Lost And Sound

Allie X

• Paul Hanford • Episode 119

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Have you ever wondered what it takes to assert artistic independence in the ever-changing maelstrom of the music industry? Alt popstar Allie X joins us this week to unravel the tapestry of her career, from the depths of Canada's underground to her rise to stardom, and the creative force behind her latest LP "The Girl With No Face." Together, we traverse the terrain of her musical influences, the unmistakable imprint of '80s new wave and synthpop on her work, and the challenges she had been secretly braving in the industry.

Through tales of attending legendary rock concerts to embracing the nuances of goth culture, we celebrate the journey of music-making and the intimate relationship between influence and personal expression. Allie X pulls back the curtain on the meticulous craft of album production, from the steep learning curves to mastering Ableton Live—all through the lens of an artist who maintains control over every beat of her journey.


As the spotlight intensifies, we get real about the seldom-discussed intersection of chronic illness and the music industry. The conversation shifts to the raw and vulnerable aspects of Allie X's life, challenging the norms of what it means to be a public figure with private battles. Hear how the power of fan support emboldens authenticity and risk-taking in an artist's evolution. We wrap up with the emotional highs and lows that accompany an artist's trajectory, emphasizing the significance of resilience and the profound impact of a community that listens and lifts each other up through the rhythm of life.


The Girl With No Face is available now, order it here.


Presented and produced by Paul Hanford 


Paul Hanford on Instagram


Lost and Sound is proudly sponsored by Audio-Technica


Paul’s debut book, Coming To Berlin: Global Journeys Into An Electronic Music And Club Culture Capital is out now on Velocity Press. Click here to find out more. 


Subscribe to the Lost and Sound Substack for fresh updates and writing.


Lost and Sound title music by Thomas Giddins

Speaker 1

Lost and Sound is sponsored by Audio Technica and right now I'm wearing a pair of their ATH M50 headphones. I love them. They fit grey and snagged there for the studio or for out and about, like where I am right now on a corner of a street in Berlin. Audio Technica are a global but family run company that make headphones, turntables, cartridges, microphones, studio quality yet affordable products, because they believe that high quality audio should be accessible to all. So head on over to AudioTechnicacom, wherever you are.

Speaker 1

Hello and welcome to episode 122 of Lost and Sound. I'm Paul Hanford, I'm your host, I'm an author, a broadcaster and a lecturer, and this is the show where, each episode, I have conversations with the musical innovators, the outsiders, the mavericks, the artists that do their own unique thing, and we talk about music, creativity, life, the things that basically inspire us to make the things that we make. Previous guests on the show have included Peaches, suzanne Chiani, jim O'Rourke, chilly Gonzalez, cosy Funny, tutti, jean-michel Jarre, mickey Blanco and first and more and today you're going to hear a chat I had with singer, songwriter, producer Ali X. Meanwhile, my book Coming to Berlin is still available in all good bookshops well, most all good bookshops or via the publisher Velocity Press's website. And yeah, so you're about to hear a chat I had with Ali X.

Speaker 1

Ali X has been the nom de plume for the last decade for Alexandra Ashley Hughes. Previously, after years in the Canadian underground scene, her first single under the name the Identity Ali X was called Catch and it went viral in 2014 and jumped into the Billboard chart after being hyped by none other than Katy Perry. Her music is, as you can probably gather from that, very, very far onto the poppy end of this show's spectrum and the world she's in, that of a successful LA-based singer-songwriter with song credits with people like Troy Sevan and BTS might not immediately seem like prime Lost and Sound conversation material, but, alas, hold your horses. I was intrigued to chat with her after hearing her new album and hearing how it was made and more about her life. Yeah, so the album is called the Girl With no Face. It's the sound of an artist expressing the love of 80s music, 80s new wave synth pop. It has goth overtones. It doffs its cap to new order, to craft work, to early Madonna human league. It's a real process of discovery, this album made in isolation over a three-year period where Ali-X acted as solitary producer, writer and musician.

Speaker 1

A word on the production of it, and that's what initially drew me in. I mean, the attention to detail on this album is incredible. It's an ode to a time when the emphasis in pop music and I'm talking about mainstream pop music wasn't about being pitch perfect, auto-tuned and primed for algorithmic content. Instead, when you listen to the album, what you'll hear is textures and sounds that feel freshly, unearthed, uncanny, not quantized, and this is something that I am allowing myself to speculate is, rather than being, when I listen to it, sounding like pure retro feels. She uses these sounds and techniques as a way to free herself of expectations, certain industry standards. It's a creatively freeing process. When you hear it, it's cathartic.

