If you haven't heard of Ari Lennox before now, you will soon. Like most up-and-coming artists in the digital age, the D.C.-born singer began her music career by uploading songs to YouTube, and for the past seven years, "underrated" is an understatement for this overly slept-on new-age, old-school artist. Ari, who sings songs about self-love, f*ckboys, and good d*ck alike, is a voice we didn't know we needed in the industry, but her time didn't come until after years of playing the underdog. She told NPR:
"I always wanted to solo at the church and they didn't ever give it to me. But eventually they did and I froze. But then I killed it. I just feel like that kind of just followed me all throughout my life. I've always kind of been slept on a bit."
As the first woman to sign to J. Cole's record label, Dreamville, Ari recently released her debut studio album Shea Butter Baby and has been making waves so big that she even made it on to her soul-singing predecessor Erykah Badu's radar. In a recent interview with Bossip, the 28-year-old songstress opened up about the advice that Erykah gave her during their very first encounter, and honestly, all of us can relate. She explained:
"I was leaving the dressing room and she was just right there. I think she was there for me. I don't know. Maybe it just happened to be that way. She was just right there, I said [hi]...I couldn't hear anything! She was like, 'Are you nervous?' I was like, 'Yeah.' And she was like, 'Just sing from your p*ssy.'"
While Erykah's suggestion may seem like odd and unconventional advice, Ari says she felt that in her spirit.
"I was like, 'Oh my God, I will.' I know, this makes so much sense. When you wanna hit that note you gotta dig deep down in there. You gotta squeeze sometimes to hit that got-damn f*cking high note. So she knew. I knew what she was saying."
It's gems like this that kept Ari going when she thought about giving it all up. Last year, after going through a traumatic breakup, Ari wondered if music would "ever make her happy again" and considered quitting the business altogether. In a tweet, she wrote:
"I don't see how I can ever be happy doing music again. I don't want to write and I don't want to listen to [sic] listen to any beats. I don't want to perform. I think I'm literally done. Never thought I could feel that way but I do. Hopefully, god can give me happiness and peace because I feel so far from it. This has nothing to do with music. I'm not mentally ok. I don't know if I will ever be."
Luckily, months later, God gave Ari exactly what she asked for in the form of a new apartment in a new city and a trip to Nigeria that transformed her perspective. The singer told Madame Noire:
"I got super healthy and I found out about loving on myself. I fell in love with New York. I fell in love with Brooklyn, and that just helped me mentally. It's just a beautiful place to heal, I think. I don't know, the trauma eventually lessened over time. Oh, and going to Nigeria [helped]. It's a whole world out there other than like, you know, whatever city you live in. If you ever feel depressed, take your depressed a– out the country, or at least be depressed somewhere else and like, just live, you know what I'm saying? Because it can really help you find appreciation for life and different things."
Now, Ari is singing her truth from her p*ssy every damn day, and it's all thanks to the fact that she trusted the process and didn't give up. Goal-focused, mentally sound, and f*ckboy free, Ari is transitioning into a new version of herself, one that we'll continue to see reflected in her music:
"I kind of don't even want to drink anymore because I want to be able to just not be sick and just always have my voice and sh-t like that. I want to be as fire as India Arie one day or Erykah Badu, or just those real singers that be singing. So it's like now, I don't know, I just want to focus."
If you still aren't convinced that Ari is one of the true leaders of the old-school, new aged R&B game, you should check out these 8 songs:
Featured image via Giphy
- Ari Lennox: "All Those No's Made Room For The Most Beautiful Yes ... ›
- Ari Lennox Is Taking A Break To Recalibrate - xoNecole: Women's ... ›
- Ari Lennox Says She Will Choose Love Over Her Career - xoNecole: Women's Interest, Love, Wellness, Beauty ›
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Skylar sees things differently. At the time, she was shooting content on her iPhone. Temi came into the picture with a new perspective, an understanding of tech, and, eventually, a camera. “He doesn't give himself enough credit,” Skylar says. “He wasn't just my tripod. He wasn't just standing behind the camera and going ‘click.’ He was giving advice. He was giving me insight to how I could look at things from a different perspective. And I was like, 'Oh, he’s an artist.' I think it was maybe a heartbeat of that kind of energy of like, ‘Baby, can you take this picture?’ And it turned so quickly into, we're partners. We can work together in a way where we're advancing each other's creative thinking.”
