Aleksiah On Writing Depressing Songs With A Beat: 'It’s Kind Of Like My Thing Now'

Being a pop princess on the rise, though glamorous and thrilling at times, must be utterly exhausting.

No one would know this better than aleksiah.

The Adelaide-based singer-songwriter, whose popularity and acclaim have skyrocketed over the past couple of years, is blinking sleepily over her Zoom set-up in a sparse hotel room.

“So, I’m currently somewhere in Germany,” she explains, looking slightly disoriented. “And then we’re going to Belgium today, and it’s the last show. And then I have to catch a train to London tomorrow.”

aleksiah is currently touring Europe, supporting queer pop-rock artist Beth McCarthy on their The Hot and Stupid Tour. Just recently, she released the impossibly catchy (and aptly titled) single The Hit, the first song to follow her indomitable earworm clothes off. All of this comes after releasing an acclaimed EP, titled Who Are You When You’re Not Performing?, and absolutely sweeping the 2024 South Australian Music Awards. Suffice it to say, aleksiah’s past year has been a stupendously eventful fever dream. And to top it all off, this is the first time she’s ever set foot on the European continent.

“It’s tricky, because I feel like the way that this tour has been routed, we haven’t really gotten a chance to see anything,” she says. “I haven’t really gotten to see any of the pretty parts or the memorable parts. It’s just: venue, highway, servo on the side of the road. But the thing that has been really lovely is that after all the shows, I get to go out and speak to everyone. And there’s been so many Australians at the concerts. And I’m like, ‘Oh my god, please talk to me, say hello, I need to hear that voice.’”

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She has been enjoying the gentle, gracious energy of the crowds at her European shows. “I call them ‘tea-drinkers,’ because they’re so polite. They sip their tea and they clap very quietly, they’re very respectful, which is really great. Obviously, I’m doing acoustic sets, so it’s just me and a guitar. It’s hard to overpower a crowd. Here, they’re very receptive. You can tell they’re actually listening and actually paying attention, which is really lovely.”

Amidst this whirlwind time in her life, what has been keeping her grounded?

“I don’t think anything,” she laughs. “I’ve been talking to the band a lot, trying to call them whenever I can. I have felt very untethered on this tour. It’s my first tour away, I’m not with anyone from Australia, it’s just kind of me and my content creator, Sof [Sofiarose Fazio Mineghino]. It’s been tough, it’s definitely been tough. It’s been super rewarding, but I definitely think it’s one of the hardest things I’ve done. I’m quite homesick.”

Luckily, after four days in London, where she will be playing at the nightclub Melodaze, she will reunite with her band in Spain to play Barcelona’s stacked Primavera Pro festival, performing alongside the likes of Peter Doherty, Nilüfer Yanya, Beach House, and more.

“That’s something I’m really looking forward to,” she gushes. “I’m really excited to see my bandmates’ faces.”

aleksiah, as a songwriter, has carved out a very specific niche for herself. Her music is poppy and danceable, sonically bright, impossible not to hum along to. But its emotional content is almost always heavy.

clothes off, for example, is an upbeat banger, but lyrically it centres on body dysmorphia and debilitating sexual insecurity. And The Hit is no different. It’s a buoyant, sparkling tune, but it focuses on the anxiety of living up to expectations and the impossibility of ever pleasing that strident inner critic. Essentially, aleksiah loves to write a depressing song with a fun, catchy beat.

“It’s kind of like my thing now,” she laughs.

The Hit was written this year, “in a hotel in Sydney,” she explains. “I was supposed to have a session with people - I flew to Sydney for it. It got cancelled, so I was like, ‘Well, fuck this, I’m not wasting my time, I’m getting something done.’ So, I just sat in my hotel room and wrote it, because I was frustrated that things were cancelled, frustrated that there were expectations set on me not only by other people but by myself as well. I was like, I’m going to write something that explores that, and I did.”

When does she know that she is ready to release a single, to relinquish a part of herself to her fans?