Speaker 1

And the album? I think this has echoed in the fact that the album has been released independently and also that recently she decided to become self-managing of her own stuff. Yet, lyrically, at the same time, it deals with very personal and confrontational subjects, and one thing that happened during the course of the last few years, which we discussed during the conversation and I should say that this could act as a trigger warning is that she decided to go public about her struggles with a chronic health condition and how this affects her work and life and she talks very frankly about this, and I think this is a very, very important thing that she does discuss and massive respect for being so frank about it. I myself have encountered issues with chronic illness in the past. I mean, I've been really lucky. I feel like with me I sort of dodged a bullet, although it definitely, definitely graced me for some long period of time. But even now it's something that never truly goes away and I think there's something very important to be done in normalizing all variations of the human condition.

Speaker 1

So many people deal with things that on the surface, we know nothing about. We just presume they're okay. This became the case with AliEx. So, aside from that, we also talk about identity, about not following trends, about resisting certain creative default habits, certain industry expectation habits. I really love chatting with AliEx. I learned a lot. I kind of got really immersed with what she was saying, and I hope you do too. So this is what happened when me, paul Hanford, met AliEx for Lost In Sound.

Speaker 2

Okay, ready to rock.

Speaker 1

Excellent, excellent. Thank you so much for speaking with me today. Are you in LA at the moment?

Speaker 2

I am, yeah, and I wanted to say thanks for having me, because your podcast is super cool.

Speaker 1

Oh, thank you. Well, thanks for making the great music. I've had a few interviews with people in LA recently and it's always this kind of strange thing, because I'm in Berlin and Europe and it's your morning, it's my almost evening now. Does it feel like a good morning today?

Speaker 2

Yeah, but you know it's funny you say that because I'm always really conscious of how the rest of the world is. You know, getting especially Europe is getting to like the end of their day, or the UK, and it gives me an anxiety that when I'm in London and based there, which I just was for a couple weeks it completely goes away because I'm actually like ahead of everyone and in terms of like the inbox and whatever, I prefer that.

Speaker 1

Yeah, yeah. No, it is interesting when you think about different time zones, isn't it Like the sort of elements of time travel to email or time travel anyway, but like well, thanks so much for speaking with me today. The girl with no face is just out and it makes. Well, it marks over a decade of you using the name Ali X.

Speaker 2

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1

Does it feel like a decade to you? I mean, it's a little bit over, but does it feel like a whole decade to you, or does it sort of? Or is time a bit funny?

Speaker 2

Time is always a bit funny, but I it's funny because I started a relationship around that same time which I'm still in, and or both. I would say it feels like it's been forever, but it also feels like it just started. You know, it's sort of yeah, it's sort of both.

Speaker 1

And I take my own interpretation of what you mean by that anyway that things can feel just like a long time and very quick at the same time. I think, particularly when you want map it against other things in your life as well, and like I'm always doing that with things like cafes and stuff, saying it like 10, 10 years only felt like yesterday and I think like actually like a whole area can change in that time.

Speaker 2

Yeah, for sure yeah.

Speaker 1

Is there like, particularly like, a way that you feel as an artist you changed the most over this time?

Speaker 2

Yeah, there's been a big transition. I feel like when I started I mean, I was already 28 when I started Ali X, which is like grandma for a pop girl, but now I'm 38. And I feel like when I even when I started, I was quite behind in my writing and knowledge of music I think I stunted my growth, not intentionally, but I stunted my growth by doing this very traditional, schooled music, schooled upbringing, you know, doing classical and theater, because I always knew that I wanted to sing and my parents didn't really know much about, like, the music industry, so they're like supportive and they just put me in singing lessons and sort of. By going that route, I ended up doing, you know, like regional classical piano competitions and community theater and all these things which were great fun.

Speaker 2

But what I've realized is that, at my heart, what I do best is is creation. You know I'm a creator. I don't want to sound pompous, but I would use the word like visionary. I see things and that that's what I'm good at. And I didn't even really listen to music properly until I was probably 21 is when I started actually hearing things like bass and guitars. I was just listening to the voice.

Speaker 1

I was listening to Broadway's soundtrack.

Speaker 2

So so yeah, I feel like to answer your question. When I when, when Ali X project started, that was like I'd already been doing it for a while, but it took me so long just to get to a point where I had some sound, like a semblance of a sound, and then I had so much more music to listen to and I just keep, keep and even at this point, like I just have there's just so much room always for growth because I always have so much to learn. So the way that I make music keeps changing and what I, my taste, keeps changing and yeah, it's been a wild sort of evolution.

Speaker 1

I mean it's interesting what you were saying and some other guests have talked about this before about how a classical education can be kind of stunting as well as good in other ways. But like any you mentioned as well. But it wasn't to your early 20s that you started to notice like different textures and sounds in music.

Speaker 2

But did you find?

Speaker 1

was it hard to? Also, did you feel like you had to kind of deprogram yourself at all from like ways you had been taught?

Speaker 2

For sure. Yeah, I mean I am. I'm always trying to control my voice so that it isn't too bright or For it doesn't have too much vibrato, because that's really my voice is most comfortable, sort of in in those situations like where I'm singing hi and I'm singing with vibrato and it's really obnoxious sounding. I don't like the sound of it, so I'm always trying to manipulate it, which is much easier to do in a recording context. I find that when I, when I go to a live show, especially if I don't have ideal sort of monitoring or whatever, I will default to my but it's funny because the average person is actually they think that that's really like it sounds great. They don't think it sounds annoying, like wow, you can really sing and I'm like I don't know. I guess I'm a bit too in my head about it.

