Uplifting Tinashe
“This moment is a testament to never giving up on yourself,” Tinashe posted on Instagram at the end of September. This quote was the beginning of the caption on her post expressing appreciation for all of the love that her most recent album, Popstar, is receiving. Throughout the rest of the caption, Tinashe talks about always feeling seen as the butt of the joke and having to rely solely on her passion for and love of music. “I no longer craved the validation of accolades, awards, or even success because it was too painful to care anymore,” she wrote later. This post was prompted by Popstar receiving several music industry accolades including an amazing Pitchfork rating of 9/10 and peaking at #1 on the Worldwide iTunes Chart. At the end of the caption, Tinashe says that she’s emotional seeing the response to her album “...because after all of these years, to finally be here in this moment and seeing the praise for this project and finally feeling seen and heard is unbelievably touching.”
It’s easy to see why Popstar being such a smash is so emotional for Tinashe. Her breakout came in 2014 with the release of her first album, Aquarius. That album featured her first songs with mainstream recognition, the ever-iconic 2ON and personal favorite of tweenage me, All Hands on Deck. However, after those songs, it wasn’t really until she released her mega viral single Nasty in 2024 that her mainstream success came back. I still remember how inescapable that song was when it came out. ‘Is somebody gonna match my freak?’ is such an incredible, catchy, funny, real, et cetera hook it’s no wonder it went so viral. It felt so good to yell that live. But, having gotten into her music because of what she was releasing in those ten years in between comercial successes, I’m really baffled at how the music industry hasn’t valued her more. The strength of her career, even without mainstream success, is incredible to see. It’s made even more incredible by the fact that she isn’t signed to a label and hasn’t been for some time.
In February of 2019, Tinashe split from RCA Records due to wanting to have complete creative control of her own music. While she remains signed to a distribution deal, everything that she released has released since 2012 is independently released by her. It makes total sense that 2019 was the year she was finally able to make 100% of her own creative decisions. That year in November, Tinashe’s fourth album, the iconic, showstopping, never-been-done-before, life-changing album Songs For You was released. When I became a Tinashe fan in 2020, Songs For You was her newest release. It’s blend of R&B and pop was so irresistible to me then and still is. How that album didn’t get the treatment that Popstar is getting, I don’t know. But I do know that Popstar deserves every single little bit of praise that it’s receiving.
From head to toe the album is perfect. It’s a complete no-skip album for me. Across the 16 tracks, Tinashe sings about dating a loser, her complicated relationship with success, her love of music juxtaposed with her lack of recognition, and her general feelings of existentialism about life. The album involves more electronic production that her last albums have too. The first track and one of my favorites, Sunglasses, is a gorgeous and intimate song produced by the goddess Arca. The lyrics are so playful and hedonistic, and the beat behind it has so much texture. Arca also adds adlibs to the track that are the cherry on top. On the song Twentyfive Eight, Tinashe sings in a gorgeously high voice while the beat offers up sporadic drums and metallic glitching that makes you wanna move.
As much as I love this album, and could talk about it forever, and think it’s easily one of my favorite albums of the year, it wasn’t actually the thing that got me to buy my ticket to Tinashe’s Chicago date of her pre-tour, three-show run of performances: Three Nights With A Popstar. The album hadn’t even been announced yet when the shows were announced. The only thing from it that had been put out was her single Crash Out. This song is PinkPantheress’ self-described song of the year, and I can absolutely see why. Pre-sale for these shows opened on July 22nd. I was lucky enough to already be a fan of hers and so determined to see her for a second time. I had no idea what was coming with Popstar, and no clue just how magical the performance would be.
Unfortunately, my first experience of the night wasn’t so nice. The show was and The Salt Shed. I didn't have a press pass from UIC Radio, but I still need to write about this concert. I had forgone a sweater under my raincoat because I thought I would get too hot during the show. I was definitely right about that, but in doing that I ended up subjecting myself to about half an hour of shivering in the 40 degree wind and rain. I guarantee that the wind was making it feel colder than that. When the line finally started moving, the women in front of me joked about how terrible it would be if we all found out that the show was actually on The Salt Shed’s outdoor stage instead of the indoor one. I couldn’t even crack a smile.
