Samantha Hudson poses exclusively for ICON at the La Mosca warehouse in Madrid.PABLO ZAMORA
There are people who are difficult to interview because their work already says it all (try doing it with certain chefs or footballers) and others who are almost impossible to interview because they themselves say everything; They explain themselves so well on their own networks, with their own tone, that any question asked on behalf of someone else only serves to lengthen the path to the same destination or, worse, to subject the interviewee to a different tone that, generally, portrays the interviewer more.
"Like Risto Mejide when he asked me if I liked having a penis.
Samantha Hudson (Leon, 24 years old) is used to explaining herself. There is no one like her on the Spanish scene: if she did not explain herself very well, it would perhaps be impossible to understand her. He started using that name around 2015, when he was a student at a high school in Mallorca. That, shortly after, a school work of his, a song, Maricón, posted on YouTube, went viral. That she retained fame and began to be known as a pop star of working-class origins and principles; as a representative of a social and cultural underground; as a gender dissident person (neither male nor female) first and a non-binary trans girl more recently.
"What did you say to Risto Mejide?"
"That I did like my penis, but that's a very inappropriate question. If you don't understand the context of the character, it's very risky and maybe it gives me dysphoria. But since that wasn't the case, I said why am I going to get angry and leave this man in a bad light, being able to answer and show the inappropriateness of the question.
More than the life and work of Samantha Hudson, there is the life of Samantha Hudson, which is her work. She has three albums, Samantha's Greatest Hits (2019), Total Liquidation (2021) and EVOO (2023), and with them she tours all over Spain, but the work she is best known for is how and how much she speaks. Of precariousness, gender, Spanish machismo, the absurdity of fame or the culture of effort: for many, our times; for her, her life. She speaks without great pretensions, with a harsh voice, sweet tone, crooked teeth, voice actress diction, sarcastic and a little defiant, a little sincere, a little artificial, as if she doesn't quite believe what is happening to her but dares you to deny it. On the internet, with a much weaker formula you can go from being a micro-celebrity to a digital star.
And indeed, Hudson's stardom lies beyond digital lately. Last week, for example, he won the MTV EMA for best Spanish artist, a popular vote award, over giants such as Quevedo or Lola Indigo. Her most trashy era, that of a gay boy with the appearance and ways of a transvestite, with Shin Chan or SpongeBob SquarePants clothes and the discourse thatshe did not take anything very seriously has become outdated in front of a non-binary trans artist with her own style, musically and aesthetically. "I've always seen myself as a big superstar," he replies now. "In the last few years, the only thing that's changed is that more and more people see me as a big superstar. It's imposter syndrome, but not to myself but to other people, you know? I don't see myself as an imposter, but others do."
"Do other people see you as an impostor?"
"The girls who follow me, of course, don't. But there are still a lot of people who take me for the dick of the sereno. I have never taken any triumph or defeat too seriously, neither good nor bad, in order to assimilate everything in a prudent way and not let myself be crushed or drunk by successes. And a prize is very sweet. But this is like a demonstration, that is, in everyone's language, using the rules of standardized circuits: 'Hey then, here I am.'
It is, by eye, the third act of a life that has not yet reached the age of 25. If its popularity is already somewhat atypical, so are the unknowns generated by its durability. Can someone who has spent their entire lives explaining themselves out loud really grow? What room for change is there when so much of what you've thought about yourself is collected in a newspaper library? "You never have to listen to yourself when it's past nine o'clock at night. You get into bed and suddenly you're bombarded by intrusive thoughts: I always feel like pulling from newspaper archives. I watch videos and read interviews and I'm like, 'Oh my God. How poorly expressed that is.' Then the next morning it goes away. There is no need to judge ourselves so bluntly. If I hadn't had that thought that I don't identify with anymore, maybe I wouldn't be at the point where I am now," he monologues. "It is normal that a stage of the past no longer represents us, even that we perceive it in an alien way. But that excites me too: 'Look how young and absurd she was.'"
She continues: "I always do everything thinking about when I'm an old woman. And I really like to feel like I'll be able to look at my interviews from when I was younger, or all the photos that come out. I buy the magazines and keep them; I cut out the newspapers and keep them in an album. I always look at him with mercy and nostalgia, rather than with resentment or remorse, 'damn, how could you be like that'. Especially because I've worn looks that if I were to judge them I would be sunk in misery."
When you imagine yourself as an old lady, how do you imagine yourself? Well, I have a problem because I imagine myself with giant tits. But right now I don't have dysphoria of my body, so I don't know when that's going to happen.
You have time between now and then. I have time, yes. But I don't know how appropriate it is to go under the knife when you're so old, especially to get huge tits [laughter]. I imagine how... Very secluded and very soury. A neighborhood lady, you know? The typical one who comes with the combing, with very dyed hair, with her quirky model, who is known by the greengrocer and everyone greets her, because I want to be that girl. And I also don't expect to be a legend or for people to remember me. In fact, the less I am remembered, the better. I'd even like to be a cult one. That they call me once a year to see a series at the film library and that's it. And I'm met by three indie sissies. It's just that it's very overwhelming that people think about you so much. I have no perception of myself, sometimes I forget that I exist.
Show me? Let's see what?
The latter, if you can explain it better. I feel life like a fever dream. 'Oh, so I won an MTV EMA.' But I also think it's my charm and it helps me a lot not to take things so seriously. It's just that it's very rare to exist.
Is it very rare to exist? I have no self-perception. I don't feel like I'm a public figure or that I'm in the star system. When I go out partying, it's a good thing I'm a nice girl because if I don't... Sometimes I'm so embarrassed and I'm so inappropriate... And these people know I'm Samantha Hudson. They could just sink my life, but they don't.
