iiara, formerly known as Chloe Ho, is making a bold entrance into Singapore’s hip-hop scene with her new EP Wake Up Slow. After announcing her transition into iiara on Instagram, she debuted her new persona with the music video '23,' featuring local rapper Zaymm, showcasing her dynamic visuals and diverse flows.
Her latest video for 'Wake Up Slow' takes a different approach, blending melodic tones with hip-hop grooves, highlighting her versatility. We caught up with iiara to dive deeper into her journey, her new identity, and what fans can expect next.
You announced on Instagram that you were moving on from your singer-songwriter persona, Chloe Ho. Why have you decided to go forth with the persona change into iiara?
I realised that I’ve reached my peak with the singer-songwriter genre, and since I was already incorporating rap-like phrases in quite a few of my songs I just decided to switch to hip-hop. At that time I was starting to fall out of love with my music and the way that I portrayed my artistic self as Chloe Ho. I'd only had ideas of being a rapper then, as I was always influenced by big names such as Mac Miller, Aminé, Smino, Noname. When I really got into the studio to produce the songs and really feel my voice out, I met Mat Isham aka Big Mat, currently my manager, and he gave me the confidence to take the leap and make the switch.
Chloe Ho feels like someone I grew out of and this all happened when I was 23, hence the song titled '23' resonates so closely with everything I went through to grow into iiara. When Chloe Ho represented my art I felt incredibly trapped as a lot of the music I made was made to impress. With iiara now I feel completely free from that. I feel like everything that I’ve created and want to create with iiara is the boldest I’ve ever been with my art, being in the scene, and being me. I’ve now fallen in love with iiara's persona and I’m glad that I'm finally certain about everything I'm creating and the stories I want to tell.
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What has been the most surprising or challenging part of rebranding yourself as iiara?
The most surprising thing was when I felt that every single person that I’m working with truly believed in me. It was surreal to be in that room with them, to feel that way, when they took their time and patience to guide me because they believed in what I could be with iiara. I’ve never felt like that with Chloe Ho. I knew that I had a lot of supporters but I wasn’t certain with my artistry at all. Now that I know what I want with iiara, they’re all in and it amazes me everyday because these people have never not showed up for me since we started working together slightly over a year ago.
The most challenging thing was learning patience. I generally, am an incredibly impatient person. When we were at the start of making the EP in late 2023, I wanted to release everything in March 2024. To think about it now that’s an insanely tight timeline for an artist like me. Learning patience was challenging but Mat drilled this into me that quality never comes from impatience. And quality was everything that I want for iiara.
Let’s take a look at the music video you dropped titled ‘23’. Do I sense an F1 reference from the font of the number you posted on Instagram? What was the concept and emotions that you conveyed in the video?
It’s more of a coincidence that the video title card seems like an F1 reference, but it’s interesting that that caught on! For '23'’s concept I really wanted to show off iiara’s indifferent attitude towards what others think about her and her art. The transition from funky grooves to a trap-inspired beat with Zaymm was meant to illustrate how my reality check hit me and how a lot of my life changed when I started to trust myself.
I wanted to emulate iiara's courageous and indifferent attitude, so my creative directors and videographers referenced a lot of Balming Tiger's 'Armadillo' music video and built a brief and striking storyline involving gummy candies on pizzas, racing around in a Toyota Sienta, and other statement scenes. Since releasing, I'm glad that quite a lot of people really understood the music and what iiara is going to bring to the table.
Let’s dive into the song ‘Wake Up Slow’ it starts with a voice introduction of Big Mat from New Mongrels and Saints Amongst Sinners, why did you have that excerpt as an intro into your song? Were there any significance in it?
The excerpt is an incredibly brief introduction to what this project is all about and the series of EPs that will follow this debut. My producer Harist gave me the idea of including an excerpt and we wanted to use a Morgan Freeman voice recording, one where he was talking about listening to your inner voice. I wanted to give some brief context on the start of the project and I wanted it to be as personal as it could be, so we decided to record an excerpt in the way Big Mat would converse with me when we worked on this whole project.
Still on the topic of your ‘Wake Up Slow’ music video, there is one moment where we see ABANGSAPAU making a cameo in the foreground of the video! Are we going to see a future collaboration with him?
Yes! I have been working with him very closely and there will be future collaborations, so do keep a lookout!
Aside from ABANGSAPAU, are there any other artists, producers, or creatives you love to collaborate with in the future?
Yes, as I’m trying to be more prevalent in our current hip-hop scene, I’d love to work with other hip-hop artists like BDKNIP, Ki Zikry, Mary Sue, and even other alternative or indie artists as well like Alicia DC, Lunadira and Benny's!
What are your future plans now that you’ve got the EP out?
Well, this is the first project out of a series of EPs, so there will be a second, third, maybe fourth, maybe fifth! I am also working on freestyles that will be released more frequently than the EPs too! As of right now, I'm putting out as many reels as I can to further promote Wake Up Slow and build the world for this art to exist in.
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