Your new song “Hit Me With Your Love” has a beautiful pop base but combines so many different layers, creating something so unique, what was the inspiration behind this song?
This song was written by LouisBell and Michael Africk, so I wasn’t super involved with the initial creative process. But when I heard the song, aside from being so catchy, I resonated with the lyrics and then added my Japanese lyrics to help tell the story in some of my own words.
To me, “Hit Me With Your Love” embodies the strength of a woman who knows what she’s worth. Your actions have to speak louder than your words. If you want to be in my life, you have to show me you’re worth my time!I think a lot of people can relate to a song like this at some point in their life.
You started your career at the age of three with dancing, became a model at six, been an interpreter, and now a star singer, which is amazing for someone so young. What were the transitions between each job, because they’re so similar but so different?
They’re all different, but they’re all ways for me to express myself, so rather than transitions, every new thing I try feels like an addition toways I can be creative.
Who were your musical influences growing up and how has it impactedthe way you write and create music, especially going between LA and Tokyo and being exposed to different music industries.
My musical influence is Ariana Grande. She’s been my idol and inspiration since I was a little girl.
Your songs, including your new song “Hit Me With Your Love,” combine English and Japanese. How easy is it to make the change in languages to portray one message and do you have any difficulties when trying to make the two languages sound cohesive together?
It’s very challenging to write Japanese lyrics to match the Western sound, and make the two languages sound cohesive together, since Japanese phrases are usually longer than English phrases.
If you could summarise J-Pop in one line to people who have never listened to it, how would you do it?
J-Pop is uniquely its own genre of pop, upbeat and emotional at the same time.
Your upbringing brings so much different culture, how has that impacted your style of writing? In a world where identity is such a huge thing, how has your diversity impacted your feeling or identity?
Experiencing multiple cultures since being young definitely gave me my own unique perspective to create and write, especially in Japanese, which is a language that has many subtle underlying meanings in certain phrases.
Is there anything you’d like to try in the future outside of music?
Fashion and beauty have been my passion my whole life and it continues to keep me inspired so I’m excited to keep exploring those fields.
What are your dreams and hopes for your music in 2024 and beyond?
I want to release my album that I’m currently working on, and do a world tour!
Do you have any music / TV shows / films / books you’d love to recommend toyour fans right now?
I recommend “First love” on Netflix. The theme song is written and sung by a Japanese artist I like, Utada Hikaru.