Urias expands repertoire on Her Mind and celebrates album: ‘Very incredible period of my life’ [ENTREVISTA]

Not only in the international pop scene, the musical genre in Brazil also suffers from some generic standardizations, whether in the sound or visual sense. However, a singer with a very interesting work in music is Uriahwhich launched Her Mindsecond studio album, on June 8, 2023.

Different from the debut album, titled Fury (2022), Her Mind diverges a lot in the sonority that Urias worked on previously. In this new era, the 29-year-old artist uses a lot of electronic music, house music, trance, hyperpop, São Paulo funk, among others. Not only in Portuguese, she sings in two other languages: English and Spanish.

In an interview with Rolling Stone Brazil, Uriah explained the decision behind this change in her sound. Or rather, to cover the repertoire. “I already wanted to make music outside [do Brasil]in other languages ​​to try to make our work reach a new place, trying to climb one more step,” he said.

I really wanted to make electronic music, but that would bring many Brazilian elements for people outside to hear and think about the possibility that we also have electronic music here, made and produced, with things that we have here.

How did Urias bring Brazilianness to electronic music?

To bring this Brazilianness, Uriah uses far beyond the already known synthetic beats of this type of music. The production used instruments such as cuíca and berimbau. In addition, there are even references to São Paulo funk in “tycoon,” track nine. The singer also highlighted the work of the producer maffaldawhich “brought a lot of ideas and a file in the mind of a lot of what he wants and how he wants to do it.”

All this effort in hirmind it paid off a lot. Second Uriah, fans really enjoyed the album, which had impressive numbers on streaming platforms. “It reached places I didn’t even expect, to be honest, because I had released another record, the Furyand this time it was very different, because this album… it’s not that I didn’t think it would arrive, but we always try to think with our feet on the ground, but it went too far,” he explained.

I want to keep working on it, in this era and make everything very complete. It’s been a very incredible period of my life, and the Her Mind it has provided moments, concerts and other types of contact with my audience. It is being very happy!

As for the issue of the different languages ​​present on the album, Uriah commented to the Rolling Stone Brazil as he has always been fascinated by languages ​​- so much so that he studied it in translation and international relations at Federal University of Uberlandia when I was a university student.

The first contact with another language was in childhood. She started studying English when she was 11, after her father enrolled her in some schools: “But my greatest contact was through music, in the sense of routine, what I was going to wear, what I was going to talk about, but with the academic basis.”

“For me, language has always been the academic subject that I most identify with. Spanish is because I was a big fan of music too. Spanish is more music. I started taking some classes, but I never really got into it,” he continued.

But the challenge for me, really, is to write in Portuguese. Our language is very complete, with many nuances and the most beautiful language there is – and the one I like to write the most, too!

Her Mind will reach another level soon

It is also worth remembering how Uriah will take all the power of Her Mind and other works in her career in the first edition of The Townscheduled to take place next Saturday, September 2, 2023, on stage factory.

“For me, it is extremely important. We prepared a bigger show than we usually do,” said Urias. “There will be other sets, a bigger ballet and new looks – even bigger hair [risos]. But we are taking the show to the next level!”

Of course, the singer was still quite eager to perform in front of a new audience, and described this moment as a “privilege.” “It is a highly anticipated event, which will bring a lot of great people here. So we are taking great care to make it work,” she observed.

09/02 – HER🌸MIND TOUR | @thetownfestival edition pic.twitter.com/uK5C7FmyWO

— peligrous little urchin (@uriassnake) August 30, 2023

Anger, representation and the power of music

there in Fury, Uriah used an interlude to talk about anger. “And so, my friend / I do more now, what motivates me too / Besides anger, what motivates me to do / Is knowing that I gave my all / My maximum to extract milk from a stone / You know, taking money even from my health / To make money from a music video / And I know where my work is, got it?”, recites on the track.

This song was released in 2022 and is still very current for the singer. As she explained to Rolling Stone Brazil, there are other motivations, but this feeling has not changed: “I still feel a lot of things. Of the things I talk about in Rage, a lot of the reason for my anger is systemic, so it’s not things that have changed since then. I still go through the same things I went through before.”

Obviously, today I’m more armored, but that doesn’t mean I don’t get here. I keep getting angry, but I have other motivations, you know? Things work out, so I think about continuing to make things work out, but still. I found it very important to learn to use anger as fuel, because I can handle it for my entire life.

Another very important and recurrent theme in the songs of Uriah it is her experience as a trans woman. For her, representativeness is very important in music and in public agendas, but it is necessary to be careful and aware.

“As time goes by, we see that representation for the sake of representation gets nowhere,” he opined. “First, there is no way I can represent all trans women, who exist in different bodies, types of people and ethnicities. Second, I’ll be honest with you, sometimes we also need people outside our frame to also talk about us and include us, because sometimes it’s us for us.”

“We already know what we are going through, but beyond our record that this will be resolved. It’s not my fault. We have to reach more and more people,” added Uriah. “When I see a person like me in a prominent place, I can imagine myself and build this dream possibility and leave the margins, even having an incentive and strength to adjust and leave this perspective that plagues us.”