The Rise of Rina

"So, you're a singer... I was quite surprised you sang in English." The scene opens up with Rina Sawayama struggling through a one-sided conversation with an British man as he runs through cliche after cliche about Asian women over sushi. He then uses chopsticks to slant the corners of his eyes upwards and narrows them. Rina has had enough. Bells go off, she erupts with rage, and her song “STFU!” begins.

Rina Sawayama is a British Asian pop singer-songwriter and model. She was born in Niigata, Japan and raised in London, England since the age of five. Prior to her first EP release in 2017, Sawayama was a political science, psychology and sociology student at the Magdalene College of the University of Cambridge, and graduated with a degree in political science. In college, she was a member of the hip hop group Lazy Lion and began her solo career in 2013.

"Online you can present your best edited self [and] your overheating phone substitutes human warmth. Weirdest of all—you're together, but also very alone."

Sawayama’s main stylistic influences come from ‘90s and early 2000s acts, though her music spans multiple genres, even melding multiple genres in a single song. Her single “STFU!” brings together nu metal, heavy metal, pop and avant-pop while “Comme des Garçons (Like the Boys)” draws influence from early 2000s dance music. In "Snakeskin," Sawayama brings together Beethoven's Sonata no. 8 and Final Fantasy's "Fanfare" by using samples of each in the song's instrumentals. While her music draws inspiration from a range of places, much of her inspiration comes from her background and upbringing. She brings out topics such as navigating the Digital Age as it rapidly develops, political and social issues, and her own experiences growing up British Asian.

In her 2017 EP, “RINA”, Sawayama explores the way social relationships are affected by the digital age and the simultaneous hypervisibility and isolation that comes with it. In an interview with C-Heads Magazine, Sawayama states, "Online you can present your best edited self [and] your overheating phone substitutes human warmth. Weirdest of all—you're together, but also very alone." The highlight of her EP is “Cyber Stockholm Syndrome,” which addresses the way human interaction begins to feel completely foreign as people become increasingly dependent on online social relationships and the escapism online platforms bring. The song narrates the contrasting forms of isolation the speaker experiences as she keeps to herself in real life but “parties” on her phone to compensate, eventually growing dependent on online interactions as social interactions in real life leave her feeling alone. In an interview with The FADER, she talks about the meaning behind the song: "...The digital world can offer vital support networks, voices of solidarity, refuge, escape. That's what 'Cyber Stockholm Syndrome' is about: pessimism, optimism, anxiety and freedom."

Sawayama’s debut studio album, “SAWAYAMA”, takes on a more personal form, experimenting with both artistic styles and reconciling pieces of her identity with who she has become. Both as a model and as a student, Sawayama faced racial discrimination from the industry and her peers alike. Many of the songs in “SAWAYAMA” take on the discrimination and identity conflicts she faced throughout her life and respond with fire.

Her song “STFU!” draws from the racial fetishization and microaggressions she faced throughout her career as a model and responds with a bold rejection of such objectification through both the combined nu-metal and pop styles and the lyrics. “How come you don't respect me? / Expecting fantasies to be my reality,” she addresses the aggressors, calling out the dehumanizing nature of the way they treat her. In relation to the song, Sawayama collaborated with Taiwanese visual artist John Yuyi on a visual series critiquing Asian, particularly Japanese, beauty standards, stating that “for a lot of women in Japan, these are the expectations people put on them, from anime culture, kawaii culture... that can really put women at a disadvantage, objectifying and infantilizing them.”

While "RINA" explored the external struggles regarding her racial identity, “SAWAYAMA” addresses the internal struggles she faced growing up such as the identity conflict that comes with her immigrant status. In “Akasaka Sad” Sawayama uses her staying at Akasaka Hotel instead of going home as a metaphor for her feelings of alienation in both London and Tokyo and the depression that follows her wherever she goes. As a Japanese immigrant, she feels out of place in England, but as someone who grew up in England, she is unable to feel truly Japanese despite being born there.

Even today, Sawayama faces discrimination for being a Japanese immigrant living in the UK. In 2020, Sawayama was deemed ineligible for the The Brit Awards and The Mercury Prize as she was, in her words, “not British enough to even be eligible for the 2 biggest UK music awards" despite living in England for over 25 years. The rules for eligibility for both awards state that solo artists must have British or Irish citizenship, therefore making Sawayama, who has retained her Japanese citizenship (due to the country’s laws prohibiting dual citizenship), ineligible despite having an indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status that gives her the right to permanent residence and to work. As it is her only connection to her family in Japan, Sawayama chose to retain her Japanese citizenship. In regards to being barred from the awards, Sawayama stated in an interview with Vice that “[As an immigrant], you get to a level when you don’t have to worry about your nationality and your status and whether you fit into this country. Things like that bring into sharp focus, like, whether I am even British. It’s just very upsetting.”

