If you don’t know Tei Shi yet, it’s the moment to discover her before this Argentine indie pop singer-songwriter becomes huge. Her first LP Crawl Space is out at the end of March. It’s a contagious indie-pop project, Tei Shi once jokingly described her work as its own genre, “mermaid music”. We had a little talk before her sold-out Parisian gig and she explained us how she feels about releasing this first album. 

You’re about to release your first record on March 31st, and actually you are making a sold-out show in Paris. How do you feel about the fans that support you even before your album comes out? 

It’s really strange, especially because I haven’t played live for a while. I took a year and a half working on new music so it’s pretty crazy for me to be back in Paris. Last time I was here, I really enjoyed it. This city is so beautiful and the culture is wonderful. Everything seems very sophisticated and there’s no negative feelings here.

What about the creation of this album? 

It was interesting working on it as with the EPs, I did not expect anything. I just made them very quickly and so many opportunities came out of them. For the album, I was in a different emotional mood. Firstly I put a lot of time and details into it. My mind-set was at the point where my feelings were like a little bit suffocated. This creation drew from a lot of changes in my life. The process when making the album was interesting. I feel more independent and now that it is coming out, I have this weird feeling, as I was working on it for a while and I’m happy we got a beautiful result. There was no rush while producing it. Also, it is a strange feeling to put so much in and to let it go. I’m actually excited and nervous.

In the meantime, you signed a record deal with Downtown Records, you kept this freedom of creativity?

It’s kind of good for me as for the EPs and when I was touring I was totally independent. It was a good experience at the moment I need to think to leave those things to other people. With Downtown, they let me do my things and they respect my art. So this is exactly what I needed. It’s the first time I’m working with a label and its’ been a really good process.


Tei Shi is dropping out Crawl Space on 31st March via Downtown Recods / Interscope. 

Interview and 35mm photos by Ivica Mamedy