Rising: anaiis on motherhood, devotion and expanding her capacity for love

On her most recent album, Devotion and the Black Divine, London-based artist anaiis embraces grace, self-forgiveness and the work of nurturing her inner child.

“Devotion requires commitment, sacrifice and discipline,” the French-Senegalese singer anaiis explains, crediting her profound ideas to American multidisciplinary artist Ja’Tovia Gary. Barely a few words in, and we’re throwing around ideas about the universe as if we’ve known each other for a lifetime. That’s just the kind of presence anaiis holds, even through a MacBook screen. She joins our video call from her cosy London home, taking a gentle pause from afternoon parenting now that her son is finally asleep, to discuss her latest album, Devotion and the Black Divine. She is kind, curious and lightly philosophical, occasionally flashing a reassuring smile under the confidence of her bleach-blonde buzzcut. 

As we mull over the word “devotion”, anaiis explains that it applies just as much in her son’s nursery as it does in the studio. “I’ve never experienced anything else in my life that’s as confronting as becoming a mother,” she laughs. anaiis meets that journey with open arms on My World (Beyond), a soothing downtempo lover’s rocksteady, singing, “The first time you smiled and looked into my eyes/ You gave me a reason to keep holding on,” in a tribute to her son. “My capacity for love has expanded,” she explains, warmly. “There’s a nurturing voice in my music. I have the voice of a mother now. I see everyone as someone else’s child.” 

Perhaps it’s no surprise that the singer-songwriter thinks so deeply about belonging and how we are all connected. Her life has circled in wide, looping arcs from an early age, with stops in Toulouse, Dublin, Senegal and California before eventually settling in London. She even spent time in Brazil, completing the collaborative 2024 mini-album anaiis and Grupo Cosmo – through live improvisation – in just a week. Her newborn was nestled by her side throughout, and the experience of performing in such a collaborative way stirred something sacred and helped her step into a new role.

Throughout the interview, she references Black feminist authors such as bell hooks, from whom she adopts her lowercase styling, and writer adrienne maree brown, who follows the same practice and appears on album interlude, The Act of Togetherness. “There’s a lot of forgiveness and grace being given to myself on this album,” anaiis adds. On Moonlight, her powerful voice soothes with words of affirmation over a soft, skipping neo-soul bassline: “Black, and you know how to walk in your power/ No need to ask permission/ Be yourself from the start.” It’s an intimate dialogue, a palm pressed against the mirror towards her own reflection. “I think I’m trying to heal my inner child that has often felt a lack of worthiness.” 

Much of her experience as a Black woman has involved carrying the weight of systemic inequality, feeling undervalued and resisting being labelled solely as an R&B artist. “I’ve given myself permission to be more experimental on this album,” she expresses. Devotion and the Black Divine is simply too rich and fertile to be confined to one genre. The album opener, Something Is Broken, slides into warm synth chords and subtle vocal glitches, and Call Me (a) (B), the funkiest moment on the record, is a slick, Prince-driven vibe, with a shuffling hi-hat and catchy, confident backbeat. When the comparison to the Minneapolis maestro is mentioned, she giggles and admits he “came to her” during recording, his ad-libs and spirit somehow guiding the groove. The same rousing rhythm spills straight into Green Juice, a dreamy, hypnotic 2010s-sounding nostalgia jam that she almost didn’t include on the album. Devotion and the Black Divine drifts into different states, just like nature itself. 

Halfway through Devotion and the Black Divine, the album highlight Here Comes the Sun rises with dark, orchestral swells, and the lyrics, “Set your eyes on the horizon/ What’s in front of you, will surprise you,” stir deep into the core of human experience. “I think I allowed my voice to go somewhere else. I tested things, and I pushed myself with this song.” It feels like a message anaiis was destined to pass on.

Sounds like: Sacred neo-soul guided by intuition
Soundtrack for: Healing your inner child
File next to: Solange, Yazmin Lacey
Our favourite song: Green Juice
Where to find her: @hotcocoacartel