“I guess I come from a bit of an academic background, so I always approach things like a dissertation. The title of the essay would be ‘Won’t you break the chain with me?’ It’s about intergenerational pain, and I’m asking the listener to figure out this whole world with me. It’s an invitation. I’d say ‘Dynasty’ is one of the craziest in terms of production. I think we had 250 tracks in Logic at one point.”

Another theme "SAWAYAMA" centers around is the generational trauma that burdens the Asian diaspora. “Dynasty,” addresses the “dynasty” that is generational trauma and the struggle towards overcoming and healing from it. On Apple Music, Sawayama breaks down her thought process on the writing of the song:

“I guess I come from a bit of an academic background, so I always approach things like a dissertation. The title of the essay would be ‘Won’t you break the chain with me?’ It’s about intergenerational pain, and I’m asking the listener to figure out this whole world with me. It’s an invitation. I’d say ‘Dynasty’ is one of the craziest in terms of production. I think we had 250 tracks in Logic at one point.”

Sawayama likens trauma to inheritance, stating, “I'm a dynasty / The pain in my vein is hereditary,” and insists on rejecting and overcoming this unwanted inheritance, asking the listener “Won't you break the chain with me?” and declaring, “I'm gonna take the throne this time.” However, despite the bold statements she makes, Sawayama acknowledges the difficulty of breaking generational chains due to the reluctance of older generations as they “hide it in the walls / Sweep it under marble floors.” She also admits to her own hesitation and how she tried to run away from it in the past (“Mother and father, you gave me life / I nearly gave it away for the sake of my sanity”), and admits that she can still have a role in continuing on the trauma if she doesn’t heal from it (“And if I fail, then I am my dynasty”). This theme is also highlighted in "Akasaka Sad" where throughout the chorus of the song, she references her parents and the sadness she feels as “Just like my mother / Just like my father,” referencing her familial roots of depression and mental health issues.

One of Sawayama’s personal singles highlight her identity as a Bisexual and Pansexual woman, accepting both identities in her interview with Vice, and stating that "I've always written songs about girls. I don't think I've ever mentioned a guy in my songs, and that's why I wanted to talk about it." Her single “Cherry” is carefully written in the perspective of a woman realizing her feelings for another woman and highlights the journey towards self-realization of being queer while being mindful of avoiding further stigmatizing bisexuality and pansexuality. In the song, Sawayama discovers new feelings and the female gaze writing: “Down the subway, you looked my way/ With your girl gaze (with your girl gaze)/ That was the day everything changed/ Couldn't stay the same." At the same time, her internalized bi/pan-phobia, the inner conflict that arises with being attracted to more than one gender is highlighted: “Even though I'm satisfied/ I lead my life within a lie/ Holding onto feelings I'm not used to feeling," and “Telling myself that it's cheating / But it's something else.“ After grappling with her own emotions, Sawayama then addresses newer feelings, such as yearning and wanting to know the feelings of the other woman, asking her, “Won't you be my cherry now?”

Other topics Rina Sawayama addresses in her discography stem from the work she had done as a student in Cambridge. Her song “XS” plays on the phonics of the word “excess” and criticizes capitalism and overconsumption. The song highlights the ridiculous nature of overconsumption and the impact it has on people and the environment due to exploitation and how people justify these acts to themselves. She explains her point in a statement published on Pitchfork,

"'XS' is a song that mocks capitalism in a sinking world. Given that we all know global climate change is accelerating and human extinction is a very real possibility within our lifetime it seemed hilarious to me that brands were still coming out with new makeup palettes every month and public figures were doing a gigantic house tour of their gated property in Calabasas in the same week as doing a ‘sad about Australian wildfires’ Instagram post.”

Sawayama also targets sexism in her music. In “XS”, she writes: “Make me less so I want more (More)” and explains on Apple music that “Women earn less than women, yet are marketed more aggressively than men,” addressing the way capitalism preys on and exploits women. In “Comme Des Garçons (Like the Boys)” the common occurrence of women adopting masculine personas in order to be successful are exemplified in the narrator. Over the course of the song, the narrator discusses how she wakes up every day to put on a false ego in order to avoid being erased by the media, while also justifying herself to the listener. On Pitchfork, Sawayama states: “When I was writing this song I wanted...to lyrically explore the idea of people having to adopt negative male tropes to appear confident.... The idea that the socially acceptable version of confidence is in acting ‘like the boys’”

Rina Sawayama’s music is a fresh and bold voice in pop culture, one that is unapologetic and unafraid of experimentation. By blending together her insecurities and her strengths, she creates an atmosphere that is both energetic and comforting. For the Asian diaspora living in the West, she’s a voice that we’ve all been searching for, both lyrically and as someone who is one of us. As an artist, Sawayama brings back the influences that made the early 2000s iconic and adds her own twists to them through genre bends, cinematic instrumentals and shifting perspectives, taking her anger and pain and turning them into works of art.