There is nothing average about Laila! — at only 18, the singer, songwriter, rapper, and producer is working toward becoming one of Generation Z’s next influential artists. Even at 4, the Brooklynite knew her purpose was to create music and become an entertainer. She vividly remembers around her second birthday, her father, Yasiin Bey (formerly known as Mos Def), gifted her a Yamaha drum pad set. While maybe not the most practical gift, it was an apt one.
“He always knew from the beginning I was gonna be an artist of my own,” she tells Refinery29 Somos at a recording studio in Brooklyn. “He’s always given me the space to create whatever I wanted. It’s fun being able to go back and forth on melodies with him and just jam out. We can talk through music in a way that I think is really special.”
“He always knew from the beginning I was gonna be an artist of my own.”
Laila!
Her family knew of her musical talents early on. It’s why they began calling her Baby Genius, a nickname she still uses as she shows in her “Like That” music video. It was even obvious to those outside her circle. In her first interview, which took place in August 2024, radio personality Angela Yee recalls meeting 9-year-old Laila!, listening to her freestyle, and being impressed by her skills. Seeing the artist in her then, Yee told her that, in the future, they would sit down for her first interview. And that’s exactly what happened ahead of the September 6 release of her debut album, Gap Year. Titled after her own experience of taking a year off school, Laila! welcomes us into her world of nostalgic R&B through 17 tracks. The Black Dominicana wrote and produced the album alone, resulting in throwback ‘90s and early 2000s R&B sound and soulful melodies through a 2024 lens.
While her middle school peers bumped the trendy songs of the moment, Laila! was busy listening to her “very extensive” curated R&B and hip-hop playlists. “None of the kids my age knew or liked any of the songs I was listening to. I kind of always felt left out,” she says.
Whenever there was a school dance or holiday party, she’d search “new songs” and learn the lyrics on YouTube ahead of the events. “I didn’t know any of the songs,” she says. “All the kids would listen to new mainstream [music]. The school would get a DJ that would play whatever was on the radio at the time. This was in 2017 and I didn’t know the music. I just didn’t know what was new.” Instead, she was sonically in the ‘90s and ‘00s, listening to artists like Brandy, her biggest musical influence. With Brandy, the Moesha actress’ debut album …read more
Source:: Refinery29
