CREATIVE CONVERSATIONS 143: YAGKI ON THE SPACE BETWEEN HEALING AND GOING THROUGH SOMETHING HARD THROUGHOUT HER SONGWRITING PROCESS

Interview by Caitlin Dyson.

Lebanese/Australian alt-pop artist YAGKI has unveiled her melancholic single, Just A Ghost – produced by Nico Scali (Loretta, jnr.) and mixed by James Guido (LAU, Lucy Sugerman).

Just A Ghost reflects YAGKI’s journey of running away from home at 16 to escape a difficult upbringing in housing commission and foster care. It also delves into her guilt of leaving her family behind in severe hardship, highlighting the generational trauma that traps families in these environments.

Futuremag Music sat down with YAGKI to explore her space between healing and experiencing vulnerable moments while songwriting.

FMM: Congratulations on the new song. I think it's a really solid addition to your catalogue and just overall, a great song, in my opinion. The song itself is quite upbeat and the production's very clean and uses a lot of bright tones, but the meaning is very much the opposite. Why did you choose to present the song in this way?

YAGKI: I think for me, with the song, I wanted it to be something that was always quite warm. With anything that I write, I want there to be some sort of release and catharsis with it and having such big, bright production that feels like it's constantly lifting and growing, really just contributes to that release. And I think that, especially being in pop, having music and having songs and writing lyrics, they're all drawn from my experiences, which are a bit heavier in topics. I really wanted to achieve having that balance. I worked with Nico Scali from Loretta, who is incredible with that sort of sound. I think the pairing of those two worlds just really worked.

FMM: In the music video for Just A Ghost, you have clips from your childhood featured, as well as your sister. Did you have a clear vision for the video of this song when you were writing it?

YAGKI: I think I usually come to a vision after it's done, so I'll write the song and I'm quite a visual person in general, so once I can kind of almost listen to the song, close my eyes and go, okay, this is how I can see it. I try and replicate that as much as possible. So with Just A Ghost, it was always that feeling of running down an endless road. You don't know where you're going, and you're just going through that.

And for me, when I was imagining that, I was going, okay, well, what am running from? And that's when it wanted to visualise the generational impact of the song and bringing in myself, my sister, and me from a while ago into it was where that kind of conceptualised.

FMM: I think it's a really a good idea that you've put videos from your childhood in it. It really kind of ties it all together, I think.

YAGKI: Thank you.

FMM: So you've been very open about what you've been through when you were growing up. I know that for a lot of musicians, songwriting can act as a form of therapy. Would you say this is true for you as well?

YAGKI: I think it definitely has been, and definitely most recently, it's been more, for a lack of a better phrase, it's like it's me actually kind of letting myself be open and not in a way that I wasn't before. But I think that I, with my writing, was very to my chest with, like, okay, I'm going to keep these songs close. I'm going to kind of say a meaning, but I'm not going to kind of really go into it. And I think it's only now that I'm going, okay, well, if I'm writing a song and I feel this way, let's share that. And it's okay for that to be shared.

I think that especially with pop music, there is a bit of a stigma for it to be very polished, and you see a bit of the writing, and then it's out, and then it's all the, you know, the glitter and the glam. And I think for me, it's like, I really want to bring my audience into that process of what it is like also releasing music where there is such heavy topics. Because the way that I grew up, I listened to pop music, I loved pop music, and there wasn't really anyone that I could connect to. So I'm hoping that through the music that I'm writing, that relatability can come through from just being able to share it as authentically as I can.

And that's also extremely scary as well, because as I've gotten more open about it, I'm like, oh, I'm a bit more shaky now. I'm a bit more anxious, and I'm going, okay, well, let that happen. I think that hopefully people connect, going, she's a real person and this is how she's feeling.

FMM: Yeah, yeah, exactly. I guess you kind of want to be like that artist you wanted to have in your life growing up as well.

YAGKI: 100%.

FMM: This is the second single you've released since you've had your artist rebrand. How does the music you were releasing under Sarah Yagki vary from the music you're now releasing under just Yagki?

YAGKI: I think that kind of drawing back to what I was saying before, it feels more true to my story. And I think that Sarah Yagki, as an artist almost was still kind of keeping those stories close to her chest, not in a way to not share them, but because I think that I was still in the process of not understanding how to. I think with Yagki, focusing on, you know, Yagki's from my lebanese last name. It's my heritage. It's who I am. It represents not just me, but all the generations before me, not just from here, but from Lebanon as well.

I think the songs from Sarah Yagki I still love, but Yagki, especially the songs that are coming up, really just kind of push the barriers between. Okay, how far can I go with really getting into some deep things with pop and seeing what I can do to really just make that genre and make those stories as fluid and relatable as possible.

I think it is very much like Sarah Yagki had her heart on her sleeve, but Yagki's kind of tearing it out each time to share.

FMM: So you're feeling much more comfortable in what you've been through and willing to share it all?

