VINCINT dishes on new music, nightmare gigs & the queer power of Xena: Warrior Princess
The artist linked up with DJ Matt Suave for cathartic dance track “Be Good,” which should keep us dancing until their highly anticipated sophomore album.
Mark
Good times call for good anthems, and VINCINT is here to meet the moment with “Be Good,” a cathartic dance track made in collaboration with DJ Matt Suave, which sounds even sweeter in light of this week’s good news.
The recently released song is an homage to the breakthrough house hits of the ’90s, brilliantly weaving together Suave’s piano-driven groove with VINCINT’s own soaring vocals for a celebration of queer joy & self-expression that hits so good amid a blue wave, thanks especially to its drag queen-filled visuals that’ll keep us partying into 2027 and beyond.
How about we take this to the next level?
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And, speaking of “beyond,” this is just a little somethin’ somethin’ to tide us over until VINCINT’s forthcoming sophomore album, which is expected to drop in the next year. Our first taste of what’s to come was their high-energy lead single “Signal,” an earworm that cuts through the static and ushers us into the singer-songwriter’s exciting new era.
“I really went back to the women that I listened to in college and the years after, a lot of pop production and heavy, heavy dance,” they tease of the upcoming project. “Production-wise, I was very inspired by Robyn and The 1975, Tina Turner, and Muna. I know that doesn’t sound very house and dancing, but something about those bands right now is speaking to my soul and the way that I make music. I’ve kind of infiltrated a bit of the joy I get from all of them into what I do.”
Soon they’ll be sharing that joy with the rest of the world—and we can’t wait. In anticipation, we decided it was high time we invited VINCINT into the hot seat for our rapid-fire Q&A series, Dishin’ It. In our conversation, the artist opens up the “wild” fantasy series that gave them life as a kid, the house music icons who keep them dancing to this day, and the nightmare gig where everything that could’ve gone wrong did.
Is there a piece of media—whether a movie, TV series, book, album, theater, video game, etc…—that has played an important role in your understanding of queerness and the queer community, or your own identity? Why does it stand out to you?
Well, of course there is! This is going to be a wild answer, but it’s Xena: Warrior Princess: the lesbian representation, the queer characters, the no limits when it came to finding out what your identity meant in any space. It had so much to do with how I thought about myself, which is probably not ideal for a young Black child in Philadelphia, but it was a real confidence booster because I watched this woman overcome so many things, fall in love with this other woman, and never take sh*t from it, and so that was a real standout time in my life for sure!
Congrats on “Be Good,” your new single with Matt Suave—he’s definitely a student of the house scene & Chicago’s underground club culture, so how did the genre shift inspire you for this new track?
Thank you so much! Matt is an old friend and such an incredible DJ and person, and when he reached out about being on his product, I was so excited to do it and to be a part of it. It was a perfect pairing simply because the next phase of music that I’m doing is dance and house, and when I heard the track, it just felt like the perfect thing to be a part of to have in that stratosphere of music to make people feel good. It was a perfect pairing at a perfect time.
“Be Good” feels in conversation with music from the queer artists & allies who’ve pushed dance music forward from the very beginning. Who’s an artist from that world, past or present, who inspires you & why?
I’m such a massive fan of Kevin Aviance and CeCe Peniston, Crystal Waters and Honey Dijon are masters of the craft and of the dance floor, and they’ve inspired me so much, especially in this new genre of music and this new space for me to be unapologetically Black, unapologetically pop, unapologetically loud, and joyful in my music, and to have them in my heart’s ear as I made this music and collaborated with Matt was the only way that I think it could’ve come out as well as it has!
We still can’t get enough of your single “Signal” which is such a burst of energy. Why did that feel like the right single to give fans a taste of this new era?
I always try and pick singles based off where my life is at the moment and if it makes sense to me, and they always seem to play out well haha. It made sense to me for “Signal” to be the first single because I feel there’s a lack of communication between human beings that doesn’t involve devices. There’s a step missing with all of us at times, and right now, I have the need, the yearning for connection and authentic connection between two people.
And it’s all leading up a new album. When you first set out to bring this project together, were there certain vibes or specific inspirations you were hoping to channel? What drove the production of the album forward for you?
New era incoming, baby! There were so many inspirations, but I really went back to the women that I listened to in college and the years after, a lot of pop production and heavy, heavy dance. This whole project for me is a love letter to the perseverance I had to display over the last couple of years. Production-wise, I was very inspired by Robyn and The 1975, Tina Turner, and Muna. I know that doesn’t sound very house and dancing, but something about those bands right now is speaking to my soul and the way that I make music. I’ve kind of infiltrated a bit of the joy I get from all of them into what I do.
Where’s one of the first spaces you can remember that made you feel a part of a queer community?
Wow, I haven’t thought about this in so long, but what are the first spaces for me? I was a bar that my mom bartended at called Spoilers, and I had an uncle, Bryan, who I believe at the time was the first queer person that I knew. Uncle Brian didn’t use pronouns. I think the only pronoun that he did use is fabulous, but I remember spending afternoons there after school and how many people came in the doors and were queer and accepted and Black and wonderful, so it made me feel so safe to know that spaces like that existed.
You’re such a pro at live performance, and you’ve performed for all kinds of stages to audiences all over the world, but do you have any horror stories of a “gig gone wrong” that you can share? Or perhaps a show that was especially strange, funny, or interesting?
I could tell you 1 million stories like that, but I’ll tell you about the one here in LA actually for my tour when I was touring my album There Will Be Tears. It was probably for me the worst show of the tour and yet one of the biggest I played, it was The Fonda and it was sold out, and I was so happy so of course everything that could go wrong went wrong. I think I lost a shoe that show my costume broke in the back my microphone and ears kept going out and I just remember going downstairs after the show, slamming the door and being so angry and hearing applause from upstairs and then it all came back to me like it’s just a moment it’ll pass. Be grateful that you get to do this because not everybody does and that’s something.
And, in closing: Who is an LGBTQ+ artist/performer/creator that you think is doing really cool work right now? Why are they someone we should all be paying attention to?
Right now for me, Dominique Morgan is becoming a favorite of mine on TikTok with her takes and how she so eloquently uses words to either eviscerate the girls who need to deserve it haha or uplift the girls that truly need to hear from someone like her, so she’s a favorite of mine. And then I’m going to be a bit narcissistic and say myself, I’m just so happy to be putting out new music and I think it’s some of the best work I’ve ever made! So yeah, those are my two haha
Matt Suave’s “Be Good” featuring Vincint’s is now available wherever you listen to music. And stay tuned for more updates on Vincint’s upcoming album!
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“Living and walking in your truth every day is something that is very terrifying for those who have never seen what truth looks like,” says VINCINT.
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