The pair often says they’re two sides of the same coin. Skylar is an Aquarius. She attended art school, paints, and loves poetry. She’s more than happy to let the couple’s management firm and agency, Kensington Grey, handle their admin work. And, she loves to sleep in. Temi, on the other hand, wakes up early. He’s a Virgo. He loves a to-do list and regularly checks in on the couple’s brand partnerships spreadsheet to make sure everything is on track.
Because his storytelling was steeped in his love of technology, he didn’t always think of himself as a creative person. “Where I [am] the dreamer who wants to pluck things out of the sky and spend all day with my head in the clouds, Temi [is] so good at grounding me and helping me figure out how to make things make sense on paper. We just work together in such a complimentary way,” Skylar says.
It’s been more than six years since Brooklyn-based couple Temi and Skylar started dating, and nearly four since they cemented their working relationship. On TikTok and Instagram, the couple’s travel, fashion, and home content regularly rack up hundreds of thousands of views. They’ve worked with brands such as Coach, Aesop, Away, and Liquid IV, bringing their vibrant perspectives to every campaign they execute. Still, nearly two years since both Temi and Skylar committed to full-time content creation and creative directing, the couple says their romantic connection remains their priority.
“We told each other we would much rather go back to full-time jobs and preserve our relationship than to be full-time freelancers, barely getting a night's rest [and] barely kissing each other because we're so busy shooting,” Skylar says.
Working from home can make it hard to separate work from personal life for any entrepreneur. It can be even more challenging when your business partner is also your lover. Temi and Skylar had already used couples therapy as a tool to help them effectively communicate with one another. When they ran into challenges while working together, their therapist helped them set physical boundaries to help combat the issues.
"We told each other we would much rather go back to full-time jobs and preserve our relationship than to be full-time freelancers, barely getting a night's rest [and] barely kissing each other because we're so busy shooting."
“It actually took us doing very specific physical things to create boundaries between work and play in our relationship,” Skylar says. “So, for instance, we will only have conversations about work when we're out of bed or we're at the table or in the office. Initially, when we started, we had to light a candle to say that, 'Okay, this is a space where we're connecting, we’re not talking about work.' We needed really hard boundaries at the top. And then it became a little bit more organic.”
The boundaries have been crucial to implement, especially because the couple began working together so naturally. When the pair first met, Skylar was NY-based a social strategist for BuzzFeed and was using content creation to drive business to her lingerie company. She was shooting her own content. Temi was working for Microsoft in D.C. He’d recently traded in his DJing equipment for a camera. “I've always loved taking pictures,” he says. “Even when I was a kid, my African mother would wake me up at 3:00 a.m. [during a] party, and be like, 'Come take the family picture.'”
Growing up, Temi says he watched his parents support each other and be the true definition of partners. He knew he wanted the same for his own relationship. But, the couple also wanted to make sure they were being financially responsible. The pair didn’t quit their traditional jobs until they’d saved up two years' worth of their cost of living. And, Temi received his Master of Business Administration from New York University with the knowledge that it could either help him advance in his corporate career or be applicable to his business with Skylar.
Temi and SkylarCj Hart @hartbreakToday, they say their working relationship is more of a “quiet dance.” They still implement some of the boundaries they learned in therapy, but they also lean into their natural strengths and deep love for one another. When we speak, Temi has planned a date for the couple to see Princess Mononoke in 4K IMAX and added it to their Notion so they can factor it into their busy schedules. “I fully plan to date for the rest of my life,” he says.
Skylar says the couple doesn’t just wait for date nights to check in with one another, though. This often happens in the mornings, after Temi has made her peppermint tea and poured himself a cup of coffee. When they ask each other how they slept, she says, it’s not just a “nicety.” It’s a genuine question meant to foster connection.
“A lot of it happens during the day in the midst of work. We'll stop and we'll hug. Or we’ll slow dance in the kitchen,” she says. “Sometimes it's hard to set a whole date night when you have 7,000 things going on. So, we must grasp these moments and check in when we can. And I think it's become so organic to us that I actually didn't even realize how often we do it. But all day long, we're like, 'Are you good? I felt like your energy shifted,' because we're best friends, we just know. We just feel it happen.”
What’s better than being in love? Building wealth while doing it. Watch Making Cents here for real stories of couples who make money moves together.
Featured image by Cj Hart @hartbreak