Seven generations, she repeated, letting it sink in.
A few months later, Im on a Zoom call with the singer, a.k.a.
31-year-old Nemah Hasan, the Canadian daughter of Palestinian immigrants.
Natalia Qubti*
Nemahsis hopes her music wont resonate in quite the same way in the future.
It means that weve normalized and humanized Palestinians.
Then Ive done my job.
As she wrote on Instagram, Stick of Gum is a love song.
So rightfully, what more can I care for than where I come from and who I come from?
Nemahsis self-released her debut album,Verbathim, in September 2024.
Nemahsis approach to visual storytelling is just as striking as her music.
This powerful imagery, she has explained, is meant as a commentary on censorship.
Verbathimis just the word verbatim except someone is grabbing my tongue, she wrote on social media.
The holding of my tongue symbolizes the censorship Ive faced trying to speak my truth.
I dont get inspired by reading words.
So, I look at things and feed off the audio in my head.
I wont write for months or even a year, she says.
But when I do, I write a lot 10 days, two weeks.
Its not that I cant write all year, its that I cant afford to.
The struggle is real, but so is the passion behind her work.
I bottle everything up until I can afford to record, she confides.
Lyrics come first, then melody.
I believe the melody is within the lyrics.
