{"id":371029,"date":"2024-09-06T11:24:38","date_gmt":"2024-09-06T10:24:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.gaytimes.com\/?p=371029"},"modified":"2024-09-06T11:24:38","modified_gmt":"2024-09-06T10:24:38","slug":"sevdaliza-in-conversation-with-pabllo-vittar-alibi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gaytimes.com\/originals\/sevdaliza-in-conversation-with-pabllo-vittar-alibi\/","title":{"rendered":"Alibi, trans unity and making drag history: Sevdaliza in conversation with Pabllo Vittar"},"content":{"rendered":"

In an exclusive conversation for\u00a0GAY TIMES,\u00a0<\/em>Sevdaliza speaks with Pabllo Vittar about their historic single ‘Alibi’, why she’s always felt “closer to drag queens and trans women” and representing “true Persian women” in her art.<\/p>\n

WORDS SAM DAMSHENAS
\n<\/strong>PHOTOGRAPHY\u00a0ZAHRA REIJS
\n<\/strong>STYLING LEENDERT SONNEVELT <\/strong>AND LEA WILBRAND
\n<\/strong>MAKE-UP SOPHIA SINOT
\n<\/strong>HAIR YUHO KAMO<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>

With their exploration and celebration of the \u201cuniversal divine feminine energy\u201d on \u2018Alibi<\/a>\u2019, Sevdaliza and Pabllo Vittar have made herstory. This summer, their bullerengue, baile-funk banger – featuring additional vocals from French singer Yseult – became the number-one TikTok song globally and graced the Billboard Hot 100 with its presence, where Sevdaliza and Pabllo respectively became the first Dutch-Iranian and second drag queen (after RuPaul) to land a hit on the U.S. charts.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not all: after just two months, \u2018Alibi\u2019 is approaching 400 million worldwide streams and the Queen of Brazilian Pop, former GAY TIMES<\/em> cover star Anitta<\/a>, has just hopped on a remix for \u2018Pt. 2\u2019<\/a>. \u2018Cultural reset\u2019 and an abundance of exclamation marks (!!!) feel appropriate here. \u201cThe song is resonating because it’s fresh and all three artists are really powerful in their own way,\u201d says Sevdaliza, who also credits the quadrilingual smasher with subverting expectations for drag artists in the music industry. \u201cI\u2019m honoured to play a part in that. I’m also queer, and I feel so much closer to drag queens and trans women.\u201d<\/p>\n

In conversation with Pabllo Vittar, Sevdaliza reflects on the creation of their hypnotic and – again, it bears repeating – herstoric<\/em> new single, how receiving transphobic hate as a cis woman brought her closer to the trans community and her mission to represent \u201ctrue Persian women\u201d in her music. Pop music emergency alert: there\u2019s also talk of new material\u2026<\/p>\n

Pabllo:<\/strong> Can you tell me a bit about the writing and collaboration process for \u2018Alibi\u2019? What was it like collaborating with myself and Yseult?<\/p>\n

Sevdaliza:<\/strong> The song was being made as the features were being added, and I started with just the sample without my vocals on it. I went to the studio in LA, I was also producing it, and Yseult came there. She started to record a bunch of stuff and I was like, ‘Wow, this sounds cool.’ I thought that it could be more of an anthem so I pushed it in another direction. Then, you came on it and it sounded like drag opera! The whole vision started to come together – it\u2019s definitely not a normal song. I also crafted the production around every vocalist’s individual verse, because it was a lot of puzzling [together]. That’s why it took so long to make.<\/p>\n

Pabllo:<\/strong> It was an honour<\/em> to be part of this very strong, very empowering song. I’m blessed. I wanted to show people a different side of me and vocals that I’ve never done before in a song. When you sent it to me and I started to work on it, the song instantly made me go for those kind of vocals, and they fit perfectly with yours and Yseult’s. This song made history as only the second entry for a drag queen on the Billboard Hot 100 after RuPaul, and I feel very blessed. In Brazil, in my childhood, I didn’t have an artist to look at and feel like I could be there too, you know? I feel blessed that RuPaul inspired me at the beginning of my career and, now, I can be that inspiration to people growing up. Maybe they can see a little bit of themselves in me and in powerful people like you and Yseult\u2026<\/p>\n

