“A lot of it was about acceptance”: Syd steps fully into her self on third solo album Beard
A lot has changed for Syd since her last release; newly married, newly sober and a new homeowner, the 34 year-old explains how she’s come full circle on her latest album.
A producer, a DJ, a singer and a writer, the polymathic Syd, 34, is a prodigious talent. She has worked with Kaytranada, Kehlani, Lil Uzi Vert and Little Simz, toured with Billie Eilish and has won a whole Grammy (and nominated for another) for writing Plastic On The Sofa, a standout of Beyoncé’s foundational 2022 album Renaissance.
Syd was just 18 when I first met her. It was 2011 and the LA-born teenager was in Texas for SXSW, Austin’s annual buzzy gathering that had a reputation for breaking new acts, including Eilish. Without a doubt that year’s hottest band was Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All [OFWGKTA], an anarchic collective of rappers, producers, skaters and creatives who were chaotic, confrontational and controversial, offending people with their nasty language and blood-soaked live shows.
Odd Future were renting an unassuming house somewhere in the suburbs when I went to interview them; the utterly magnetic Tyler, The Creator held court as bandmates Hodgy Beats, Left Brain, Domo Genesis and Syd’s brother Taco ran around the garden and climbed up trees. Quietly, in the midst of the storm was Syd, engineer and occasional producer and lone female in the group. She sat at the heart of it all yet somehow outside of the maelstrom, a keyboard tucked under her right arm, observing, laughing at her friend’s antics, speaking in the softest voice when asked a question. “I love it cos it’s what we always wanted,” she said then of the attention they were receiving. “As much as we hate to give it credit, shock value does attract people. People might hate what we’re saying, but they can’t deny that we’re good at doing it.”
Although the band imploded a couple of years later, Syd and fellow queers Tyler and Frank Ocean became the most successful of OF; Syd teamed up with bandmate and best mate Matt Martians and then nascent newcomer Steve Lacy to form The Internet, the Grammy nominated group behind 2015’s Girl and Special Affair (they are currently finishing up their first album since 2018).
In 2017, she stepped out solo with the progressive pop record Fin, followed by 2022’s Lonely Hearts Club, which was as soft as it was swaggering. Her third album, Beard, is a gorgeous, confident collection of songs set to a soundtrack that includes alt-R&B and windswept Bossa Nova exploring growth, identity, love, lust and family. Opening with the softly yearning Walls, she briefly interrupts the flow with the completely charming Callin, before delving deeper into the cycles of relationships we hold with ourselves, our bodies and our loved ones.
We’ve spoken a couple of times in the intervening years; Syd is much more assured than back in 2011, but carries the same spirit of her teen self; indelible, an outlier, naturally chill and cool in the calmest, least ostentatious way. She’s fun and funny, laughing easily and often. Currently in New York where her wife has a place, she’s excited to talk about her new album, her new life. Recently married, a recent homeowner and the parent of two new dogs, she’s also no longer drinking, which she contemplates on the album’s midpoint, Always Be Mine. “I’m two and a half years sober, and it was this relationship that really helped me change my relationship with drinking,” she says, sitting on the steps of a Brooklyn Brownstone. “And, in doing that, I decided I don’t want to drink anymore. I actually prefer the dry life.”
Indeed, Syd says, she’s never been happier.
Being a part of Renaissance was one of my greatest achievements, and pushed me to say, I don’t want to be a songwriter. I want to be an artist! These days, I’m a lot more comfortable with the artist title.
SYD
Hello! It’s been four years since we last spoke. What have you been up to since then? How’s life been?
[Grins] Life has gotten progressively better, I’m happy to say. Life’s been good. I bought a house, which was a huge dream of mine. [My wife and I] also adopted two dogs, so we have three dogs now, so that’s a lot of…
Walking?
It’s more so a lot of fetch (laughs). We get a lot of exercise. But yeah, it is a lot of walking, and I prefer to walk them one at a time because they get their little solo time as well.
Congrats on buying a house! What took you so long?
Honestly, I was searching for years before I found something. I am picky when it comes to architecture, and I grew up in a historic home so I grew up knowing more about interior design and architecture than the average person. But I held out, and it was worth it. Financially, I’m extremely lucky in that I signed my first record deal in 2011; I had the leverage of Odd Future, so I got a really great contract. And I live below my means. It’s not that easy to do, as an artist. I think a lot of artists, specifically Black artists, felt that we had to embody this ruler archetype, this ‘I have more money than all of you.’ And it’s hard to keep up with the Joneses. Thankfully, I never got too deep into trying to do that. I always feel like I’m shitting on people when I’m too flashy. I remember feeling I’m supposed to look and present a certain way, even if I don’t feel that that’s me, or even if I can’t or don’t want to pay for it. So I tried to focus on what I like.
Aside from the new house and the dogs, you also got a Grammy. How was writing Plastic Off The Sofa for Beyoncé.
