There was a time in Notep’s life when she didn’t feel she had a voice anymore.
That’s not just metaphorically, either: after spending years performing under one of Thailand’s biggest record labels, singing songs written by other people and moulding herself into an artist she no longer recognised, singer Note Panayanggool (นท พนายางกูร) had started to disassociate even from the act of singing itself.
“Singing is muscle memory,” she said, reflecting back on that painful time in her life. “When you sing a certain way for a long time, your muscle remembers it. I lost touch with my voice, and I was just lost.”
For many artists, commercial success is the dream. For Notep, it turned into something closer to an identity crisis that, like a phoenix out of the flames, became a glorious rebirth.
In 2011, she blew up nationwide when she appeared on singing competition The Star, one of the biggest talent competitions in the country. Back then, she was just a young girl with a ukelele, and her time on the show made her so popular that for a time ukeleles were sold out in many shops up and down Thailand. Back then, it surely looked like she had it made.
Yet now, sixteen years later and on the cusp of the release of her newest album PAKARANG, the Thai artist has arrived at a very different understanding of what success looks like, and it certainly isn’t measured by streaming figures or brand partnerships, nor by how many people know your name. Instead, it lies somewhere nestled between the sound of the rainforest in the early morning, coral reefs glowing beneath the ocean’s surface, and making music capable of helping listeners reconnect with themselves.
It might sound a little unconventional, but then, very little about Notep’s artistic journey has been by the book.
“[Back then] I had to follow a lot of the things they told me to do, including making music a certain way,” she recalls to me, as we chat on an incredibly hot day in the UK. “They were making all my creative decisions, telling me what to sing, and all that… and of course, it wasn’t me.”
As time went on, this ever-growing gulf between her artistic voice and external commercial demands started to erode at her until it became unbearably impossible to ignore. Despite building a successful career, she found herself increasingly burnt out, eventually reaching the point where continuing felt like it could break her.
“I just couldn’t do it anymore,” she says sadly. “After the contract was over, I was really traumatised… I couldn’t even sing. I didn’t recognise my voice anymore.”
Rather than forcing herself back into music, she did what few have the courage to do when the thing they love has become more poison than peace: she stepped away from it entirely. In her time away, she found herself returning to another lifelong passion, visual art.
What began as a creative vacation quickly began to evolve. As she started to feel her creative buzz returning, Notep realised that healing was a theme she continually returned to, a clear indication that this was something she desperately needed herself. From meditation to Vipassana, sound therapy to energy healing, she found herself slowly coming back together, piece by piece, moment by moment.
Through meaningful lived experiences, not manufactured perfection, Notep discovered that she truly had the power to start afresh as an artist, this time fully on her own terms. Key to this was a new pivot towards nature and healthy self-stability, thus unlocking the channels to find her musical drive once more.
“I realised exactly what I wanted to do because I felt so connected to nature,” she tells me happily. “I kept researching on that, and I learned about sound frequencies; how different frequencies affect your brainwaves and put you in different states. … After that, I started recording the sounds of nature a lot because I was spending time in nature, diving. I got into diving a lot, scuba and freedive.
I go to the jungle, all types of nature, and I record the sounds. So blended [my music] with my new knowledge of frequencies.”
For the first time in years, Notep realised that music no longer felt like creating a product, or something that meant compromising her own passions or identity.
“I realised you can be spiritual, you can be environmentally aware, but also do cool things,” she laughs. “Make cool music, make cool art and design and fashion.”
At long last, in 2024, she independently released her album Metamorphogenesis, the first record she’d dropped in over a decade, and an album borne solely out of love and joy, with commercial impact not even a thought on the horizon. What it resulted in was a 42 minute sonic journey blending ambient textures, dance music, and the world around us: an album reflecting curiosity and harmony rather than anxious expectation.
“The goal was for me to fall in love with music again,” she explains. “The process of making it was purely for me. I didn’t think whether other people would like it or not.”
Even though Metamorphogenesis was created almost entirely by herself for herself, it unexpectedly blew up, taking her across the world and confirming something she had quietly begun to suspect. Music hadn’t left her, she’d just lost sight of it behind the many different things in life that didn’t matter at all. Now, with her vision clear, music returned with more purpose than ever.
