Chloe Qisha and the hard graft behind big pop

It’s sort of sickening having a crush, isn’t it? It’s all you can think about. It eats at you when you’re sleeping, working, out at the club. Maybe especially when you’re out at the club. There’s almost nothing worse than having a crush. But there’s also nothing better. Thus, it makes for the stuff of perfect pop music. At least for Chloe Qisha. When we connect, the London-based, Malaysian-born artist is sitting on her couch nestled between her two cats after a long day of promo. She’s waiting for her ex – with whom she co-parents the pets – to come pick them up. It’s the perfect representation of who Qisha is as a pop star — the kind of auteur who can speak to the highs and lows of modern dating, in an era where meet cutes happen on hinge and building a family often starts with animals rather than kids or homes. It’s a time in human history when we’re all changing jobs, changing friends, changing interests at a rapid pace, indulging in the fun of desire with the recognition that the world is kind of crumbling around us, anyway. Qisha understands this, and she’s writing pop that meets the moment. Enter Fantasize, the lush, 80s-inspired oeuvre that is Qisha’s debut mixtape and the m...