Shab is an outspoken Iranian refugee living in America that also just happens to be an international Pop Star. In a recent Instagram post to her millions of fans about Iran, Shab spoke out for the first time about how the Iranian Morality Police would harass her beautiful sisters: as no one was empowered to stop them. She remember her brothers being kidnapped and held for ransom: simply because her family opposed the revolutionary regime. She remember as to how pro-Khomeni forces persecuted her father and burned down his workplace: with her Dad dying of a heart attack in his early 50s from the stress that was brought to their doorstep. And she remembers his death leaving her mother with 13 kids to raise, without any help and during a horrifying revolution and social upheaval.
By Kamil Bobin
Discovered via Musosoup
Hey Shab, super nice to have the chance to chat with you. What first got you into music?
Good morning, Kamil! This Kamoii girl – that is my maiden and middle name – is glad to meet you!
As far as my entry in the world of music is concerned, there really was no Magic Moment when I decided that I would become a pop singer. Music was always a particularly important part of my life and the women in my family are semi-famous for their dance parties. But if anything, it was the reality of the career of my brother, Shahab, as a successful concert singer in Farsi here in the United States. Eight years ago I started singing in Farsi on a hobbyist basis with Shahab – and with time and improvement, the experience led me to believe that perhaps it was my calling.
Describe your favorite and least favorite part about being a musician.
My favorite aspect of being a musician is being able to work with some incredibly talented and fun people. While I have heard plenty of horror stories about the experiences of other singers who have had unfortunate experiences with a variety of creatives, we have been incredibly fortunate to have assembled a working group – we call it Shab Squad – where all members understand that this is a team sport where it is uncool to be self-focused. When you get to work in such an environment, the effort never seems as if it’s labored.
On the other hand, probably the thing that I dislike most are those times when career duties disrupt my role as a Mom or as a partner to my guy. My family is the most essential element of my life and it pains me greatly when I have to separate from our kids for more than a couple of days.
Where are you from and do you have a stable home or do you prefer travelling?
I was born in Tehran during the early years of the fundamentalist revolution. My father was part of the petrochemical elite in Iran and my family was thus brutally persecuted by the Khomeini regime. My father died 6 months after I was born at the age of 52 from the stresses that my family endured: and I had brothers kidnapped while my sisters suffered under the brutality.
Thereafter we fled in stages from Iran as a family – and I lived temporarily in Ankara for a year before ending up in a German boarding school from the ages of 8 to 14. And I was fortunate enough to get an American green card during the early 1990s after my family legally immigrated to the United States.
Despite all this trauma, my mother was determined to raise her 13 kids in a stable family environment – and I am particularly close with most of my brothers and sisters. And I have tried to emulate my mother’s example in my own adulthood and am incredibly fortunate to have a family of birth kids, step-kids and a guy who supports my career almost beyond belief.
As far as the Career Travel is concerned, it’s just part of the deal as a pop singer. Like many other people, working away from home is a necessary detriment to my career, but I am fortunate in that my guy is able to travel with me on most of my work trips (and even pilots us to most of my domestic obligations). So while I hate being separated from the kids, bringing my guy on the road with me is a short-term stand-in for our regular family environment. And always one of the best parts of any trip is walking through the front door of our house and seeing those little smiling faces running up to me.
How do you differ from most other artists?
I really can’t think of another artist in my genre who is the youngest of 13 kids in a family that had to flee their native country due to the terrorism of a fundamentalist revolution and didn't arrive in their new American homeland until the age of 14 with only one suitcase of possessions and speaking only Farsi and German but no English. Nope...I really can’t think of any!
And if that's not enough for you – and slightly more seriously -- I differ from most pop singers as I was a skin and hair aesthetician long before I ever sang into a microphone… so we get to save a lot of money by being my own stylist!
Your latest song is 'Dolce Vita'. Can you share with us the background of its creation and did any unusual things happen during its creation?
I am sure that it will come as no surprise that the atmospherics for the song are rooted in my love for the stylistic elements of Federico Fellini classic movie, Dolce Vita. I love the look and feel of the era which Fellini depicted: and even while the movie takes place in Italy, we felt that a Latin vibe was quite fitting for the portrait that we were looking to create.