YAGKI: Yeah, and I think it's also a willingness to not be holding back if I'm not in the space that I feel like I should be sharing it to. I think that there is also a kind of part of me that really just wants to share the journey, because I think there's a lot of songs out there where it's either everything's very low or everything's healed and I'm great, but there's also this grey area in between where that process of just trying to figure it out, is almost like, I think I'm trying to write pop music for the space in between those two parts.

FMM: That's very true. I've never really thought of that. You're kind of writing in between those two areas, I guess.

YAGKI: Yeah, 100%. And I think it's because I am in those two areas, I think that I'm always going to be. And I think that there's something beautiful between the space of healing and the space of going through something hard and the limbo that you can find yourself in in that process. That's what I'm really trying to do with Yagki.

FMM: Something I Do and Just A Ghost are both very personal and reflective songs. We kind of touched on this before, but how did you feel releasing songs like this?

YAGKI: I think that it's honestly been for my head and my heart, it's been, you know, very healing. It's been very beautiful to write, but I think that with Something I Do and Just A Ghost, it's almost like I'm still understanding how my body reacts to it, if that makes any sense.

So, for example, as I'm releasing it, I know that I'm happy with it, but my body feels a bit shaky and I'm like, I don't understand why. And I'm still learning that. I think it is because at the end of the day, no matter how much you can share and talk, your body will always remember what you felt and what you've been through. I think that I'm so grateful to be able to share it, but it's also still kind of learning how I feel towards it and just bringing people into that journey because I don't think I'm alone in that. I don't think I'm alone at all when you try and write or share something and you can kind of go, why am I shaky? Why am I feeling like this?

FMM: Yeah, your mind and your physical being are two seperate things. I totally get that. Last year, you did quite a long run of shows around Australia. Is that something that you’d be keen to do again, or is life on the road not really your thing?

YAGKI: I definitely am. but what I did last year, that show run, I went pretty much around the country and kind of almost just wanted to create relationships in every state and go, okay, I really love this. And now this year, I haven't done as many live shows purely because I've spent that time focusing on my songwriting and my releases and really figuring out how to kind of do it all. I think for Yagki, it's not just, you know, doing only live shows. It's not just releasing. It's not just doing socials. I want to find a really good balance of it all.

What's been really exciting is that I do have that balance now, and especially for the live shows that I've got coming up. I've got a big one at the end of the year, actually, that I'm about to announce, which is exciting. But I think that for me, with my own live shows, I want to make them really different. So I did one at the start of the year where it was an unreleased night. And then the one that I've got that hasn't been announced yet, at the end of the year. I've got something else that's really special about that. I want to make each headline show really different. But in terms of going across the country, I think that it's gotta be based around what the song's about and what I need to share and where that kind of comes into the play of things. I've got a song coming out in January, which I am so excited for, and around that time is when I'm gonna pretty much just kind of go everywhere.

FMM: I’m excited about the show announcements. I don't know if anyone's ever asked you about this before, but you have red hair. I've noticed that the colour red seems to be a common motif throughout a lot of your press shots and tour posters. Is there any particular reason for this? Does the colour red symbolise something to you?

YAGKI: I can't remember how this came up, but it came up recently, someone kind of did a similar thing where they sat me down and was like, tell me about this in your hair. What's the go? I left home at 16, and when I left home, I dyed half of my hair red, really horribly, with Manic Panic. I got this really awful fudge. I just popped it in, and I think that I dyed my hair, at first red. Honestly, now looking back at it as a way to kind of remove who I was, I think I try to erase the first 16 years of myself, and I was like, let's just become someone that isn't recognisable.

And then between 16 to 18, between living in different refuges and just kind of traveling about to find a safe space, I almost became the opposite, where everything I did kind of surrounded my hair. I had friends coming up to me going, I can't dye my hair red now because you've got it. You've owned the colour. It's done. And for me, honestly, the red hair is a symbol of change, but it's also a connection to my younger self and everything she had to go through. I think that with every release and every story, I think there's more and more, almost, like, melancholy and sadness to going, okay, that's everything that I had to do to be able to do music, and there's something beautiful in that.

So, yeah, the red hair was a way to kind of just become someone else, and now I'm at the point where, especially with the rebrand, I went, no, I need to just show everything I am and be as honest as I can about that.

FMM: I think I speak for a lot of people when I say you seem to be very inspirational, just being so open about what you've been through. I'm sure it's helping a lot of people.

YAGKI: That's exactly what I want to do. I think even last night… I have a couple of different sleep disorders, and I had one of those nights where I just kind of flew out, and it was just so up and down. But I feel like now I can kind of say that to you and be honest about that and kind of go, yeah, I'm human, and this is exactly what I'm kind of trying to deal with. I really hope that connects to people. And at the end of the day, I hope that this time next year, we're both chatting, and there's a lot more people that feel like they have hope from Yagki, and that's really what I want to do.

I think for me, at the end of the day, a lot of it does come down to my little sister, who's featured in the Just A Ghost music video. She is living a very similar childhood to what I went through. I think that for everything that I do, it's kind of like I'm trying to give hope in that. There's, you know, a lot of heavier topics. There's a lot of things to talk about, but I think that I want to talk about them rather than not being talked about at all because I'm not alone in it.