Tickets are now available for NIA ARCHIVES at Rock City!
Ever since releasing her debut single Sober Feels in 2020 (self-funded by her student loan), Nia has become a poster girl for jungle’s revival. Growing up in Leeds, her musical indoctrination was a family affair with introductions to production software, gospel at church, and soon discovering everything from jungle to R&B on local pirate radio. From her pre-teen years, Nia would geek out over breakbeats in her bedroom, but as an artist she pushed the mould by bringing an unexpected vulnerability to the bangers. With her new album, Emotional Junglist, Archives seeks to double down even further. Like the legacy of the punk movement, Nia’s interest lies not just in jungle’s sound, but in its spirit. “People know my rave girl era; this album is for the post-rave experience. I want to feminise junglism and celebrate the female gaze. I hope that other women and girls find parts of themselves in it.”
Throughout her career, Nia has continued to blaze a trail of innovation. In 2022, she wrote an open letter calling out the MOBOs for not having a dedicated electronic/dance music category. They took her feedback on board, eventually introducing an award – and Archives became its first ever winner. She made history as the first jungle artist to earn three career BRIT Award nominations, securing nods for Artist of the Year and Best Dance Act at the 2025 BRIT Awards, following a 2023 “Rising Star” nomination. She also founded her own label, Up Your Archives, which allows her to nurture and support new dance music talent, while affording her more space for experimentation in her own right. Up Your Archives is her commitment to jungle. Nia can play an underground rave one night and open for Beyoncé’s Renaissance World Tour the next, while also exploring new sides of herself as a performer. With the new album comes a levelled-up live show. “I’m really excited to take that step as an artist and figure out who I am as a performer, rather than somebody who hides behind the DJ decks, which is what I’ve kind of done for many years.”
Emotional Junglist marks Nia’s biggest sonic leap to date. In “Dance With Me 2Nite”, she flirts with dewy-eyed indie pop while a psyched, syncopated beat nods to her roots. Her vocals marry romantic strings as, lusting over a crush, she asks “hesitation [to] sit this one out”. Written with Ethan P. Flynn (FKA Twigs, David Byrne) and Julia Michaels (Lady Gaga, Sabrina Carpenter), Nia finished the song with Blur and Arctic Monkey’s collaborator James Ford. In another lead single, “Vertical”, skittering hi-hats underscore a honeymoon period of romantic infatuation. “There’s this one synth that kind of beeps, and it just makes you feel a bit dissociative,” she says. “That’s what I enjoy about production – how can you say something without the lyrics?” She cites Madonna’s Ray of Light era and Björk as inspiration for the reduced BPM and nods to Nineties electronica. “I wanted it to feel like December in London.” While the record plays with genre, jungle purists will find satisfaction in the thudding basslines of “Feelingz Go Numb” and “Get Me Down”, featuring Jorja Smith – a collaboration she describes as “creative harmony”.
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