The power of being nice. If you're a girl, or a racialized person, or a gender nonconformist, etc., you're not allowed to be nasty, or edgy, or angry. In general, people tend to dehumanize you or not empathize too much with your experiences, because they perceive them as something very particular, isolated, alien to their movements. Otherness does not belong to the norm. For men, it's not a necessity to deal with misogyny or women's issues. White people don't feel the need or the responsibility to pay attention to structural racism. For cis straight people, LGBT is a niche thing.
And do you manage to bridge that imbalance by playing with it? Since others already empathize so little, if you are suddenly angry or allow yourself the luxury of being in tune with your emotions at the time, you seem like a despot, an unpleasant aunt, you have lost your temper. Being angry totally discredits the speech, I'm very aware of that and that's why in interviews I always have a neutral and pleasant tone of voice. If she were a girl who wasn't that charming, she'd be a character that audiences don't like.
Is it censored? Then, as soon as you are a little settled, you can take certain licenses. Maybe I'll say, 'Hey, I'm not interested in what you're telling me at all,' and it seems like a totally out of place comment, but people still kind of find it funny. Because I've developed a language that's always somewhere between serious and ironic, so it's very hard to know when I'm really talking to you or when I'm playing a joke on you. I've kind of told you for the haha, but I'm really sorry.
That is a very recurrent motif in all his interviews. Have you noticed that there is an intention to unmask Samantha Hudson, to see how much truth there is in her statements and her lyrics, who is really behind the hair and the voice? People are very fond of the explicit, of the truth. Sometimes the truth isn't as important as the narrative. I do everything for the narrative, the narrative of my life. That's why I said that I dissociate and see myself in the third person, I always think that I'm in a kind of Truman Show, of a series that I star in (and that I've decided to star in, because there are times when you feel like the secondary character of your life and that seems very sad to me. Ever since high school, I said to myself, 'You are the martyr of your own passions. And you have to be the main character of this TV movie that's going to be your life.')
Don't kill us but... So, are you really like that? The answer is yes, but even if it wasn't, why are you trying to unmask me? Why do you always try to go the extra mile? Aren't you satisfied with what people offer you, aren't you satisfied with the anecdotes I'm telling you? There are things you'll never know if they're true. Poetry reigns supreme over reality, and it seems pretty aspirational to me. I don't want my life to be hyper-realistic, I want my life to be poetic. I've always been asked, 'And how much is there of Ivan [the name on his ID] and how much is there of Samantha?' Well, I think it's impudent. Isn't what I offer you enough? Do you think it's really so easy to design and write this complex narrative and then you come and try to unravel it and see what's behind it?
Next week, on the 18th at the La Riviera venue in Madrid, Hudson will begin his EVOO tour, his latest work, his most complex and adult. "I feel like I'm a little bit further away from that grotesque trash atmosphere I had before. I take myself more seriously, within my parameters," he confesses. "It's true that the musical production is much better, and in the sound it looks like there's been an upgrade, I feel like I'm more of a rapper-enjoyer thing. Concerts are something I'm excited to prepare. To have an idea, to say: 'Vega, we're going to take the arch to the choreographers', 'We're going to plan a choreography', 'The lighting design', 'Talk to the graphic designer to do the visuals'... Give them an imaginary and a universe and then that it takes shape and you do it and people come to see you; That suddenly an idea you had in your head materializes and people can enjoy it. It's a lot of fun, I think it's the grace of creation and, in general, of dedicating yourself to something artistic. I think it's a lot of fun, to have something in your head and suddenly it exists in a material way. I enjoy that a lot."
Is this a contradiction to his eternal discourse in favor of leisure? And if so, should we take it seriously? "I don't like to brag that I work because I don't think work is worthy, so to brag that you've worked hard seems stupid to me," he concedes. "And also because I'm embarrassed to throw flowers at myself. But I am working my proposal. They're not going to go see Joaquín Sabina."
It would be nice to have a show that was you with a guitar. I could write a song on the level of Joaquín Sabina. I don't know if Joaquín Sabina could write EVOO.
EVOO is not political. Samantha has been, very much so: two years ago she premiered the video Por España, where she used so much of the stale Spanish imaginary and the logic of the most narrow-minded right that seemed to advocate the demonstrations against Ferraz. His political views were an essential part of his image. Another thing that has been left behind. "You've just been burned out to be overshadowed by your identity or your political views. It's something that I claim and that I'm very proud of, but facing that absurd pigeonholing that the media leads you to over and over again is very tiring. It got to the point where I was asked questions at the level of a minister. It's not that most ministers are up to the task, I'm telling you too. 'Love, it's 7 o'clock in the morning, I mean, please, ask me something more relaxed, I don't know.' But I keep going. Especially at concerts, I always throw in a wedge. In the end, my speech is part of my art. I also think that's why the MTV award was well deserved.
Why? I'm excited because I think that for the first time in a long time we are above the figures of the algorithm, the streams, the obsession with virality, capitalization, hyperconsumption... Logically, Lola Indigo and such are the greatest artists ever. But I think the most iconic artist has been awarded. And a concept of art that I claim has been rewarded, a holistic and total art. My aesthetic is my art. My gender identity is my art. Every time I go out dressed in one of my looks, for me that is a performance, all the values, the community, the ideals that I represent, that reference for the young girls who are bursting onto the scene... All of that makes up my artistic concept. Beyond the performance, the staging and the songs, I think the biggest artistic milestone I've ever made is creating Samantha Hudson. And I've created it from scratch, since I was 15 years old, and step by step in every year since.
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