Fast forward to 2026, where she’s cruising towards an even rosier musical horizon.
If 2024’s Metamorphogenesis meant rediscovery and joy, 2026’s PAKARANG represents connection. Connection back to an audience who never forgot her, connection to the world Notep loves, and connection to herself too, and the exciting objective of seeing how she could further bring together the freedom she discovered to her listeners.
“[In] 2025, I was still touring and exploring, and working on new music. This year was when I was like, “Okay, I’m ready to release again.” But this time I want to be more intentional,” she explained. “I want to actually make music that people want to listen to. So I really prioritised the listening experience for my audience. The music that I release for this EP is easier to listen to, and it’s more aligned, more intentional with what I focus on now, which is more deep listening, connecting people to nature, to themselves, but also still keeping it very modern, very contemporary for people to relate to and understand easily.”
Tapping into the varying emotional states her music might generate has led us to an record full of contemporary electronic pop bangers. More poppy than before, yet still infused with hints of the environmental storytelling and immersive experiences she loves. It is an album you can as much bathe in as dance to, a sonic treat for the ears that fascinates whilst also comforts. Perfect for summer, perfect for these upcoming pumpkin-bronze autumns, perfect for winters relaxing by the fireside. Heck, it’s a great record for any anxious day, no matter the time of year.
It’s perhaps this balance that makes Notep such a fascinating figure within Thailand’s contemporary music landscape. Rather than treating environmentalism as branding or aesthetic dressing, it forms the foundation of almost everything she creates, and has become a passion she has pursued with as much love and purpose as her own music. By moving away from treating partnerships as a tool to gain more attention, such ventures have instead found her anyway.
“I got opportunities to do talks, whether it’s online or offline with Greenpeace,” says Notep. “I started joining campaigns… and it got me the opportunity to work with Nat Geo. So this year I’m officially working with them, and it’s my life’s dream! Like, I’m still pinching myself! Two months ago, I got to go to the Amazon to field record, and that field recording will turn into a composition for an audio-visual exhibition in Bangkok in November.”
It’s a treat to listen to her speak with such reverence and appreciation for the natural world, from visiting remote tribes who permit very little outsider contact, all the way to recording in Mongolia, or doing a project down the Mekong River later this year that will take her all the way to Laos. Pondering on just how many doors have opened for her by rejecting the usual pathways pulls us all the way back to the beginning, to the very system that chewed her up and left her near-voiceless.
“Instead of caring about how much streaming I’m getting, which brand I’m working with,” Notep contemplates, “I’m advocating for communities, for nature, for things that doesn’t have voices, you know? Archiving sounds that could be gone if I don’t archive it, culture… preserving culture. It’s very ‘life goals’! This year has been incredibly magical.”
Thus, we are back to PAKARANG, a magical project in its own right. Named after the Thai word for coral, the record draws inspiration from one of Notep’s deepest environmental passions. She’s a founding member of Coral Gardeners Thailand, the Thai branch of the organisation who works with figures such as Benedict Cumberbatch, Jason Momoa and more to raise awareness around tackling climate change and preserving our ocean reefs.
“They’re like the bones of the ocean,” Notep says, her eyes lighting up. “Coral technically has the same substance that we have in our bones as well. So I feel a lot of parallelism in that.”
The comparison seems more than fitting. Like coral itself, Notep’s work is built on quiet resilience, something delicate enough to all too keenly feel the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, yet strong enough to ultimately endure. Her work reflects the amalgamation of her journey without ever losing sight of joy or the simple beauty of creating something from the heart.
“This EP is really about, like, creating conversations around how our body, the ocean, coral reefs, nature are all intertwined. We’re not separated,” she muses happily. “We are one.”
After once believing she might have lost her voice forever, it is clear that Notep discovered something far more valuable: she hasn’t simply found it again.
She’s finally found her own.
PAKARANG is out on the 4th of September. Her latest single “Crystalize” is out now. NOTEP can be found on Instagram here.