Speaker 1

Yeah, I think it's a little bit about like making certain kinds of music as well where, like I think, particularly with a lot of the influences that you you show on girl with no face and a lot of the sounds that you make, it's a weird deception between sort of you know I can hear how much work has gone into it, but at the same time, you know a lot of the music that you're influenced by and how it comes across. It's all has to kind of like appear a little bit effortless as well, doesn't it, like you know, think about like artists, like new order, like I can't think about ban but Wanted to sound like more like yeah, we just went into the studio and you know they spent forever like kind of figuring out how to use that equipment.

Speaker 2

That's such a good point. Yeah, and I think I knew going into this album that even though I was, you know, referencing that stuff so intensely, so directly, I knew that I care too much and I'm too much of like a melodic Indulgent bitch to like ever Sound like I don't care, you know, like I'm not, like there's a there's sort of like the not the punk spirit but like the post punk spirit in this record. But I I Knew that coming through my lens it would turn into something else. You know what I mean definitely, definitely.

Exploring Influence of 80s Pop

Speaker 1

I mean I've been listening to it a lot the last few days and I think, like you know, one of the things that I mean there's a lot of things about it I really like. But like one of the things about it is just this like real attention to detail and Like whether that is like on a track like Galena I apologize if I pronounced that wrong.

Speaker 1

No, that's correct yeah oh brilliant and it to me it feels like it's without wanting to sort of be indulgently retro, it just feels like there's an attention to detail of like the kind of work Madonna was doing, like in the early, you know, the mid 80s, and that kind of bright, really big studio, like electronic pop music of that time.

Speaker 2

was it fun, like playing around with this kind of like inner, I don't know, I don't want to say inner geek, but, like you know, going through this kind of repertoire of Influences it was yeah, I mean, there was many parts of this that were torturous, but like the parts of doing the research and and learning about the gear and watching the documentaries and Listening, of course, to that, these records, like it felt so satisfying and and like comforting, I would say.

Speaker 2

I would say that, like my journey in LA has been very much in the commercial pop world, which I didn't necessarily intend for that to happen, it just happened and then I didn't want to leave that world because this is kind of like it's almost in some ways, as good as you can get in terms of like the reach you know and how successful you can be. So and I, like I said, I am pop, I am melodic, so but what's happened is like I've I've started to enjoy pop music less as a listener like I. When I listen to it it sounds I get kind of competitive or I get down on myself or I get angry that it's so lame or whatever, like I don't. So so this music that I listened to for this record, I I listened to it just with such enjoyment and such a sense of like there's so much experimentation and rebellion at this time and it was really comforting to me.

Speaker 1

Yeah, it's really nice to sort of like hear that and how you, how you, dug into that and what do you think it was about this era as well that is so inspiring, like even now, like 40 years later, we still, you know this music is like it's become so permanent, really, yeah, well, I think, like, like I mentioned punk briefly.

Speaker 2

I've never really gotten into punk music, but my, my partner is definitely a punk, or maybe what he would now say is an ex punk, but he introduced me to all this and from like that, that, those few years that that was happening before it all turned into this, like there was this spirit that that that happened and and it left it's mark, I think, on history forever and you can still hear it through all these records. It's just sort of no, just like it was just a new time in music and and and I think when we got into post punk and goth and new wave, like there was all this technology as well that was happening, all this new technology that people were so creative with, and especially in England and in the UK, but in Germany as well.

Speaker 2

Actually, like I just think, yeah, it was just such an interesting time and I think it really wasn't about what was popular and obviously the music press played such a big role. I don't know. Also, my dad is like British and so I think there's a little bit of romanticizing happening in my head of like my roots and sort of like picturing him and his Brothers and his sister like during this time and like I don't know like I there's. There's something that's least like Personal happening there and me remembering, not that it was at this time, but my, my trips to the UK and yeah, there's sort of some like I think I'm totally projecting it, but there's some like familial thing that I'm doing as well or I'm like, yeah, I'm a part of this.

Diverse Themes in Music Production

Speaker 1

I don't know, amazing, yeah, no doubt Where's your dad from in the UK, coventry Ah, okay, so that Midlands, and there was quite a lot of that music that was from those, or particularly the kind of golf stuff as well, yeah. And I mean to be honest, he wasn't even that like into all of the music.

Speaker 2

Then he was who was more into like.

Speaker 1

I don't know.

Speaker 2

So he was like you know just very working class and into like I think he was still into like Pink Floyd and stuff like and actually went abroad and so it wasn't like super part of this. But he remembers it all and he like stumbled into a pistol show and like you know cool stories like that. But yeah, there was a lot happening in the Midlands during this time.

