Nanette is going to keep showing up

Nanette is at a salon in Joburg’s Braamfontein neighbourhood when she and I get on a call to discuss her music and upcoming plans on a Tuesday morning. 

With a new single out, a deluxe edition of her last album due for release and a career milestone performance only a few days away, the 24-year-old R&B singer has a lot going on. 

On this particular morning she’s elected to do a bit of multitasking, giving an interview while getting her hair done, fielding questions on the ins and outs of being a rising star while people chat in the background.

This weekend she’s opening for Grammy Award-winning British sensation Ella Mai at the GrandWest Grand Arena in Cape Town, a moment made all the more significant because it will be her first time performing in an arena. 

“Honestly, it was really shocking,” she says of being invited to join the show’s line-up by the event promoter. 

“It was really exciting when I heard because the line-up had been decided but it was a case of people having genuinely advocated for me to be on more R&B line-ups. And I’m very grateful for that advocacy because it worked.”

Other supporting acts include Sjava, Nasty C, Zee Nxumalo, Scorpion Kings, Uncle Waffles and Oscar Mbo.

Nanette Sphesihle Nobethu Mbili Jolobe has come a long way from Durban where she was born and grew up listening to the R&B legends that would come to influence her later sound like Brandy, Janet Jackson and Destiny’s Child.

“The list is really endless but I spent most of my formative years listening to very soul and gospel/jazz-influenced music,” she says while also mentioning Brenda Fassie, Miriam Makeba and Hugh Masekela among that formative soundtrack. 

The smooth R&B sound she’s become known for now wears its ’90s influences on its sleeve but it also has the perspective and vulnerability to make it stick. 

Her most recent album, Painfully Happy, was partly shaped by the death of her aunt, a loss that threatened to sour what was otherwise a hopeful and exciting period of her life. 

“I wanted to make an album that spoke to how success and joy can coexist with things like grief and pain,” she says. 

“And so the whole time while I was going through what I was going through, it just felt like a lot of painfully happy moments. That name sort of stuck. I was reflecting on life and how things really aren’t linear, how sometimes things can be going great and terrible at the same time.”

Next month she’s releasing the deluxe edition of the album with five new songs to add to the original 12. One of them is Baggage, recently released as a single in anticipation of the deluxe release. 

Over an infectious baseline by Grammy Award-winning producer Andre Harris, Nanette delivers a soundtrack for letting go of what holds us back. With lines like “A hundred motherf*****s woulda told me I’m the best/ A hundred motherf*****s wouldn’t make me so depressed”, she turns anger into irreverent R&B poetry.

But as with any singer-songwriter admired for the vulnerability of their lyrics, there’s the ever-present question of what to keep for herself and what to share with the world, how to maintain a private self while being a public figure.

“Because I leave it all in the music and my music is very candid, I don’t like to share too much of my personal life,” Nanette says. 

“That’s how I try to maintain the balance. Even when, for instance, I go to podcasts and they ask me who I’m dating or who I’m sleeping with, I’m always just like: If you really want to know, you’ll listen to the music, because there’s nothing I don’t talk about in the music. There’s nothing I’m not candid about in the music. 

“Obviously, I don’t want my life to become one big gossip page where I have to tell people the names of people I’m messing with or who I’m beefing with.” 

“I feel like I try to keep that for the music and I hope that the listeners can understand that. That’s just the type of person I am. I don’t want to conflate my personal life with my art because I’m a very shy, private person. I like to be in my home watching anime and just chilling. 

“Most of the honesty and the candidness and the very interpersonal parts of me, I put them in the music and then I can keep a bit of what’s my life to myself.”

Released last year, Painfully Happy was her third album after The Waiting Room (2024)
and Bad Weather (2002). While always sticking close to her R&B foundation, Nanette has experimented with EDM, rap and amapiano featuring artists like Nasty C, Major League DJz, Zwayetoven, Tellaman and Blxckie. 

Then there’s also the two tracks from Kelvin Momo’s album Amukelani — Fool Me and Imfula — she was featured on, which both charted at No 1 on Spotify, YouTube Trending and Apple Music charts.

But the main ambition is to become an international act. Sharing a stage with Ella Mai this Sunday feels like a step in the right direction for the young singer. 

“I genuinely believe I’ve proved myself to be deserving of these stages,” Nanette says. 

“I’m not even trying to toot my own horn but I don’t know how many better performers than myself there are in this country. I leave my whole soul on that stage. And I’ve never received a bad performance review.

“I always walk away with more people wanting to know about my music. And that’s the whole point. I come from a stage background and I think that the stage is such a spiritual place that maybe a lot of people don’t think about and don’t even care to think about. 

“When I step on that stage, I don’t have it in me to disrespect the stage and that means I don’t have it in me to disrespect the audience either. I always tell myself: “Even if I had what I believe is a bad show, it’s 10 times better than what someone calls their best show.”

It’s that level of self-confidence that’s pushed her to where she is today, climbing the charts and working with some of the most talented artists and producers in the music industry, all before she celebrates her 25th birthday. 

As her star rises, Nanette says she wants to be a consistent artist who remains true to herself. What does consistency look like for a rising R&B star in Mzansi’s crazy music scene? 

“Consistency looks like never stopping yourself from learning. If you’re always willing to learn from other people or from other experiences, then there’s always room for more growth because you’ve never told yourself that you’ve reached your plateau or your ceiling. Beyond that, I feel like consistency just looks like showing up, even when you’re not in the mood for it. 

“Showing up even when you don’t want to. It’s a whole lot of showing up. Even when people don’t see that you’re doing what you need to. A lot of the time we want to show up and have people see that but often no one’s going to give you the credit for still showing up on your worst day. But you still have to do it.”

Show up at GrandWest Grand Arena in Cape Town to see Nanette live on April 26.