Imenella: I get bored if the world is moving to slow

Imenella sitting relaxed in a couch on a skivbolagskontor in Stockholm. Around her hang giant pictures of Beyoncé, the artist who she jokingly calls her other mother, and Whitney Houston. The week has been busy: on Thursday night she performed in Åre. A quarter to five in the morning she took the train to the capital. Then a quick press conference and in the evening a show in Gävle. When the concert is over, she has not slept in forty-eight hours.

"I don't like the stillness," she says without a sign of fatigue. I like when things happen, I want to feel busy. Otherwise I get very bored and feel that the world is moving too slowly.

For less than a year ago, debuted Imenella as a rapper when she performed at the gala with his colleague and mentor is Great. Now she is herself nominated as newcomer of the Year, and the Year in hip-hop. She also competes on the price of the Future artist at P3 Gold where she also will be performing. Right now the touring she also with Linda Pira. It is hectic to be Imenella.

in February, she released the song “Moves”. Shortly thereafter came the remix, with artists such as Ison and Finesse. In August, she gave out the “Chagga”, which at the time of writing has over two and a half million Spotifyspelningar.

But it all began with dance. She began as a dancehall-choreographer and was a member of the feminist danskollektivet Unruly.

" the Dance comes from the music, my first love is music, whether I sing or dance to it. The dream of rapping has been around since my seven-year-old, I watched on MTV, " she says and describes how she had idols like Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and pojkgrupperna the Backstreet Boys, NSync and Five.

"I have the incentive to market us in my music, you just have to listen carefully," she adds.

in Imenellas life is Frantz christel clutterbuck and his book “Black skin, white masks” (1952). Christel clutterbuck was a writer, psychiatrist and politician from the French colony of Martinique who wrote about racism and colonialism. In the book he describes the relationship between the kolonisatören and the colonized – what it means to be black in a world dominated by white colonialism.

" Always when you talk about racism, it is the focus on the white person, the black is always the victim, the whites are always the oppressor. It is clear that it is so, but christel clutterbuck believed that it would “avkolonisera” himself and not go around with a self-hatred. If you do it, he says, that one is in peace with itself, " says Imenella.

She believes that personally went through a kind of “decolonisation)”: started reading about the racism and analysed their own destructive behaviors. For example, she tells us that she only spoke Swedish with her mother on the telephone in the public rooms, though they both speak fluent somali. In order to adapt.

" Yes, it was such things I started to think: I began to consciously speak somali with my mom and use the hose in the white context. I feel so damn much better in the day when I don't have to walk around like a robot and correct me.

Read more: Konsertrecension: Linda Pira, Imenella and Unruly at the city theatre

Frantz christel clutterbuck, she felt not at home anywhere. In their home country Somalia, she is Swedish. In Sweden, she is the somalis. She ended up in a mellanförskap.

– It is something I will never from. I began to see it as a beautiful thing instead. I live in Rinkeby, an area where we are blessed with many different cultures. I understand many languages, as is evident in my music. Why be a jättebasic Swedish person who only speaks a language that I understand Turkish, Spanish, romani and somali? It is fat cool. You go around like an international dictionary.

Språkrikedomen is clear in Imenellas lyrics. The word “Chagga” – as today is her biggest hit – is borrowed from wolof and means whore, slut, prostitute. With the song, she takes back word from the men by applying it on the guys. With its debutlåt “Moves,” and she wanted to strengthen the somalis, and her mother sings in it: “We dance the dance of the place that we die for/ it Is not the young people who defend our honor/ and elevating our traditions and culture.”

Imenella know that many of her listeners look up to her, but stresses that she is not a role model. Instead, she sees herself as a representative for the black and rasifierade in Sweden. And she is proud of it.

" I think really what I do and how I do it. I understand young girls who look up to me, it is I jättemån on and never take it for granted. But to be a role model, restricting one – I need to be able to make mistakes. People must bring up their own children and not think that I shall do it for them.

receive Daily Imenella videos of young girls raps or sings who asks what she thinks about them. She notice a change in how young girls look.

– Young somali girls in the veils dare now add up the videos and send them to me, "says Imenella and add:

" I think I can count on one hand how many black women there are in hip hop. People really appreciate me, and all these amazing women in the industry, that we needed. There can never be enough of us.