“Usually, I’ll sit and ruminate on the song for long enough that it doesn’t really feel like mine anymore. I think personally it’s a good thing when I can feel a little detached from the song. Because if I still feel too attached to it, it just becomes a crying fest all the time. The Hit - I really like the song, but it was kind of born out of a place of anger, and frustration, and resentment, so I didn’t really want to hold on to those feelings anyway, because they’re not good feelings to hold onto.”

When asked if she thinks she’ll ever learn to silence her inner critic, or at least to tame it slightly, she immediately says no.

“I don’t know if that’s ever really going to be possible for me,” she admits. “I’m a very self-critical person. There’s an ongoing joke with my band and my manager where something really good will happen, and I’ll always just say, ‘Could be better.’ Because it always could be better. It could be worse, I guess.”

Where does she think that comes from?

“I don’t even know,” she says. “I always wanted to be the best. But the best is stupid. No one can be the best. There’s always going to be someone or something better, and that’s a good thing, because it drives you to keep going.”

aleksiah is the ultimate perfectionist, and thus an unrelenting self-critic - when it comes to her music, and, as she has bravely opened up about, when it comes to her body. She has described herself as having experienced body dysmorphia issues “since I can bloody remember,” and has also peppered the sentiment throughout Instagram posts. In a reel promoting clothes off, aleksiah once joked, “hi i’m lex and i’m scared of having seggs bc i hate my body but instead of going to therapy i wrote a song abt it <3”

It must be confronting, then, for her to be at a point in her career where she is constantly being perceived, constantly posing, constantly being photographed, and constantly being watched as she sings onstage about the punishing journeys her mind can take.

“It’s still super difficult,” she admits. “And I think the only way that I’m getting through it is, in my mind, ‘I’m like, you don’t have a choice, you have to do this, you have to get through it.’ I don’t think it gets any easier, but you get better at hiding it and putting on the facade.”

Being able to construct outfits, and to look at dressing as a creative process, has helped give her a sense of aesthetic control.

Though she loves to dress up - mostly in thrifted outfits - she usually has to prioritise practicality. “Especially onstage because I have the guitar on me. I wore a really cute outfit two days ago, and it was not practical. My boob was about to pop out and I was panicking. Can’t have that!”

Though she is undeniably talented at writing songs that would suit the club dance floor, she isn’t necessarily the biggest fan of partaking in the nightlife scene herself.

“This is actually a really funny story,” she begins. “I went out clubbing with the people I’m on tour with literally two nights ago for the first time in four or five years, and it was the weirdest time. I just haven’t been clubbing in a very long time. I’m just not a super club-y person. I find them so overstimulating.

“Too much noise, too many lights, too many people. But I signed someone’s boob, and that was a first for me,” she laughs. “It was exciting! I didn’t know how to place my hands, I was like, I don’t want to invade your space!

“It was really funny, they were playing Justin Bieber circa 2012. And I love Justin Bieber circa 2012. Great era for the Biebs. Beauty And A Beat by Justin Bieber featuring Nicki Minaj is, in fact, that one special song that can be counted on to send her running to the dance floor. “It’s just one of the best pop songs, I don’t care what anyone says.”

But she might not have much time to hit the dance floor again in the near future.

When she returns to Australia from Europe she will be hitting the ground running: she will be releasing her sophomore EP on July 11th - titled Cry About It - which will feature the three singles Batsh*t, clothes off, and The Hit, and well as two as yet unreleased songs called Cold and Keep My Cool.

The cry about it national tour will also take place across July and August, which will see her playing the entirety of the EP live for the first time. And it seems that hopefully, amidst all of this, aleksiah might finally be learning to make some kind of peace with herself, her work, and her image.

“It’s been tough, definitely being perceived in that kind of way, having lots of photos and stuff done. But it is also good in the long run,” she says, nodding to herself. “I have photos to memorialise this, I have a physical thing to show that, yes, I was there. I was there.”

aleksiah’s forthcoming EP, cry about it, will be released on Friday, 11 July. You can pre-save the EP and purchase tickets to her tour here.