That song was something Sabrina Claudio and I had written together years prior. I sent it to Beyoncé’s people, and I was surprised, but they took it. If anything, aside from the confidence to produce, I also got the confidence to be an artist and focus on that. Being a part of Renaissancewas one of my greatest achievements, and also something that really pushed me to say, ‘I don’t want to be a songwriter, I want to be an artist.’
Which brings us to solo album three, Beard.
Yeah, I made a new solo album (laughs). And I got married! Did a courthouse wedding almost a year ago.
Congratulations! How was it?
It was funny, because we were really late, we almost missed our appointment. Then we went straight from the courthouse back to our house to rehearse for the Billie Eilish tour. So it was honestly a regular day. We just happened to leave with a marriage certificate.
No party, no celebration?
We plan on having a real wedding, we just wanted to do the marriage first and get the paperwork.
Get it while you can, who knows if gay marriage will be legal forever.
Yeah, right. We had both agreed that we wanted to stay together, we don’t want to split up. This was right when ICE started going after people in the airports, and we were getting ready to go to the UK, and I thought, I’d feel a lot better if we had some rights to each other.
How is married life reflected on the album?
Honestly, most of it reflects my life since my last album. My partner and I have been together since – well we started dating while I was finishing my last album [2022]. So, we’ve been together for a while now. It’s given me a lot to talk about, a lot to grow with. And you’ll hear a lot about it on the album. It all honestly comes back to the older I get, the more happy I am with how my life looks, the more important my family are to me. A lot of the album is this big race to make it and to come back to what’s important, which is time with the people that you love.
Why did you want to open the album with Walls?
I had originally planned on starting the album with 2 Many Days, which is now the last song but then I was playing Walls for Matt [Martians], and he suggested that I start it with Walls. I thought that was a lovely idea, so I went with that. It made me feel really good about how it would be received by the people whose opinions I care about the most. It also felt a great first sentence to a book, in a way. It sets the tone for the rest of the album. It’s letting you know as a listener that it will get deep!
I love the title, Beard, and its queer connotations.
The working title was Peach Fuzz because my A&R asked me, ‘If you could name this era of your life, what would you call it’? At the time, I had started to like how I looked with a little moustache, which I’ve had since I was a kid. You know, hormone things. I grew up being really self-conscious of it, because of girls at school, and being called manly or masculine. Getting older and my mom pointing out when my moustache is a little long, ‘You don’t want to get that?’
You can always rely on mumsie to come with the feedback.
(Laughs) Right! It wasn’t necessarily a forced situation, like, ‘I’m gonna deal with these beauty standards’. It just happened naturally. I was like, ‘Hmm, I look pretty handsome, I like this.’ I decided to see how long it got, because I’ve never let it grow longer than a week. I have this one little hair that kept curling into my mouth so I cut it. I remember thinking, ‘Oh my god, I don’t like this, I feel naked on the face. I felt more confident before I shaved’. I turned to my partner, and she was like, ‘Ew, put it back!’ So I left it. It was a time where I was rewriting my own beauty standards at the same time where I was creating a home with a partner and being more aware of the gender roles that we play. And the gender roles I’ve always played.
In which sense?
Like, I do the yard work and she does the cooking. I don’t like to cook, I never have. I’ll wash all the dishes. I don’t want to cook. I love trimming my Ficus. I just got a weed wacker. I love being out in the garage. I like working with my hands and getting my hands dirty. I’ve always been that way, so it’s not something that changed, it’s something that I came to accept.
So, the album is an affirmation of you, your identity, your relationship which happens to be queer…
Yeah, I think it just so happens to be. I’ve always approached my music that way. At first, it was in an attempt not to pigeonhole myself as a queer artist, because I had seen a lot of queer artists around me doing that. I was like, ‘Let me just be Syd and write about who I’m dating’. I realised the role that I also play as a queer artist and the responsibilities that that comes with. The best way I know how to be responsible is to journal it out, and tell the love story that happens to be me and another woman. I’ve always tried, maybe subconsciously, to normalize it. I was in high school when I Kissed a Girl came out, and I feel like we have enough of that representation. Maybe in a way to overcompensate or go against that grain, I’ve tried to write it in a way that it’s just a love song, it’s just an R&B song. I’m a woman and I’m saying girl and that’s the only difference.
You’re experimenting vocally on Beard and there’s a feeling of expanse across the record.
I felt like I didn’t give it enough, vocally, on my last album. I’m still really happy with how it came out, and I have no regrets, but I was also really intentional about trying to find my whole voice on this album. That was also thanks to the two vocal coaches that I’ve worked with since I put out Broken Hearts Club: Dorian Holly and Rachel Riggs really helped me find my voice. And find that my voice sits low. I spent years comparing myself vocally to other women and feeling like, Why can’t I do that? A lot of it was acceptance. Accepting who I’ve always been. I really wanted to use this album to lock in. Not in a disciplinary type of way, but more so in a mindset kind of way. That’s really what had to change.
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