Speaker 1

Yeah, and it is just because my dad, like he, had similar experiences in the 60s where I feel like he he wasn't like mainly in any kind of real scene, but he had the same thing where he had stumbled into who, concerts and things like that and it just feels so mythologized. I mean, both those eras just feel so mythologized now.

Speaker 2

Yeah, yeah, and I've and I've, like I've been reading you know, got in punk books and I read actually Peter Hook's book about Joy Division, which is oh yeah, I haven't no, because he's quite. Funny it's he's so, so funny. Yeah, it's a me, and actually I played. Banquet Records did an in store on release day and there was a guy that came in and said that he was at the London Joy Division show, like the last show before Ian Curtis passed.

Speaker 1

Wow, to me, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it is mad, isn't it? We think about that and then it was he mentioned about as well. I mean, I don't I'm not really a fan of asking people about labels, and there have been mentions about like golf with it, and do you feel like golf is a term that you identify with or do you feel like it's more like something that you can maybe play with, like certain aspects of?

Speaker 2

I think I'm so glad you asked that. Actually I've been because of how I look I'm off camera right now, but I'm very pale and sickly looking and I always have been, and I used to be self conscious about it and I used to. It used to be a thing where, like in high school, I would go to like my friend's house and and, and they would my friend would tell me later oh, my mom asked if you were a goth, like just because of how I look, I wasn't ever trying it.

Speaker 2

So then I think when I started Aliacs, that was kind of when I really just started to embrace that and like, make my skin even paler and stuff like that and, and I think, through kind of lack of knowledge, people started to label me goth pop, which any true goth fan if they listen to my music, they'd be like are you fucking kidding? Like this is horrible, this is not goth, this isn't goth pop, this is pop, this is cheese. Like like a true goth fan I'm talking about.

Speaker 1

Yeah, sort of like proper fields of the nephilim cover themselves in flower.

Speaker 2

Yeah, yeah exactly, but I finally feel like I earned the label goth pop on this album.

Speaker 1

Yeah, it's like. It's like an elusive badge of honor in a way, and with the album as well. So, for what I know and correct me if I'm wrong but you were like the solitary figure and making it from producing it, writing it, to being the kind of main creative voice and and operates of the equipment. Was this the first time in your life that you had taken the reins on of everything for a project?

Speaker 2

Ah, yeah, I think I've always had it in me to to have a hand in everything, and I've always, I've always yeah, I had a hand in production, but usually from the chair in the back of the room or pointing at the screen, not actually in the DAW you know with with a few exceptions, like my song Bitch, which is one of my most successful songs. I produced that myself in 2014, or?

Speaker 1

13,.

Speaker 2

I guess it was released in 2014. So the success of that song was one of the things that made me think hmm, maybe I should give this a go. Like what if I made a whole album like that, where I'm on the old, it's all my instincts and all my taste and all my all my gut feelings, or whatever. And so when the pandemic happened, I felt like I had the time to to to give that a try, and and so I did, and yeah, and it was. I knew it would be hard, but it was much harder than I realized and took even longer than I thought it would.

Speaker 1

Yeah, I mean, was that was there like a big process of in terms of the length of time it took to make? Was there a lot of time that you had to sort of spend just learning as well rather than just making?

Speaker 2

That's exactly it. I think that's that's what some people don't seem to get actually like on on, maybe on the industry side, or even fans like the learning curve, like there's certain things that that I do believe that music can be like something like a talent or an instinct that you're born with. However, I don't think anyone's born knowing how to run Ableton lives or like yeah, Anyway.

Speaker 2

That's a skill Like it takes hours. It takes many hours to get your fingers to be intuitively knowing all these shortcuts and like to to basically turn all your, your instincts into this machine Like it. Like it just takes a while. And then, of course, like I don't really know what I'm doing to this day with with EQ and compression, like I'm just kind of baking it till it sounds correct.

Speaker 2

And that can take a lot of time and drums, like drums took, took a lot of time and I care about, like I'll I'll trial and error something to death. Like I'll try I'll never be satisfied with just the first thing I try. I'll be like, oh, can I beat this, Can I beat this? I should probably try these 10 other ways and then decide which one. So, just by virtue of like, how I am with my, my, my personality and my execution, it took a long time as well. You know, like there's just there are so many aspects.

Speaker 1

Yeah, yeah, and it is. It's such a process, isn't it? And I think there's such a sort of mystery about production. And I remember when I was at university, my, my, one of my production lecturers was code nine and everyone kind of like all of us, like key, key fanboys would kind of queue up and ask him questions like how do you get this? You know dubstep, drop, drum sound, and he would never answer anything.

Speaker 1

And I and I could have understand why. But I also sort of felt like maybe there's that element of of you know, like you were saying as well, but maybe he didn't know himself.

Speaker 2

Yeah, oh, totally Well, and it's yeah. I've had a couple of people ask me, of course because I'm in this co-writing world oh, now that you've produced an album, would you produce for another artist? And I'm, and I'm like I don't think I could, like I don't think I would be fast enough, I don't know how to listen to whatever they're playing me as a reference and just do that. You know, this was a very sort of personal and really stumbly experience.

