Get Lost with Guy

How has your music taste shaped your growing up?

It came to me at a very young age. My parents are musicians. I grew up with my dad who is a saxophonist and jazzman from San Fransico. So I grew up with a lot of jazz, a lot of soul, Marvin Gaye was playing, John Coltrane, you know? So I was in this very like Afro-American music scene. Music in my family comes from gospel, it comes from the church, it comes from the Afro-Americans coming to the "land of the free" and finding a voice for themselves. So I feel like this part of my family really built the way I listen to music now.

I know I was inspired by Kelis, Macy Gray, and Betty Davis just for the way they sing their emotions. Um, I could say that I'm inspired by Erykah Badu, but I'm not even inspired by her because she's just so chill and I'm like all about screaming and emotions. I want to do what Betty Davis didn't have the time to do. It's like my goal in life to be able to be as free as a song like "They Say I'm Different" from Betty Davis. I think that I built my music from these women, and then I started going out. Going to techno parties, and discovering like this black culture in Paris that I didn't know about. For me, techno was always like super white.

In prior projects, do you feel like you were creating your voice to fit into a box, and now you're kind of creating your own sound that is made for your voice in a way?

Yeah. I think the first EP, I wrote it at 14, 15, 16. It was really when I was discovering how to do music. So I wasn't really thinking about fitting into boxes. I was just thinking about how it sounded cool. The EP came in March and I'm already like done with it. Because for me, like "Princess," I wrote it like four years ago, it's like so far away from me. I'm not connected to it like at all anymore. This is just because I started really working on music and really seeing and thinking about music and not just being like this "cool Black girl who sang like Erykah Badu." I was really trying to like get out of the box that I put myself in, in a way, cause I did not think. I was just like 'music out, music out. Like, yeah, I'm a musician, blah, blah, blah.'

So you were talking about how some of your inspirations were from your parents. But what was one of the first records that you ever bought for yourself or loved front to back?

'I am Sasha Fierce' by Beyonce, 2008. I was seven, I was like all over the place, all over the place. This was like the album I was singing in the car. I was like, 'This voice is for me, this is the voice.' And also an album that my father did with Macy Gray. He did the song called "Related To A Psychopath." It's just like the craziest song ever. And then I saw her live and I was just like, 'You are so crazy.' She was like so big and with her rings and she was like pulling her rings out and like giving it to the people, and like people would get hit in the face. I was like, 'You're so not jazz. You're so rock and punk.'

So with "Good Girl Gone Bad" you're turning over into a new era and there's definitely some more rock and trap influences. What inspired this?

"Good Girl Gone Bad," It's like the first episode of this series called "Hotel Room Drama" that I want to start. And it's really like a platform where I want to have fun. It's like the project where I just want to do a song in like five minutes, put it out there and do a video clip. I want to use it as like a fun way to create. And like even the video kits, I don't want to think about them too much. I really want it to be like super like—you know, being on a label, it takes time for songs to go out.

And I feel like this platform for "Hotel Room Drama" is going to show more of myself. Not especially with the sound of the EP, but I really want it to be like a project—like there's the EP and 'Hotel Room Drama.' And with the videos you're going to see, you're going to have fun listening to it. And it's just going to be like really young. And I want to be working with people I love. I don't want to be like, 'What is the label going to think?' Um, they didn't give me no money to do it, I just did it myself.

I started to get so irritated by like waiting and validations, blah, blah, blah. So it's going to be like more in rap/trap—like I'm a huge Lil' Kim fan. I'm not a rapper, but I love doing rap freestyles made by singers. You know what I mean? It's like in this trappy and fab vibe, but I'm not a rapper, so it's always going to be like very classy and me. I'm already working on the second one with this artist from London that I love so much. I want to use this platform as a free soul. I want to be this Freebird. And if I want to do a trap song, if I want to do a classical song, I'm going to do it on there. I was really scared to put out "Good Girl Gone Bad" because I was supposed to put out "Princess," and now I'm like " I want you gone, nigga!" But people really got the sense of it. And Dian is the feature on it. So I just started my label called "Spin Desire" and yeah, she's my first artist there. So it was really important for me to like put her on. So it was like a combination of plenty of stuff that I wanted to do.