I managed to get a spot pretty close the the front. I wasn’t in the first several rows, but I could see her without straining my neck, which is a miracle. Being in a concert crowd is one of the only times I’m aware of how short I actually am. 5’5 doesn’t feel so bad until there’s a head obstructing your entire field of vision.
Right at 8:00pm, when the show was listed to start, a DJ came out. An opener hadn’t been advertised, but I am always so excited when a DJ opens a show. I like it more than having another artist open. She really brought the energy, too. The crowd was so loud and engaged during her set that I just knew we were about to do the most for Tinashe, and it was making me so excited. The DJ warmed us all up, and as the final song of her set, she played Midnight Sun by Zara Larsson. I was hooting and hollering along with the rest of the crowd. She got off stage at 8:45, and Tinashe came out soon after nine.
The first song that Tinashe performed was the album’s title track, Popstar. The main source of lighting on her during this song was the flashes from four paparazzi cameras that were being used by her back up dancers. It was a really cool way to stage it. During the second song she performed, Cloud 9, the crowd was singing so loud that it was making me emotional. I think that the this concert was one of the best concert crowds I’ve ever been in. Could less people have had their phones up the whole time? Yes! But I was guilty of that on more than one occasion, so I can’t really complain that much. Were we loud as hell though? Yes!
The beginning of this set had so much energy. She transitioned my absolutely favorite song off of Popstar, the high-sung Flashbacks into my favorite song off of Tinashe’s 2021 album 333, Bouncin’. I lost my mind during this transition, it felt like a treat just for me. During her performance of Link Up, her dancers whipped off their wigs to reveal long cornrows and then kept dancing with their wigs. It was so amazing.
The most emotional moment of the whole show was her performance of Empty Stadium. That song in and of itself is such an emotional ride already. To hear it live and to be apart of the crowd response was so incredible. In the song, Tinashe sings about having a dream of performing to an empty stadium. The song is about her anxieties as an artist, and feeling unseen and unheard in the music industry, despite her tenure as an artist. ‘And I’m standing on the stage just waiting for applause that’ll never exist,’ she sings. After this line, there’s a short instrumental break. When she performed this at the concert, every time she sang that line, the crowd got as loud as it possibly could afterwards. I teared up a little during this. It felt really incredible to uplift Tinashe live and in person. She really deserves her flowers by now; I’m so happy she’s finally getting them.
It was incredible to see how well the new songs on Popstar worked in a setlist interwoven with the rest of her discography. To hear hits from her new album like Nobody Wanna Dance Anymore and Pillow Fight next to some of the biggest commercial hits in her discography like Nasty, No Broke Boys, and 2ON was really special. It made me even more baffled by how this amount of success hasn’t already been hers. Her sound has remained so uniquely her and has evolved so much from her debut record. Even when she was still signed to RCA Records, her voice was clear as day and just as catchy. But regardless, it feels really beautiful to see an artist that I’ve loved for years now celebrated in such a major way. She is such a star. She’s the most amazing dancer, singer, rapper, her stage performance is so commanding, and her music is so catchy, so well written, and so, so good. During her performance of Melatonin, Tinashe invited a bunch of fans on stage with her to sing along and dance. It was so fun to witness, and such a cute moment. As her final song of the night, she performed the first single Crash Out, and the crowd was jumping the whole time. I listened to the album on the bus home with a huge smile on my face.
She just announced a full tour for Popstar, and safe to say, I will be going again. I’m so excited to see how she’ll be presenting these songs differently at those shows. That concert was one of the best concerts I’ve ever been too. I can’t wait to see what else she can accomplish as an artist, and where her career goes from here.
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