Speaker 1

Yeah, and how did the production as well affect your songwriting? Because you know you've been an established songwriter for other people for quite some time. But did this did like what you were learning? Did that kind of change how you think about songwriting?

Speaker 2

Yeah, I had like because I have written in this way before, even if I wouldn't have finished the production. I've started a lot of demos myself as beats and written by myself, and it is definitely a different process. One thing I try to do is I try to get like a beat going that feels exciting, but I won't spend too long on it before I try to get a chorus, because the pop writer in me is just like okay, without a good chorus, what am I even doing here? So that would usually be the first thing I tried to tackle and then get into the verses pre-chorus bridge, if all those aspects are there.

Speaker 2

When I started writing, like when I was fresh out of theater school, I was like sitting at the piano and my hands were doing these progressions that were very what I had been singing in theater school and I found that. So I found that writing at the piano became detrimental to my creativity. Like I could. It would always sort of sound the same. It always almost sound like a Disney song or something. So I found that, like writing in a DAW was was great. It opened up a lot of different possibilities and on this record particularly, I liked to. I like to write bass lines first, because my sort of rule of thumb by the time I was a year in was if it's not working with bass, drums and vocals, it ain't going to work like it needs to. It needs to work in that aspect, or I don't have a song, so I would often start with maybe just like a simple loop drum pattern and then a bass line I was excited about, and then I put a chorus on top of that. That's maybe my most common process.

Speaker 1

That's amazing, and you found that through trial and error and through finding that that's the way it suits the music.

Speaker 2

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1

Yeah, and also I mean you mentioned this a little bit earlier on as well or kind of in a roundabout way about like what you were seeking with this album or what the sounds and influences and the album gave you, compared to the kind of contemporary landscape of pop music which you know in various ways we think of as kind of very auto tuned and a lot of kind of pitch perfect elements in there. Did you feel like, as someone that is involved in that as well, did you feel like this album gave you a chance to be a bit rebellious with that?

Speaker 2

Oh for sure. Yeah, I, I was definitely ready to rebel, and I think I don't know if you listen to lyrics too much, but if you do, you notice this is kind of an angry album.

Speaker 1

Yeah.

Speaker 2

There was a lot in me that wanted to come out that I didn't even realize and I definitely felt myself relishing, and relishing in doing a form that was older and not popular right now. Like I mean, most songs are over four minutes, which is an act of rebellion itself or a pop album, and I did. I mean that one. I didn't even think too hard about and, particularly with the way that I process the vocals, I really try to avoid auto tune. I miss the sound of older albums where everything isn't in the exact center of the pitch. It's not really natural for it to be in the center of the pitch. I get that, it's an aesthetic choice, but it's one that I'm a bit bored of.

Speaker 2

So I barely used any auto tune on this. I think I used it on background vocals and that's it. I mellowed, we mellowed it. I actually didn't mellow down. I had an engineer mellowed it at the very end which cleaned it up a bit. But I really wanted something more raw and something that like if I was just. I wanted people to hear my real voice, like if I was singing to them in a room.

Speaker 1

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1

And the another thing and I hope you don't mind me asking and we don't have to talk about this at all if you don't want to but you've been quite open about chronic illness and about how it's affected your process with the album and through your career.

Chronic Illness in Music Industry

Speaker 1

You know, and I think I wanted to commend you for being very open about that, because I think a lot of people deal with chronic illnesses and outwardly, in the surface, people just think that they're okay. You know, was was this for you? Was this a process in terms of talking about something that you've been dealing with for a very, very long time? What was the process for you in feeling finding a way to bring that out in your work or tell people about it, because it can be quite scary, kind of just telling people, especially when people are relying on you. You know, in some kind of way, that you do have a chronic illness or like there's something in our health. I've had things in the past, too, that have been chronic illnesses and or a chronic illness, and I found it can be quite scary, because it also means that I don't want people to view me in a certain way as well. Yeah, so what was it for you?

Speaker 2

Oh my God, it's like a big, that's a big question. Where to start? Yeah, I think I've always felt like I got sick when I was a teenager and symptoms were embarrassing. So, you know, I became sort of masterful at hiding it at a young age and had so much shame around the disease that I have. And then as I, as I pursued a career in music, you know like, like I think when people get older and they, like everyone else, starts having other illnesses and stuff, like when you're a kid, most of your friends aren't sick. But as I've got an older, more people around me have been, you know, able to relate perhaps more. But I went into the music industry so I didn't really have a thing where I became all open about it. If anything, I became even more secretive because I was a liability you know like.

Speaker 2

Imagine you're like, you're 28 years old, you're moving to Los Angeles competing with 21 year old parties. Like, by the way, I'm 28. And I get sick for months at a time. Want to sign me?

Speaker 1

Yeah.

