Rachel Chinouriri

British singer/songwriter Rachel Chinouriri brings an indie sensibility to her experimental electronic pop with dark, vulnerable lyrics. Born in London to Zimbabwean immigrant parents with strict, traditional values, her limited exposure to secular music meant she developed a uniquely personal sound. It was a style that distinguished her 2021 debut mini-album, Four Degrees in Winter, and her 2022 EP Better Off Without. Chinouriri’s full-length debut, What a Devastating Turn of Events, arrived in 2024. Chinouriri was born into a large family who had emigrated from Zimbabwe and settled in Croydon, South London shortly before she was born. Brought up with traditional, conservative African values, she was forbidden from listening to secular music at home but nevertheless discovered artists like Coldplay, Daughter, and Lily Allen, who formed the basis of her own style alongside African acts like Ladysmith Black Mambazo. Learning to play acoustic guitar, she developed a uniquely personal indie folk sound. In 2016, at the age of 17, she self-recorded a few lo-fi demos on her mom’s laptop with a cheap microphone and posted them online as the Bedroom Tales EP. The songs combined folky, fingerpicked acoustic guitar and basic programmed beats with her smoky, soulful voice and surprisingly mature, dark subject matter, an amalgam that attracted attention on music blogs. Enrolling at the famous BRIT School, she studied musical theater in order to grow as a performer (and bypass songwriting theory classes) while continuing record her own music. Her popularity grew, and she signed a management deal, worked with various producers, and was featured on several singles, including Preditah’s “Animals.” In 2020, Chinouriri signed to Parlophone, which released her debut mini-album, Four Degrees in Winter, the following year. It had a fluttering, electronic- and hip-hop-influenced experimental pop sound, while the lyrics took a dark and vulnerable tone. 2022 saw the release of her third EP, Better Off Without, which included the dreamy singles “All I Ever Asked” and “Happy Ending.” Over the next year and half, Chinouriri played major festivals and toured as a support act for artists like Lewis Capaldi and Louis Tomlinson. Starting in late 2023, she began ramping up for her debut full-length with singles like “The Hills” and “Never Need Me.” Her first album, What a Devastating Turn of Events, was released in May 2024. ~ John D. Buchanan