Born and raised in Hamburg, Germany to Chinese parents, Elly Xia channels EDM, indie rock, and the hyper-connected soundscape of digital culture into their own take on hyper pop, at once intimate and without borders.
Elly Xia began their musical journey on classical piano before turning to YouTube at 16, sharing multilingual covers that intertwined their love of languages and sound. While studying in Scotland, they formed a rock band, marking their first foray into writing and performing original music.
Now based in London, Elly Xia creates music that hits as hard on the dancefloor as it does in your head.
3 words to describe you:
introspective, eclectic, bold
Describe your sound:
I'd say my sound is an amalgamation of all the phases of music I grew up with. You can hear traces of my classical piano background, but also my love for emo, EDM, and tracks you can rave to. My brain is a little fried from having spent too much time online too young, and I think there’s usually a lot going on in the music I listen to and want to make. I’m drawn to melodies and sounds that feel playful or brain-tickling, but I also love harder, harsher textures that channel raw emotion.
As someone who tends to be emotionally contained, music gives me an outlet, and a way of regulating and expressing what I can’t always say. Lyrically, I process experiences and observations through writing, while production allows me to make those stories more danceable.
Describe the moment you knew that you wanted to pursue music:
I think I've always had a quiet dream of wanting to pursue music but never allowed myself to admit that to myself - partially because of my parents' expectations, and partially because I had no idea how I would even make that happen. As a teen, I wanted to be in band but didn't get to fulfil that wish, so during my undergraduate degree, I founded an indie rock band named Verbatim (@verbatim.band). At one of our rehearsals for an upcoming show, I felt so overwhelmed with euphoria that I almost cried. Pretty safe to say that from that moment on I knew I had to give music a serious shot or I'd regret it.
How does your heritage impact your art?
I think my heritage impacts the way I view the world, so in a sense there’s nothing it doesn’t touch. The whole classical piano origin story is pretty common for Asian/Chinese diaspora kids, and I also grew up listening to a lot of Chinese folk songs at home. At the same time, being raised in a predominantly white environment pushed me online at an early age, where I found refuge in different subcultures and got exposed to a wide mix of music. I went through phases of K-pop and J-pop (aside from the emo, dubstep, and other phases lol), which probably primed some of my taste today, too.
Because my lyrics are rooted in my own life, and I sometimes write in Mandarin and German alongside English, my heritage naturally filters into my work. I think being in the diaspora also made me more openminded, musically and otherwise, so it feels quite natural for me to move between genres, languages, and cultural references without really separating them. It’s just kind of the lens I see and create through.
What moment are you most proud of in your music journey so far?
It's still early days in my music journey but I'm proud of how far I've come in my production journey. I produce my music myself, and less than a year into music production, I think a lot of learning has come from unlearning the unconscious "self-gatekeeping" I was doing and realising 'Hey, actually I am fully capable of doing this and making cool things that I like." My creative journey has also been a journey of recovering from imposter syndrome and perfectionism for sure.
Aside from that, I'm really glad I have met and made friends with so many musicians in London and online whose artistry I'm continuously inspired by, and I'm also excited to be performing at the Royal Albert Hall in November as a resident artist of the Music for Youth New Frequencies artist residency (@mfyfrequencies).
Your next music goal:
Finishing enough tracks to play my own live show and learning how to DJ!!! I've been saying that for too long...
If you could collaborate with anyone, who and why?
I would love to collaborate with Ninajirachi. I adore her productions, they're so fun and addictive, and I feel like there is an unapologetic authenticity and "girly-ness" in her music that I find really refreshing, especially in the genre space that she's in. I'm just generally a big fangirl of hers.
Your favourite song/lyrics:
他把心丟給大海想找回一點浪漫 (He threw his heart into the ocean, in hopes of finding some romance again).
- 在 by hue.
I think it's such a pretty play on words, because the Chinese word for romance in this context is a loanword consisting of the characters for "wave" and "overflowing/free-flowing/unrestrained". Ugh, such lovely imagery.
3 songs you're listening to right now:
over u (Himera remix) - ultra caro, Himera
Circles - Pierce The Veil
Bound2U - Frost Children
Your community shout out:
Shoutout to @wyalinus and @minor.thesound! I had so much fun filming the MV for my new single with them. Both of them are incredibly talented and hardworking, and I'm glad that they support and believe in me the way I do in them!
Anything else you'd like to share:
I have a song coming out on the 19th of September, which will be in three languages and talking about my family's migration story.