Speaker 2

So I really like I really did my best to hide it and I'm not one of those sick people that likes being identified as a sick person. I don't know, I don't really understand the ones that do. I guess it makes them feel special. I don't. I've never wanted that to be my story. I've never wanted to be a spokesperson for or what I have. You know like it's, it's all complicated and it's all quite personal, but it's been.

Speaker 2

It's been, you know, the most challenging part of my whole life, probably managing that and trying to reconcile that with my, my visions of what I want to create and my level of ambition and all that. But, as my career has gone on, I mean, like all things in life, if something is ever present and it's very painful and it keeps happening, it's pretty hard to keep that all inside and for it not to come out at some point and sure enough in 2022,. I had to kind of just come clean about it because I was in the hospital and my tour was about to start a week later. So I came out about it and also my last record, cape God. I was like poetically talking about it and hinting about it.

Speaker 2

And then the other thing that happened in the process of writing Girl with no Face is I really moved away from traditional ideas of how I'm going to work in the music industry. I started seeing everything different. I started hating the idea of signing anywhere. I started self-managing. I started realizing that really the only thing matters is if people will stream my music, buy my merch and buy tickets to my shows. And so I realized, actually I'm not really hiding this illness from my fans, I'm hiding it from the gatekeepers, the lawyer that told me oh, you're 30. There's nothing I can do with you, those people.

Speaker 2

And then, as I allowed myself to be more open about it in my music, sure enough it started coming out in a lot of my lyrics and a lot of these songs and yeah, it's still all new to me even doing interviews like this and talking about it. But for my own mental health and physical health, it feels like it does feel good to be able to be honest. I love being honest in life. I actually hate lying and I hate hiding things. So it's been strange, it's been vulnerable, but it's also been quite a relief to just say this is who I am and this is what happens to me sometimes and this is how I feel about it, or whatever.

Speaker 1

Thank you so much for sharing about that. I know it's a big thing to talk about and I feel like it's also just very inspiring as well because, as we both mentioned, as you get older, you realise a lot of people that you know also have various things in their lives that they don't feel comfortable talking about various health issues and I think to kind of show a light on that, as you mentioned as well that you don't want to be viewed as being a sick person, but like to sort of shine a light on what you do achieve and the music as well, and that it could be made by and quite often music and just anything in life is made by people that have private issues going on. I think it's very inspiring really.

Speaker 2

Well, thank you. And I know that when I hear even a story about I don't know like, the story about Ian Curtis makes me quite sad actually, because he got epilepsy and then no one really knew how to support him and he was just out there on stage having fits and it was like fans thought it was part of the spectacle and that story and then obviously he was so drugged up that he got into this sort of delusion where he felt like he couldn't live anymore. That story really touches me because I've been there. I literally have been there like where I feel like I'm in some strange sort of like my no one really knows I'm sick on stage, but it's sort of part of the show and it all becomes this like melodramatic, weird dark thing.

Navigating Success and Fan Impact

Speaker 2

But hearing that Ian like experienced that, I really related to it and it comforted me in this sort of dark way. And then you know other people that I look up to that I know that they've had these sort of like dark struggles. It does make me feel better. So I don't know if anyone is listening to this who would take something like that from my story. But yeah, I think it's good to talk about it and I think having a healthy body and having an amazing mind, they don't always go hand in hand.

Speaker 1

And.

Speaker 2

I feel like people. There should be some space for those of us who can't always operate at 100%, but still have ideas and something to offer.

Speaker 1

Really well put. Yeah, yeah, definitely. And I think also you've got like this really really loyal fan base as well, and do you feel that having this fan base for what you do, is that a way as well of kind of giving strength?

Speaker 2

Yeah, I think that's definitely where decisions to make a record like this, or to take four years to put out a record like this, or to be honest about my health struggles, like all these decisions, come from a backbone of bravery created by the very strong support that I have from my fan base. You know, knowing that they'll. They'll continue to follow me, even if I have to cancel a tour or even if I do some completely different sound than my last record or remember.

Speaker 1

And that is something I think a lot of people get scared of as well when they, when they have a fan base is this idea of of what will the fans think if I kind of completely change my sound or if I sort of speak up about an issue but that doesn't bother you at all. You feel pretty kind of good about like knowing that they're there and you can. You can express yourself how you feel that you need to express yourself.

Speaker 2

Yeah, I mean I wouldn't say I ever feel like 100% safe in that and I got I got nervous about Cape God, my last record, because that was quite a pivot, and then this one. I got a bit nervous as well. And of course they see comments on Twitter or whatever about you know fans being like not into this, like the other one better, but. But by and large my fans are really ready to sort of evolve with me.

Speaker 1

Yeah, and I think it's also as well, like you know, you get the, you get the odd thing, or like I don't mean you, but people, us generally, where people don't react well to something. But I had it when I put my book out as well, and the first review of it was really bad. Like the other reviews were really good, but the first one was really bad, and then I felt I didn't want to feel as devastated as I felt. You know, I didn't. I thought like this is really weird because it's just someone's opinion. And then it took me like a little bit of time to just go look, that's just someone's opinion, really Like I don't know that person, and but yeah, it's a weird thing to shake off.

