Taken from the summer issue of Dazed:

Criss-crossing the Atlantic as a child – moving from Rhode Island to Sweden at ten, then to Brooklyn at 18 – has given Mapei’s music a sense of displacement and a fierce independence of spirit. After the aggressive rapping of her 2009 debut EP, her singing on this year’s incredible “Don’t Wait” – all baile-funk drums and finger-clicks – has set her up as a pop innovator. Her first album sees her ditch former collaborators Diplo and Justice in favour of Magnus Lidehäll, who’s worked with Sky Ferreira and Britney. “We wanted to do a Michael Jackson album with a positive message,” Mapei states nonchalantly. No pressure.

You’ve described your household in Rhode Island as ‘part hippy’. What was that like?

Mapei: My father’s been an activist since the 60s so I grew up with a lot of people in the house: activists, vegans, just hippies that were in the worker’s movement he was a part of. There was a lot of violence, a lot of gangsters and criminals, but it was very magical as well in a way – I sang in church and started to create a fantasy world. I guess I want to show that in my music, to sing the gospel of life. (laughs)

"I’ve been really negative in the past so I want to be positive now. I wanna sing the gospel of life!" - Mapei

Your new song "Believe" is very empowering. Do you fancy yourself as an evangelist?

Mapei: A bit, yeah! I’ve been really negative in the past so I want to be positive now. I wanna sing the gospel of life! I mean, I moved to Stockholm from the US when I was younger and didn’t speak to anyone for two months, maybe longer, because I didn’t know the language. It was a total culture shock – and I missed American boys! I was the token black girl in Sweden and no one flirted with me.