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Little Simz is in a world of her own
We're closing off 2021 re-sharing some of our favourite pieces of the year. In July, Little Simz met Candice Carty-Williams. When she’s not performing, Little Simz likes to be the observer, not the observed. Right now, however, she’s focused on the camera in front of her – reshaping her long body with ease on the roof of artist Morag Myerscough’s colourful Hoxton studio – and is clearly feeling that all the eyes in the space are on her. She suddenly asks: ‘Can we have some music, please?’ directing the request at nobody in particular. At first it makes me wonder if the 27-year-old musician is shy. I realise, though, as she carries on, that it’s more of a hyper-awareness that she’s being eyeballed by a group of people that’s making her uncomfortable. ‘Because I’m a performer or whatever it is, in front of the camera or on stage, people always expect me to have this edge around me,’ she tells me later. ‘That’s all they know about me, when I actually don’t.’ Always watching I think about what I know about Little Simz. She was born Simbiatu Abisola Abiola Ajikawo to Nigerian parents. She was raised Muslim. She’s the youngest of three siblings and has released eight EPs and four mixtapes. This has all been on her own music label, Age 101. She’s described as a hip hop artist, but is fearless when it comes to adopting any genre she’s decided to master. She studied the work of Nina Simone, John Coltrane, Billie Holiday and Biggie Smalls while making her new album ‘Sometimes I Mi