Rachel Chinouriri’s success has been a slow burn. She prefers it that way

When Rachel Chinouriri played London’s O2 Arena last month, she cried.

The new wave indie songwriter was there as the support act for Sabrina Carpenter, just a week after her first Brit Awards, where she was nominated for artist of the year.

Seven years after her debut single, those milestones felt like a validation.

No wonder she shed a tear.

“A lot of it was stress relief,” says the 26-year-old, “but I also felt strangely at home.

“I was just like, ‘Wow, is this my life’.”

Chinouriri was booked for the tour after Carpenter fell in love with her song All I Ever Asked and started playing it as her walk-on music in the US.

We speak on the 14th date, as she prepares to play Assago, Italy. By this point, she’s having a blast – bounding across the catwalk every night, and dropping to her knees between songs to talk to the audience at eye level.

But she admits the first couple of shows were “slightly rough”.

“I filmed Graham Norton for the first time on Friday, then it was the Brit Awards on Saturday. The tour started in Dublin on Monday, and I had to film a music video on my day off.”

“I was having a lot of first time experiences and trying to figure out what I was comfortable with on the road,” she says.

“I’d say from show five, I was starting to enjoy myself.”

If there were nerves, they didn’t show.

The singer’s infectious energy and knotty pop-rock songs have been picking up new fans in every city. One reviewer called her set “the perfect sweet treat before the main feast”. At the end of March, she surpassed 4 million monthly listeners on Spotify for the first time. Adele sent her a bouquet of roses.

Rachel Chinouriri is officially having a moment – but it hasn’t come quickly.

A former Brit School student, she released her first single, So My Darling, in 2018, and spent the next few years honing her sound.

The 2019 EP Mama’s Boy was a mellow blend of soulful pop, while 2021’s Four° In Winter was full of atmospheric electronic soundscapes.

Underneath it all, though, Chinouriri was an indie kid. Raised in Croydon by strict Zimbabwean parents, she’d only been allowed to listen to Christian music at home. When they went out, the singer and her siblings would blast out hits by Coldplay, MIA, Lily Allen and Daughter.

Once she incorporated those sounds to her music, Chinouriri’s career took off. All I Ever Asked – a chirpy rock anthem that disguises a desperately sad story about being undervalued – won her support slots with Lewis Capaldi and Louis Tomlinson.

Florence Pugh declared herself a fan, and ended up starring in the video for Never Need Me, a killer kiss-off to a boyfriend who left her dangling.

For a musician who’d suffered crippling anxiety as a teenager (“I was pulling my hair out, and having panic attacks”) the success was entirely unexpected.

“British culture is quite self-deprecating,” she says, “so when I was younger, I just didn’t believe I could do these things.

“Even the fact I can say I’m a two-time Brit nominee is still quite surreal. Then I’m like, Why is it surreal?

“I do deserve it because I’ve been making music since I was 16, and I haven’t stopped’.”

Chinouriri’s debut album, the noughties-flavoured What A Devastating Turn Of Events, was finally released last May.

Initially charting at number 17, it has continued to sell steadily, thanks to the continued popularity of All I Ever Asked on TiKTok, as well as Chinouriri’s scene-stealing festival performances.

Reflecting on her rise, she says there is a “privilege to having a slow-paced career”.

“I’ve seen what happens when you skyrocket or go viral. If I’d a massive hit song when I was 21, I wouldn’t have been ready in any way, shape or form – mentally or professionally. I’d be panicking.

“So now that things are skyrocketing, I just need to remember that what I’m good at is writing how I feel and turning those feelings into music.

“And even though there’s more opinions about what I’m doing now, I need to trust my gut.”

What A Devastating Turn Of Events was a huge emotional purge. Among the topics she discussed: Racism, school bullying, self-harm, alcoholism, alienation and toxic relationships.

A recurring theme was men who take more from a relationship than they put back in.

“I’m quite a caregiver by nature, and that attracts boys who need a lot of help, or are very insecure,” the singer reflects.

“I tend to be the person’s ‘mother’, which isn’t fun, because I have to be the strong one and there’s no room for my emotions.”

But the days of heartbreak are over. Last year, the singer unexpectedly found herself in a new kind of relationship, one where her needs are as important as her partner’s.

It’s written all over her new EP, Little House. “Kissing me under the indigo / I begged for the morning sun not to rise / Oh, what a beautiful starry night,” she sings, totally besotted, on the ballad Indigo.

The lead single, Can We Talk About Isaac, even uses her new partner’s real name. His photo is on the artwork.

“It’s quite a brave move,” she laughs, “but I’m a hopeless romantic, and I don’t want to lose being able to document my life in song.

“It’s a risk that whoever wants to date me was going to have to take!”

The title track documents their chance meeting at a pub: “With two pints in his hands, he came over and said, ‘Nice to meet you’.”

“He’s very sweet, he’s got a very simple friendship group, he likes going to the pub – but he does so much for me. It’s the first experience I’ve ever had of being taken care of.

“He’s changed my life, no matter what happens between us. We’re both just really in love with each other and having a having a blast.”

At the moment, though, the couple have been forced apart. The Sabrina Carpenter tour lasts five weeks, after which Chinouriri sets off for her first headline tour of North America.

It comes six months after the singer had to pull out of a US support slot with alt-pop star Remi Wolf.

She says the dates would have left her penniless, even with financial support from her record label.

“As much as I would have loved that tour, I wouldn’t have been able to pay my rent, which was very, very scary,” she says.

“My fans were like, ‘Let’s help out. Let’s do a GoFundMe for 10 grand’, but it was far beyond 10 grand.

“It was like, who’s going to pay for visas, where’s your band going to sleep, what are people going to eat?

“It was a big wake up call. It made me reassess; do I need to be styled all the time? Do I need to travel this way all the time?

“So now, I’m able to go back now in full force and upgrade my venues and sell out almost the entire tour, which is mental.”

The cancellation taught her to slow down instead of grabbing every opportunity she’s offered.

It’s a sign that Chinouriri is finally shedding the self-doubt that clouded her early career.

The success of the Sabrina Carpenter tour is a prime example.

“There’s always a risk as an opener, that people might be completely uninterested, but this has been the complete opposite,” she says.

“Having the entire arena sing songs with you is such a blessed feeling to have.”

It won’t be long before she’s selling out those arenas on her own.