for the second chapter to be released.
00:28 I think it definitely furthers the narrative and tells the story.
00:31 But this song specifically, I just wanted to drop in time for summer,
00:34 cuz I feel like we need to be outside.
00:36 We all want this kind of fun party, sexy energy.
00:39 And so I thought it was perfect to start the era.
00:42 >> Yeah, because the girls are battling between needs and nasty.
00:45 >> Yes. >> They don't know who's the supreme.
00:47 >> You know, don't put two bad bitches against one another.
00:51 >> Let two bad bitches be friends.
00:53 >> Yeah, exactly. >> I'd love to see it personally.
00:54 >> [LAUGH] >> Me.
00:55 >> So do I.
00:56 Who doesn't?
00:57 I mean, come on, if you don't, it's you, that's the problem.
01:00 So thinking about, you just said this is the second part.
01:03 I wanna know what it is about the story that you're telling that made you decide
01:07 to put it out in a three part series, and when did you start creating the story?
01:12 >> I mean, I started creating all the music for
01:14 this project about two years ago, honestly, a little over.
01:17 But I thought just based on the climate of how people are consuming music and
01:22 the fast pace and how quickly content is, I don't know.
01:27 I feel like just kind of ran through that I really wanted to just kind of take my
01:30 time and pace myself with releasing the music and make sure that I gave everyone
01:33 time to really sink their teeth into every piece of the album.
01:38 And so I thought it was exciting to be able to release it in sections and
01:43 really just let it marinate.
01:45 >> Yeah, I think that, I mean, from the way that I get to view your career,
01:48 it's definitely been a shift into you being independent in a lot of ways, but
01:53 obviously with releasing.
01:54 >> Yeah, totally.
01:55 >> How do you think that that has affected your creativity and will and
01:58 drive and hesitation?
02:00 >> I mean, I think it gives me the freedom to be able to release in installments
02:04 like this.
02:05 I already have the plan to be able to continue to drop and
02:09 I'm never worried about, I just guess the trajectory.
02:14 I felt like in the past, there was a lot of pressure on each release
02:19 to kind of prove that you deserve a next release.
02:22 And so I feel like that's kind of out the window and
02:23 that's really nice to have that freedom.
02:25 >> Yeah, just to be able to create.
02:27 >> Yeah, absolutely.
02:28 >> I'm waking up and today this is what I'm gonna do.
02:30 >> Yeah, yeah. >> And I'm gonna do what tomorrow will do.
02:31 >> And follow your instincts and never question that.
02:33 I think that's really special.
02:35 >> Instinct and intuition, I think, are really,
02:38 I guess I would say representative of who you are.
02:42 >> Yeah, thank you.
02:43 >> I love the BB Angel visual experience you gave.
02:46 >> Yeah, thank you.
02:47 >> And if that could go platinum, it would.
02:49 >> Thank you so much.
02:49 >> In my household, I would.
02:50 Tell me about why you wanted to create this world for us and do that.
02:55 I mean, the choreography was insane.
02:57 >> Thank you so much.
02:58 >> It's in the world and then we're about to get another world with Quanta Baby and
03:01 then a third installation.
03:02 So tell us about that choice.
03:03 >> Just going deeper and deeper.
03:05 I think it's, again, the thought process behind it was really allowing people to
03:10 be able to kind of experience the world as fully, as completely as I could.
03:14 And I think the live experience of the show and creating new choreography for
03:18 every number is always something that, to me, furthers the narrative and
03:21 tells the story even deeper.
03:22 But not everyone gets to experience that, because not everyone gets to come to
03:25 the show, and not everyone gets to see how we're translating the emotion of
03:28 the song into the movement.
03:30 And so I really wanted to be able to give everyone access to that part of
03:33 the creative process and document and also kind of give a full length
03:38 version of the album that you could visually associate with it as well.
03:42 >> Yeah, and it was great to see it when I saw your set,
03:44 to get to see the movement- >> Yeah, totally.
03:45 >> Find its way in there.
03:46 And I was like, yeah, so I get it, I get it.
03:49 To be able to give people so many opportunities to invest in the world,
03:52 even if they can't look one way, can look this way and another way.
03:55 So thinking about that with your set,
03:58 obviously Janet Jackson served as an inspiration.
04:00 >> Yeah, just a queen.
04:01 >> She's the blueprint.
04:02 >> Yes, of course.
04:02 >> What is it about Janet Jackson that is so
04:05 inspiring to you and the music that you make and how you make it?
04:09 >> I think, I mean, from a music perspective,
04:12 I think it's the fact that to me she's kind of genre-less.
04:14 She always kind of creates things that feel really true to her.
04:18 But she's created pop, she's done dance, she's done electronic,
04:22 she's dabbled in obviously R&B, hip-hop.
04:25 There's so many different elements to her music and it doesn't fit into one box.
04:28 And I think that that's the true definition of a pop star as well.
04:31 It's just being so well-rounded as an entertainer and a human being.
04:35 Those are all the things that you wanna see.
04:37 Great performance, great concepts, outfits, fashion,
04:42 personality, all the je ne sais quoi, so yeah, queen.
04:46 >> She got that.
04:46 >> Yeah, she got that.
04:47 >> All of that je ne sais quoi, all of it, really, truly.
04:50 I think that's interesting when you think about a pop star, right?
04:53 I think it's interesting when we talk about pop.
04:56 I think from, if you just, one side looking in, you think pop is just popular.
05:02 But you really think about the person who's driving trends and
05:05 driving where we're gonna be five, ten, 15 years from now.
05:09 The fact that you can pull a desert choreography scene from the aughts and
05:15 then bring that into here for Nasty.