Speaker 2

It is a weird thing to shake off and when you've put the hours and the care into something like a book or an album that I imagine your book took you a year or more.

Speaker 1

Well, it's actually weird it took. It took a bit less, but that was because it was during the pandemic and I just you know it was locked down, so it would have regularly taken me about a year yeah.

Speaker 2

But anyway, no matter what I I would imagine you put a lot of care into it.

Speaker 1

And it's all I did. You know, that was it. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2

So that first, yeah, that first the first reactions. Especially when they're in this official capacity, they do sort of. I think on the night of release of this I was searching. I shouldn't be, I shouldn't have been doing this, but I was. I like to search my name on Twitter. I cannot go into the forums, I cannot do the Reddit, I cannot do the boards it's too much. But on Twitter I'm like I can handle it. So I searched my name and I saw some comment that was like this is horrible, this is her worst album. And it was like the night right before it came out. So one of the first things I saw, I mean it really shook me. I was like, oh my God, what if they all hate it? Which, of course, that didn't happen. But but yeah, those first ones you read, they do have an impact.

Speaker 1

Yeah, yeah, definitely, definitely, but it is. I guess it's just that you know it takes a little bit of practice to brush things like that off. You know and, and, and, but then also, at the same time as that, you've had like the much of the opposite as well, like. So one really early example was the way that Katy Perry got behind, catch, I mean. And at that time, you know, you were kind of very, very fresh faced in terms of Ali X.

Speaker 2

Yeah, it was like the very beginning.

Speaker 1

Yeah, and did this sort of go beyond like your expectations of like how that she would reach?

Speaker 2

Yeah, it was really crazy All that stuff happening when catch came out because, like I've sort of alluded to in our conversation, I spent a good number of years in Toronto going nowhere, um, I think I mean I definitely had a good time, but I wasn't getting covered by the press, I wasn't getting offers, I wasn't getting festivals, I wasn't getting no manager wanted to work with me, et cetera, et cetera. So I'm like three months into living in LA, put out this song and all of a sudden, time Magazine puts an article and who is AliEx? And Katy Perry tweets about Katy Perry, who felt worlds away, tweeting about my song. Yeah, so it was very strange and I sort of naively I remember naively thinking at that time oh my God, this is it, I've made it, I've made it, this is my moment, I've arrived.

Speaker 2

And then everything turned. Everything got very messy and tangled and a whole new sort of chapter of my life began. But yeah, it was just. It was kind of a sweet little moment there, and also a crazy one, yeah.

Speaker 1

And it's always like that as well, isn't it? It's like I love that feeling of thinking like, oh, I've made it now, and then I think I don't know if any, I don't know if I'm interested to know if anyone actually has that feeling of knowing that they've made it, or whether it's always just like another thing that you have to do after that.

Speaker 2

Yeah, I'd be curious to know as well. I've definitely given up on that idea in a positive way. I don't think it's a good way to think about. I don't think it's good to think about careers in music or even in acting in that way, because it's an abstract way of thinking. I've made it. What does that mean? A lot of people know my name, A lot of people are giving me attention. What does it actually mean in terms of how I move forward, how I support myself for the rest of my life, how I build sustainability around my career and around my mental health? None of those questions are really asked.

Speaker 2

In those moments of overnight success and a lot of the time and I've seen this over and over you have this year of this dreamlike state where everyone's talking about this artist or whatever and turns out they signed a horrible contract and turns out their manager was taking 40% of their recordings and turns out and they're left with nobody and twisted up in some bad contract and it's a big mess. And then from the fan perspective it's usually just kind of like oh, what happened to so and so Meanwhile they're in some kind of hell trying to get so. I'm all for big success. I'm all for dreaming really big and having the biggest audience possible or as big as one wants, but I like being a bit more boring and pragmatic about my career these days. I like to really. I like budgets. I like to know what I'm signing. I don't like too many people on my team. I don't like big talk. I don't like there's no reason you couldn't be the next dot, dot, dot. I don't like any of that.

Speaker 2

It's like let's look at what's actually in front of us, because what's actually in front of us is of great value, and if we work with that and we work at a scale that's appropriate to that, then maybe we actually have a business here that I can support myself with till I'm an old lady, you know.

Speaker 1

Yeah, yeah, definitely. I think it's changing the I think, yeah, I mean, I guess, pop music. They create a mythology of rock and roll. This all develops in the 50s and 60s and 70s Sort of portrays this myth idea, doesn't it? Yeah, it's not that.

Speaker 2

I'm going to make you a star kid. Here's some heroin. Sign this contract. It's the way that things have been done for a long time, and it's not all that different these days. Thank God for technology disrupting it all.

Speaker 1

Absolutely. And allowing people and communications, allowing people to be able to sort of talk frankly about things that are actually helpful to other people.