Yeah, she really added to the song. When I first listened to the song I was surprised by how much I liked it. And then I realized that it was you. And then I was like, 'Oh my God, she used to have such a soft tone.' And then that made me think of age. And I feel like with age we start to prioritize different things in our lives at different times. And like I said in the past, your music was just like a lot more—not that it's not now, but you said you're being more free, but it was a lot more—

I think it was easier.

Like softer and introspective. So what are you prioritizing now that you're conveying through music?

I'm prioritizing people saying, "I don't like the song" on my YouTube channel. Like I want those people to be like—I just got so irritated by this first EP because it was me in a way, but you know, as a teenager, I grew up so fast that in two months I get tired of stuff. So, this first EP got me really like in a phase with myself where people were like, "So, you sound like Jorja Smith." Like, I could like literally kill myself if I hear that again.

But it's really put me in a phase of rebellion. And like in the studio, I was just like the contrary of that. Um, and now I think I'm becoming like this real artist who thinks about the sound. I do piano now, I'm all about kicks. I think I became more like precise on stuff. So I really can't wait for the EP to come out and 'Good Girl Gone Bad' was for me a way to like put a slap to everyone and be like 'Okay, this is rap. And you guys are not ready for the EP because I'm going to bring you rock.' And the whole time of next year, I want to do like rock, show trap music and show every facet of me for them to not put me in no fucking box.

And you think you found your sound in a way? Are you still experimenting with that?

I'm still experimenting, but with the next EP, I worked on it for a year and I think that's it. I have a precise sound, which I didn't have before. And it's the first time in my life where I'm like, 'Okay, the EP rocks.'

So you talked about how "Hotel Room Drama" is a personal intimate space and like your personal utopia in a way. But let's just say there were no limits and no budget to your personal utopia, what can you describe that as?

Yeah. I think, uh, it's not this one. I think it's the next one. I think it's the next world. I think my community and my generation is a generation that I love. And that I respect so much because of how people my age are so into changing the word. They're all anarchists, we're all anarchists. You know, just being this Black girl in Paris is being an anarchist. I think my generation is fighting for a different world, where with all this crisis we saw how the world could turn so bad in like a minute and how they don't think about the young people. And they don't listen to young people because they're so like into Instagrams and all that.

But I think we're like the most intelligent people right now because we have seen what happened with them telling us what to do. And it's like not working and not making a better world. So I think at some point my utopia is us ruling the word and not being dictated by white supremacists. I'm trying to be really positive on the situation right now, and just seeing how much innovation reacts to it by creating, by more music—you know, what's happening in Paris with all the migrants and all that. Like literally young people in the streets giving roof to the migrants.  I think my generation is one where we want people to be together.

So in the music video, it seems like you're feeling yourself and as you should. But, it kind of reminds me of right before I go out with my friends and we're feeling our best and looking at our best. Is that when you feel most confident, or when do you feel most sexy?

I felt most confident the moment I have my glass of wine, dress up to go out, listen to music, and smoke my weed. When I'm like "Oo, I'm going out tonight!" It's the vibe I want to have, that's actually why the first episode is the beginning of the whole hotel room drama.

So let's just say, you're talking to your higher self. What are some questions you have for yourself right now?

I think I really want my career to be like an evolution of music. Like I don't want to be famous now. I would like to be famous in 10 years for people to be like, "Oh, I love this evolution of this girl!" So I'm wondering how I'm going to do that. There's a career that I really love, it's the career of Tyler, the Creator. I was a big fan 10 years ago and I'm still a big fan, and it's crazy. Every project he did makes sense with the next project he did. And like the fact that he did IGOR and it was like incredible pop music makes so much sense because in all his albums, there was like a little door that we needed to open to see the next one. And that for me, it's like a real evolution. And that's how I'm asking myself, like, 'Crystal, how are you going to do the same with your albums? How're you going to have a door at every little end of the songs, you know? How're people going to understand the album that I'm going to do in 10 years?'

What are some of the answers and advice you would give to your younger self?

I have a super great mom, so I think I would say listen to your mom, Crystal. And follow your instincts, but ask your mom first.