You can probably see these ties even more clearly in our video for Dolce Vita, which was conceptualized as a day in the life of a glamorous singer. Perhaps the coolest thing for me about the Dolce Vita video was the fact that all of the backdrops are truly part of my life. Those are my actual galpals in the video: and each of the settings – the airplane hangar, the Pilatus aircraft, the pool at my work loft, the nightclub – are, in fact, ours (Even the drink we imbibed on the plane in that video, Triple Dog Irish Whiskey, is part of our lives.)
How would you describe the music that you typically create?
I have a tough time describing it my music learnings myself, but my producer and collaborator Damon Sharpe calls it World Pop. As a result of having grown up in Iran and Germany – and then coming to the United States in my teens -- I was exposed to a wide scope of musical cultures, which you can see reflected in my present discography. And people will see this multicultural slant even more clearly with my next album, to be called Euphoria, which will be released during the summer of 2023.
How do you nurture your own creativity?
First of all, surely the easiest manner of nurturing creativity is to hang out with a lot of creative people! I am blessed to have a ton of smart people in my life, both in the entertainment industry and otherwise, and the constant exposure to these intellects only helps to spur innovative ideas and concepts.
Secondly, I try to remain open to a range of creative influences. I find inspiration in the work of other artists, both in the field of music as well as in the visual and dramatic arts: so, I guess that I conjure many of my more offbeat ideas – such as the foundation for my new Dolce Vita single -- by basically carjacking the creative thoughts of innocent bystanders!
If you could go open a show for any artist who would it be?
There are a ton of artists for whom I’d like to serve as an opening act at this stage in my career: Pink, Dua Lipa, J-Lo, Billie Ellish, Beyonce, etc. But if I had to pick only one, it would probably be Miley Cyrus as I am enthralled with her versatility, her professional joy and her obvious sexiness.
Who's your ideal musician to collaborate with and why?
Again, that's such a tough choice. Miley Cyrus once more comes immediately to mind as does Ed Sheeran, Jessie Ware, David Guetta or The Weeknd. I was just at a fashion event in London where I briefly met Luis Fonsi – and I immediately thought as to how cool it would be to do a collaboration with him. But if I only again had to name a single collaborator, it would be my fellow north Texan, Post Malone – whose mastery of different genres and sheer musical genius leaves me sometimes in awe.
What are your plans for the future?
We have a busy slate of activities going into the Spring and Summer of 2023.
· During April, I will be releasing my next single, Indestructible, which was one of the unreleased songs that I had included in the set that I performed throughout my recent European & British tour. And in fact, in three days I am heading to Los Angeles for a working Spring Break with my kids -- and they will be with me throughout rehearsals for the music video for Indestructible that will be shot at the end of the week!
· Then during June, we hope to be releasing another song that is going to be quite a departure from my past work. It’s a HipHop Pop pastiche, a collaboration with the legendary hip-hop artist Fat Joe. Essentially, we took the rhythm track from Joe's iconic club hit Lean Backand layered both the lyrics from my first single Spell On Me together with a new rap by Joe into this incredible mashup that we are calling VooDoo. And I can’t wait for people to see the supporting video for this single, which was shot on a Hollywood cityscape film set with an army of dancers. Accordingly, this effort with Fat Joe will be the grandest production that we’ve ever done on video.
· For May & July of 2023, we are now finalizing plans to go on tour again overseas. We hope that there will be maybe ten appearances in Britain during May and with my team then returning for at least three more outdoor festivals in England & Wales during July. Further, we are developing plans for my first North American tour during the latter half of 2023, which I am hoping will include a dozen and a half club dates located all across the country.
· Also and as I had mentioned previously, at some point during the summer of 2023 I will be releasing my Euphoria album, which will mostly include unreleased tracks that have never been heard before by the public.
· And finally, we have a schedule for being back in various studios during the coming months with a view towards expanding upon the new musical directions that you will hear in my upcoming album.
So it will be a full schedule!