Sevdaliza:<\/strong> ‘Alibi’ is also history for me, because I’m the first Dutch-Persian woman in the Billboard charts, ever. From the beginning – I want to say of my ‘career’, but it’s actually my life – I\u2019ve experienced bullying because of how I look. People always said that I was a man or that I’m transgender, and I’ve heard these comments since I was maybe six-years-old. People started to compare their hands and feet to mine. When I started to perform, there were a lot of fans who came to my shows in drag. I loved it because they did me in drag, it was such an honour that someone thought I had the kind of beauty to [emulate] in drag. So I always have a really positive experience with drag. Drag is being ridiculed in the mainstream and seen as a joke, more than a serious art-form. ‘Alibi’ is a huge step in changing how drag queens are being perceived in music. It’s part of your artistry as Pabllo Vittar, and I\u2019m honoured to play a part in that. I’m also queer, and I feel so much closer to drag queens and trans women because I’ve been treated like that. For me, it’s really nice to embrace this instead of chasing what is perceived right now in the mainstream as “cool”. I wanted to create my own “cool”.<\/p>\n

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Photo: Jozef Wright<\/p><\/div>\n

Pabllo:<\/strong> I hear you. What you are describing about the bullying, this reminds me of the online abuse that Imane Khelif received during the Olympics this summer.<\/p>\n

Sevdaliza:<\/strong> I have a really outspoken opinion on [the Olympics controversy] and I have no problem talking about it. It’s misogyny. Whenever a male athlete has physical advantages, like Michael Phelps with his wings, nobody talks about that being unfair towards the other male swimmers. But when there’s a woman with a physical advantage that has no place in the, I would say, white, ethnocentric stereotype\u2026 I was a professional basketball player and everybody would call me a man or say I’m \u201ctoo muscular\u201d. I remember watching Serena Williams destroy her opponents, and everybody was calling her a man. There is a certain type of place for cis women in society. If they’re not in that place, if they’re too strong, too powerful or [conforming to] this white standard of how to be powerful, they immediately call her a man. Since I realised this, I have no shame to be myself, to be loud, to show my feet or my body. In the end, my face has never been seen as a beauty standard. Everyone in my family has the jawline and the nose. If you look at my grandma, she looks like a warrior. She’s huge, a big build, and I don’t think that she’s less of a woman because she looks like that. What they’re doing to this boxer is disgusting because they don’t have the facts. In general, everybody that identifies as a woman is being treated disgustingly. They always find a way to make it hard for us.<\/p>\n

Pabllo:<\/strong> Yeah, it’s really important to bring that up right now, especially in the [context of the] Olympics. We still keep talking about this kind of transphobia and misogyny, like you just said, about how a woman’s body should be. It\u2019s crazy. That shouldn’t be the subject that\u2019s discussed, and people are still discussing it. So, yes, we have to bring it up and be out-and-loud about it because it\u2019s gotta stop somehow.<\/p>\n

Sevdaliza:<\/strong> There’s this historical piece about how women’s beauty standards have never been separate from a woman’s suffering. Whether it’s the corset, the BBL or anorexia, every beauty standard for a woman involves suffering. You have to be able to try to set yourself free from it. For us, performers, it\u2019s way more difficult to be free from it because we are constantly in the limelight. Everybody’s judging you, and everybody has an opinion about you. But this does help me sometimes to be like, \u2018Okay, maybe I don’t need to suffer as a woman. Maybe it’s okay, you know?\u2019<\/p>\n

Pabllo:<\/strong> \u2018Alibi\u2019 has become huge and Sevdaliza, you deserve it. I\u2019ve been a huge fan since \u2018Haunted<\/a>\u2019…<\/p>\n

Sevdaliza:<\/strong> Yeah, 2015!<\/p>\n