05:19 It's like, I think that's one of the really interesting things about pop stars
05:23 and about the music that you create.
05:24 >> Totally, thank you.
05:25 >> We'll be able to use your references.
05:27 >> Yeah.
05:27 >> You'll be on the vision board.
05:28 >> Yeah, I think that's definitely always the goal, is to kind of think about
05:32 longevity and the legacy that you're gonna leave in the future.
05:34 And making sure that every piece of your art and
05:37 every decision that you make kind of reflects that.
05:38 And thinking very long term as opposed to kind of looking for
05:42 instant gratification.
05:43 And I think that helps to maintain a certain level of quality always.
05:47 >> So one thing that I think about with you is if I were to imagine what your
05:50 vision board would be, I feel like I could see something like a Beatle and
05:54 then Beethoven.
05:55 I feel like you could be anywhere with it.
05:57 >> Yeah.
05:58 >> What's on your vision board for Quantum Baby and for the next installation?
06:03 >> Okay, I think just kind of expanding my reach and
06:07 also getting deeper into who I am as a person.
06:10 I think that with every single phase of my growth, there's been,
06:15 people who have like a, they always have a concept of who you are and what you do.
06:19 And I love to be able to continue to challenge people's perceptions of me.
06:22 And also just kind of reintroduce them to maybe even the person that I am now,
06:26 how I've evolved from the person I was in the last project.
06:30 And just kind of keep going deeper.
06:32 >> So we were just talking about all of your choices making sense.
06:37 >> Yeah. >> So I wanna know what your first
06:39 project and your most recent project have in common.
06:41 >> Wow, okay, my first project was called In Case We Die.
06:45 And it was very, I put it out in 2012, and there was very much a lot of
06:50 conversation about the end of the world and getting very existential.
06:54 And so that was a big inspiration for the concept of that album.
06:58 And I think that the concept of Quantum Baby is also kind of existential in a way
07:02 because it's kind of thinking about the questions of reality and
07:05 the nature of reality and how things kind of maneuver in reality and
07:08 kind of the paradoxes that lie there.
07:10 And so I think that that's something that's very reflective of how I've begun
07:13 with answering these, or not necessarily answering these deep questions, but
07:17 kind of considering these deep questions and how that reflects your
07:22 understanding of yourself in the world and relationships and
07:25 different things that you go through.
07:27 >> So I wanna play a little bit of Frankenstein.
07:29 >> Okay, with that.
07:30 >> Okay, so what I wanna do, I wanna think about if you could create your perfect
07:34 song project collaboration, I wanna know who would be on that.
07:38 >> Okay, great.
07:38 >> Whether it's Dev Hines producing, and then you have this person doing the horns.
07:42 >> Okay, nice, nice.
07:42 >> I wanna know, what's Frankenstein?
07:45 What is the perfection?
07:47 >> Okay, is Frankenstein a perfect song?
07:50 Okay, we're gonna have K Trinata, main production,
07:52 because it gets the party going, it sets the tone.
07:55 Then we're gonna have DJ Mustard come in and do some drums,
07:58 because we want that West Coast blap on there.
08:01 And then there's always gonna be, I'm gonna sing.
08:05 >> [LAUGH] >> Me.
08:08 >> That'll be me.
08:09 And then we're gonna have a little rap verse in there,
08:14 which is also gonna be some West Coast shit.
08:16 We're gonna have YG come in, give us some hype vibes.
08:20 And then we're gonna break into some type of musical bridge,
08:25 because I always love when the song switches from one vibe to another.
08:28 And the musical bridge is gonna take us into a Sade-esque space.
08:31 And actually, Sade is featured on this song.
08:33 And yeah, produced by the Neptunes.
08:37 And they're gonna make up and become friends again, and it's gonna be great.
08:41 >> Please guys, get it together, cuz we need this song.
08:44 Please stop, stop, please.
08:46 Two bad bitches, why can't they just be friends?
08:49 I don't get it.
08:49 But okay, so we've got, you started this project, this trilogy, two years ago.
08:54 So we've got BB Angel, we've got Quantum Baby.
08:57 >> Yep. >> What can you tell us about
08:59 the third installation?
09:00 >> Okay, well, the third installation is, it's there, it's part of this concept.
09:06 But I think that the best part about releasing it in threes is it gives you
09:08 the space and the room to evolve it as kind of the narrative plays itself out.
09:15 Which I think is really interesting, as I release different songs,
09:18 it kind of inspires me to kind of change just little subtle things about how
09:22 it's rolling out, or which songs I end up sticking with, which songs I revisit.
09:27 So as much as the concept is definitely there, it's also still evolving,
09:31 which is really fun, cuz then I can keep it so fresh.
09:34 >> Yeah, it's like an amorphous little block.
09:36 >> Yeah, totally.
09:37 >> Each day it could look different, the track list could look different.
09:40 >> Yeah.
09:41 >> Well, we might need this actually, or these drums might need to be going here.
09:44 And I just went out and I heard this song, and I love the way this feels.
09:47 >> Yeah. >> We could put that in there.
09:48 >> Absolutely.
09:49 >> So ever changing, ever evolving.
09:50 >> Ever evolving, just like me.
09:52 >> Very much like you.
09:53 >> Wow, crazy how that works.
09:55 >> [LAUGH] >> I love that.
09:56 Well, thank you so much.
09:57 >> Thank you.
09:58 >> I'm so glad.
09:58 >> This is really fun.
09:59 >> I'm glad.
10:00 I can't wait for this Frankenstein track to come out.
10:01 >> Yes, okay, and we're putting that out there in theaters.
10:04 Thank you.
10:05 >> You heard it here first.
10:06 All right, thank you.
10:07 >> Bye.
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