Ravyn Lenae on her viral hit Love Me Not: ‘There’s so much ahead of me beyond this moment’
Ravyn Lenae’s bathroom mirror is plastered with rainbow-coloured sticky notes. Written on each one is a different goal. Every morning, the 26-year-old US psychedelic-R&B singer stands before this gallery of ambition with her eyes closed, visualising her dreams into existence. And it’s working – many of those scribbles have become a reality in recent months. Her viral grungy summer anthem “Love Me Not” allowed her to cross off one milestone in particular: a US Top 10. Also checked off the list are a UK Top 10; a performance on Tonight with Jimmy Fallon; and a support slot on tour with reigning princess of pop Sabrina Carpenter.
“I’m never not going to write anything down ever again,” Lenae laughs, sitting cross-legged beside a watercooler at a north London rehearsal studio. “The physical act of putting your goals into the world is so powerful, and if I write it, that means I already believe it.”
Self-belief doesn’t always come naturally to Lenae. She turned to manifestation after losing her confidence during the lull between her Steve Lacy-produced electro-funk 2018 EP Crush and her 2022 debut album Hypnos. “It was four years of me digging myself into this weird hole, where I was spiralling, overthinking, underthinking, and not really sure about my position in music, and if people cared,” she tells me. “I also felt unlike myself, and I don’t know how to explain that. It’s hard to make music that feels right when you’re in that space.” Once Lenae started her visualising techniques, her mental obstacles melted away. “It sounds so simple, but I just started thinking of myself as bigger, and talking about myself as bigger.”
Her debut album established Lenae as a master of melodies: a genre shapeshifter adept at blending synth-inflected R&B with futuristic and experimental styles. As a result, there’s a complete timelessness to her sound, held together by wispy, cotton-candy falsetto vocals that fall somewhere between Janet Jackson, Ari Lennox and Erykah Badu.
Today, her soprano coos radiate through the corridors as she practises her cover of Carpenter’s “Please, Please, Please” for her BBC Radio 1 Live Lounge performance. In Lenae’s hands, the star’s rousing country-pop number is transformed into a celestial whisper of a track. She’s only in the UK for two nights, but she’s making the most of it: yesterday she was partying with Carpenter and bedroom pop It-girl Clairo after their gig at Hyde Park’s British Summertime show.
Today, Lenae stands at the mic, dressed in a silver sequinned miniskirt and ballet pumps. Her copper-tinted hair cascades down her shoulders. She cracks jokes and laughs with her bandmates: nothing here would tell you that this performer ever doubted her career.
This autumn, she will be rejoining Carpenter in America for her Short n’ Sweet tour. Lenae says she’s learnt “so much about endurance” while supporting different artists, particularly the women. “With women, you really go into it. You know, it’s not like men, who just hop off the plane and get right on stage. We’re in glam. We’re having periods. Being able to see that from an early age gave me a good perspective to think, ‘OK, is this something that I really want to do’, you know?”
Lenae, born in Chicago, Illinois, released her debut EP Moon Shoes aged 16. Alongside her peers, including chart-topper Lacy and rappers Smino, Noname and Mick Jenkins, she is considered a vital force within the neo soul scene coming out of her hometown. Before releasing music professionally, she spent her evenings after school ripping Kaytranada beats off Soundcloud, writing songs in her bedroom, and performing in her church’s congregation.
A lot of fans won’t know that Lenae’s latest accolades are the result of a decade’s graft in the industry – a time in which she had to grow accustomed to rejection. “Being able to go through all the no’s and closed doors to finally catching that ‘yes’ is something that we live for,” she says.
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Plenty of yeses have come her way since the release of her 2024 album Bird’s Eye. That record, which spans electro zaps, retro pop, and grungy rock, mapped out every type of interpersonal conundrum possible between soulmates, ex-lovers, and even family members. Lenae’s turbulent relationship with her absent father is the focus of “One Wish”, written about the time he didn’t turn up to her 10th birthday party. The song is laden with themes of abandonment and anxiety: “Candles burned down to the cake/ Still not seeing your face/ I can’t forgive you… I can’t forget you.”
Lenae used the song as an olive branch, going so far as to cast her dad in the music video to re-enact those events from 15 years earlier. “I still remember having a meltdown because he didn’t come,” she says. “I remember what outfit I was wearing; those things really stick with you.”
Writing the song was easy: it practically fell out of her. But revealing it to her father, and anticipating his reaction, was harder. Lenae says the song has brought up “a lot of difficult emotions” between them, but she’s proud of how far they’ve come. “It’s gonna take a lot more work, but I think that was a big step in the right direction for both of us.”
Lenae has received messages from fans in a similar position to her, moved to call their dads after hearing her song – likewise, she’s heard from dads who have been moved to reconnect with their kids. “That is the biggest gift for me when that happens,” she says.
The huge success of another track, then – “Love Me Not” – is only an added bonus for Lenae. The song, which went viral after TikTok user @thatsode posted a mashup with Solange’s 2012 song “Losing You”. Almost overnight, thousands of people were filming themselves lip-syncing the chorus and do-si-do-ing along. The song has racked up more than 400 million streams on Spotify.
But TikTok is difficult to translate into streaming success – and artists have to work hard to keep fans interested beyond a 30-second soundbite. At live shows, she does notice a difference in how her longtime fans and newer listeners interact with her music. Looking out at the crowd at a gig recently, she saw one girl type the words “Love Me Not” on her phone screen, enlarge the text, and hold the device on her head for the entire set. “I try not to take offence at it,” laughs Lenae. “Because I understand how people are listening to music now, and it is a little more passive. But I hope people are diving into Bird’s Eye and older stuff of mine at some point.” She smiles. “It always starts with one song, but hopefully from there we get to grow with each other.”
Lenae says her decade in the industry has never been about waiting to go viral. “Even though this is a big moment, I’ve been building [towards] a long, sustainable career. This is like the light turning on,” she says. “But there’s so much ahead of me beyond this moment.”
‘Bird’s Eye’ is out now