Speaker 2

really, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1

And, on that note, if you could give a little bit of advice to someone who is like, maybe a bit like you, but starting out, maybe just before starting out, but now, what kind of thing would you tell that person?

Speaker 2

I would tell that person kind of a version, hopefully less soapboxy than the speech I just gave.

Speaker 1

No, I love a good soapbox speech. It's all good.

Speaker 2

Me too, and I don't know if you're into astrology, but I'm a Leo, so I just really get in my self-pity A little bit.

Speaker 1

I know a little bit about Pisces because I'm Pisces, but I'm probably too self-absorbed to know much about other star signs.

Speaker 2

Same. So I would give some version of advice similar to what I just said, which is like I mean, we love starry eyes, we love dreams. Guess what? You can still have dreams without having completely glazed over starry eyes. Have some realistic understanding of the business. Understand what the different royalties are. Understand how these contracts work, because a lot of the time they're horrendous.

Speaker 2

And even though you may sign something like I did with my first publishing deal, knowing that it could go wrong but it was sort of my only option Like that is a thing and I'm not saying don't do that, but really understand what you're getting stuck in, because you may be in a situation where your arms and your legs are tied and you can no longer make music if that thing goes wrong. So you really want to know that and be prepared for that. You want to. I mean, this is a business where you got to invest upfront and you're going to be at a loss most of the time Very few exceptions to that but does it have to be a $500,000 loss or could it be a $20,000 loss? Things like that, I feel like, are really important for artists to consider.

Speaker 2

And then my final piece of advice on the creative side would be please don't follow trends. People told me this and I wish I'd taken it seriously. Please don't follow trends. Everyone has their unique view and it is so valuable and important to tap into that and to develop that. Don't be too influenced by what's popular around you. I feel like I'm finally just understanding that now.

Speaker 1

Yeah, I guess I'm giving a lot of.

Speaker 2

You have a lot of cool Indian alternative people on your podcast and. I'm speaking from, like, I'm speaking from someone who lives and works in Los Angeles in the commercial music industry. So, that said, the people that listen to this episode will probably be more likely to If they're my fans, they'll be more interested in that stuff. But I do think a lot of the advice I'm giving might not even pertain to someone who's taking an alternative route in the music industry.

Speaker 1

I don't know.

Speaker 1

I feel like it's all on a spectrum really, because I feel, again, I can't speak for what other people take from an episode or take from advice or something.

Speaker 1

But I relate to what you're saying and I also feel that, yeah, like someone who's like maybe like an underground Berlin techno DJ that's got their own label is still kind of having to deal with things like how much money they should spend and how much time and investment they should spend on something and they still want a headline bergain and they still want to headline big festivals and things like that. And I still feel like, whatever genre or scene there's still. Also, there's still sharks as well. I mean predominantly in the business aspects of it, and I think the sharks kind of obviously have their tastes and genres and maybe it depends on where that shark lives as to what their surroundings are, but I do feel that for all artists in any kind of form of any part of the industry. But it is good to take your advice about being pragmatic and, yeah, not being able to put serious time into the contracts and serious time into understanding, like, what can go wrong and what the money does. Really.

Speaker 2

Yeah, there's sharks everywhere. It's sharks who didn't have enough vision or talent themselves to actually create something. So they know to latch on to artists, and they also know that if they place a bet on a hundred different artists, one of them is bound to work and it doesn't really matter what happens to the other 99.

Speaker 1

Yeah.

Speaker 2

So just beware and use those sharks to your advantage, not the other way around. Don't wait to be told what to do by some gatekeeper, because the gatekeepers are just passively waiting themselves for the algorithmic spike or whatever. It works a bit differently now than it used to. But yeah, I'm all for sort of transparency and independence and I think you can be independently minded and go do the right deal like you can, but you just have to be educated.

Speaker 1

Yeah, alexandra. Thank you so so much for sharing all of your thoughts with me over the last hour.

Speaker 2

Yeah, it was total pleasure. Thanks for having me on your show.

Audio Technica Sponsorship for Lustin Sound

Speaker 1

Okay, so that's me, paul Hampford, in conversation with Ali X for Lustin Sound podcast, and we have that conversation on the 15th of March 2024. Thanks, alexandra, for sharing all your thoughts on the show there. The album the Girl With no Face is out now. Lustin Sound is sponsored by Audio Technica. Audio Technica are global but still family run company that make headphones, turntables, cartridges, microphones, studio quality yet affordable products like the headphones I'm wearing now as I speak to you on a street in Berlin. So, wherever you are in the world, head on over to AudioTechnicacom to check out all of their range of stuff. My book Coming to Berlin is available in most good bookshops or via the publisher of Lustin Press' website. And thanks to Tom Giddens for doing the music that you hear at the beginning, at the end of every episode of Lustin Sound, and mostly thanks to you for listening. I hope you're having a brilliant day and, yeah, chat to you soon.