MELXDIE – Just give her a Rhythm

BY SIMONE J. SMITH

“Life is like a game of chess, and you don’t want to waste your next move.”

As I watched her video, I was drawn in by the fantasy. The video had it all: dynamic colours, sexual playfulness, feminine energy, erotic dancing, out there costumes; it was like watching art in motion. The song “Checkmate,” was my first introduction to this edition’s Woman Empowered, and what an introduction it was.

Every artist plays a different and necessary part in contributing to the overall health, development, and well being of our society. They allow us to immerse ourselves in imagination and fantasy, yet remain grounded enough to start thinking about how to turn our dreams into reality.

Her playful attitude is one of the hallmarks of her creativity, but this light-heartedness and excitement is also mirrored by a paradoxical trait: perseverance. Having a creative mind allows her to do new and exciting things and engage in a way that takes her closer to reaching her full potential.

Her life is everything that you would imagine: exciting, romantic, and glamorous. However, being a successful artist is also a lot of work, which many people may fail to see. After interacting with her, she made me realize that true creativity involves combining both fun and hard work.

Welcome to the unforgettable world of Melxdie, an emerging artist filling the global stage with her radiant and intoxicating anthems. She burst into the music scene in 2019 with the release of “Summer Love,” a collaboration with international star Tory Lanez. Her genre-defying sound landed the single on Billboard’s Top 100 and Apple Music’s Top 10 in RnB & Soul.

Building on the momentum, Melxdie released “Girls R Better,” a reggae infused single featuring dancehall sensation Mavado. It quickly went viral on TikTok engaging over 21 million views and was used in more than 2,000 videos.

Melxdie’s first EP and Visual Album “Checkmate” was released on May 20^th, 2022. Her goal was to break artistic barriers, and she did it with this album. Stefanie Eby is the creative mastermind behind the visual, and she was able to create a story that referenced a lot of my real life experiences while tying the contrast of sounds together to amalgamate it seamlessly.

“I really wanted this visual to hold a deeper meaning, you could say, it’s almost like a glimpse of where I come from, and where I’m going. We even used a lot of my closest family and friends to play different characters that represent different aspects of who I am, which was a really special component for me.”

Born in Toronto, Ontario Melxdie was raised in a Lebanese, and Peruvian home. From the time she can remember, music was always a part of her life.

“I grew up around music,” Melxdie shares with me. “My mom is a music enthusiast, and it is one of the reasons why she named me Melxdie (pronounced Mel-o-dee) because she knew I was going to be a singer.

It was very daunting for me because everyone in my family was in the industry. To be honest, I kind of stayed away from music. I actually was focused on becoming a nurse and going to nursing school, so I started to focus my attention on that. It just didn’t fit right. I felt like I was living an illusion.

I remember the day that I said to myself, ‘No more of this.’ I was having a really shitty day, so I went on Kijiji and Craigslist looking for people who needed a singer. I found someone and reached out to them. I ended up going to the person’s house, and we hit it off. Really stupid move to make at 18 years old, but it worked out.”

Melxdie spent some time at the beginning of her career trying to figure out her sound. She admits that this was sometimes challenging for her.

“My sound is versatile; it is meant to get you dancing, get you feeling a type of way. I like to fuse sounds. I want people to vibe. One thing I will say is that I do not like to be put in a box. My fans can expect that they will not hear the same sound from me all the time.”

As I spoke with Melxdie, I found her to be gregarious and reticent, sociable and quiet. She seems like the kind of creative who has no problem interacting with others generating ideas and being inspired, and then retreating to a quiet place to fully explore her source of creativity. She is both traditional and iconoclastic. This means she is able to appreciate and even embrace the past as a source of knowledge, while still seeking improved ways of creating new sounds. I was curious about some of the other challenges she has faced as a young, female artist, and she was happy to share with me.

“I have always been a people pleaser. To me, it is important that other people are happy. Also I am a woman of colour in the industry, and sometimes people will try to make you feel very small. You have to surround yourself with a strong team. I grew up very soft-spoken, and being in this industry helped me grow out of that.”

She is definitely an “out-of-the-box” thinker, and some people may view Melxdie as a non-conformist and even a little bit rebellious.

“If I have to tell someone how I feel, just give me a rhythm. The music allows me to be articulate. There is a side of me that needs to come out, and my music gives me a safe space to do that.”

To end our interview, Melxdie shared some exciting news.

I just moved to L.A. and I have a second EP coming out; that is a whole other story, and I am really excited about this. 2022, and 2023 will be powerful years for me. I am blessed and very thankful.

Melxdie was a great reminder that creative people don’t just enjoy their work—they passionately love what they do.