With the arrival of her newest album, Anna has already a huge name for herself across the pond. She talks with A Cappella about her journey to fame and its cost, in her own words. Pictures by Jo Aldrin.
Casually walking in 10 minutes late, Anna drops a stuffed bag of the floor and with a huff pulls down her furry hood to reveal dripping wet hair. She apologises for her lateness and blames it on the ‘shitty’ weather. After drying up in the toilet, she sits down ready to talk to A Cappella. From the moment she sits down, she already knows how she wants the article to be like; she wants to take the reins. Anna was founded on YouTube, just like many other artists and her success and fame have only risen from there. Her first album, XOX , gained huge critical acclaim with her first single going straight to number one. She is doesn’t let the fame get to her head and keeps ‘down-to-earth’ by taking the train every so often and driving herself to places. ‘My producers get angry because I'm not acting like a ‘real’ musician” she says whilst mimicking quotation marks. ‘But I plan to keep it that way; I'm not going to change for the music industry, its going to have to change for me!”. We get the impression from Anna that she is a genuinely sweet girl, (most of the time!) and she won’t let what people say get to her. The troublesome, tough girl persona is all just an act and a gimmick, according to her. Anna wants to lead the interview to highlight the main concept of her newest album. This, ladies and gentlemen, is only Anna.
Anna on…..her success
At the beginning, everything went so fast. I was spotted and then all of a sudden I was recording tracks in the studio. A year just seemed to fly past and I was already thinking about the name for my second album. I never expected anything to come from making my videos, all I wanted was opinions o my voice! People that are found on YouTube get criticism because it doesn’t seem to be fair that people have been working years to get to my position and I had only been on YouTube about 4 months before I got scouted. But, I don’t care. I guess I'm just really lucky!
Anna on……Rumours.
I honestly hate people that are bitchy and gossip all the time. I used to be a bitch then realised that there was no point to it. Might as well start by not judging people. I try not to get what the papers say get to me, because most of it is just attacks at me and my character. At the beginning, some really hurtful things were said about me and it affected me, but then I decided to not give a shit, because people are entitled to their opinion, although it may not necessarily be right!
Anna on…..Competition.
There are certain things that can happen which can cause arguments and its annoying when those arguments are made public. Me and Missy T had a slight disagreement on my music and it was completely blown out the water. I admit, there was lots of swearing and abuse but I can’t stand back and let people say shit about me without them getting their stories right. We’re fine now. We both said sorry and moved on. The argument seemed to make me start to like her. I think it’s that I like her gusto and how she isn’t afraid to say what she wants, kinda like me! I should really watch out for her though, she’s tough competition!
Anna on….the second album
This second album took so much out of me! I had to work harder and faster because every expects so much, they expect it to be better and more brilliant than the first one and all the time in the studio you have to focus on how to do that. This one is so different from the one before. I had to draw out some really raw emotions for this. It hard to create unique music without drawing inspiration from other things. My new album will show a different side to me and my music, I cant wait to tour and show it off!
