This year, the 29-year-old Ghanaian American singer-songwriter Amaarae took, to use a technical term, a big swing. With a voice of feathery beauty and songs blending R&B, hip-hop, rock, and Afropop, she had already earned buzz for her 2020 debut album, The Angel You Don’t Know. On the follow-up, Fountain Baby, released this past June, she pushed the scope and detail of her music, channeling the dirty swagger of Rihanna and the global futurism of Missy Elliott. Amaarae cheekily boasted in a behind-the-scenes video that she’d soon have a “10-times platinum, worldwide hit,” adding, “I’m about to be on my Taylor Swift shit.”

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WORK IN PROGRESS

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So when I met with her at a hotel restaurant during New York Fashion Week in September, I was unsurprised to see her looking the part of a pop star. She showed up in chunky biker boots (vintage Chanel) and a red-lettered tank top emblazoned with her own slogan: sexy, hot & slightly psychotic. That she was ambitious was obvious—but I wanted to know how ambitious. What were her career dreams?