You know when I was telling you that The Line Up was a great music discovery source? Well that’s exactly how I heard of Rey Mayari. Julia Dang filmed, edited and co-directed alongside Julius Hayes his first music video, while her YouTube channel’s former partner in crime Maya Nilsen makes a stunning appearance in it (by the way, she has fire Music Mondays happening on her IG stories every week so you might want to follow).
Now let’s go back to our beautiful unicorn: born as Alexander Malinao, Rey Mayari is a 19-year-old Swedish singer-songwriter. Seriously, can these artists stop making me feel old? And my heart is getting extra happy as I type this, as I’ve just found out he’s from Sundsvall, where I finished my studies and, trust me, although I created some of my fondest memories in the city and I always say it would be a perfect place to build a family, there’s truly nothing to do over there aside from two night clubs, a mall and up til 2016, a nice basketball team. But that doesn’t mean talent can’t grow in its luxuriant outdoors and Rey definitely proves it!
He launched his career in 2017 with the boyband Quest, signed to Universal Music Sweden, who was already breaking barriers with two members openly gay and gender neutral lyrics. The outspoken artist is now launching his solo project independently with the single Elevate / Escalate produced by rosarummet and a bold statement as a first music video. “I’m so sick and tired of only seing one type of Asian beauty represented in the music industry. No tea, no shade towards the Kpop community, but the only representation we get in the mainstream is an unrealistic perception of what Asian beauty is… WE NEED REPRESENTION YALL!!!, Rey Mayari insists on Instagram. And not only in the stereotypes that are put on us. This video is for all my Asian and fellow POC sisters! And hopefully someone, somewhere, feels that they belong with the skin that they are born with, and that we don’t need no plastic surgery to ‘fit in’ the western beauty standards.”
Rey styled all the looks himself for the aesthetic feast served in the very Solange-esque visuals, epitomizing a stripped-back love and inviting us to embrace our bodies, our vulnerability, our nature, THE nature.
In the midst of this beautifully fragile oasis of calm, I can sense an underlying psychedelia and I can’t wait to see Rey Mayari unleashing it and continuing to elevate his art to new, higher spheres…
