“Someone asked me the other day, ‘How do you just put yourself out there? Aren't you scared? Aren't you shy? If people are gonna judge me, how do I start making music?’ And like, I don't know. I feel both extremes, l…don't fucking care at all. And then, on the other hand, it also means everything to me.”

Lexa Gates, 24 year-old rapper-singer-model-producer, is coming off a breakthrough couple of years. The Queens-born artist, who released the album Elite Vessel in 2024, finished up her first US headlining tour this fall. Gates, who will soon release her second label-released studio album, I Am, has become beloved for her lucid ability to synthesize feelings of insecurity, imposter syndrome, writer's block, and social anxiety with an immense technical ability and a sense of humor to boot.

Incidentally, at the time of our conversation, she’s coming off said headlining tour, where she spent months trekking across the US in a bus with 7 other people. “I've been walking on the side of the highway because there are no sidewalks in America,” she admits slyly. “There was one show where the bus left and we had to just stay in a hotel and take a flight. It was kind of heartbreaking to leave the bus. It's like my home.”

This sort of travel is becoming the norm for Gates, who is in pole position for a mainstream moment following 8 years and 5 albums worth of preparation. 2024’s Elite Vessel marked a momentous chapter in her career, but not necessarily a new one. Gates has been working since 2018, when she first started releasing music on SoundCloud as a teenager. As she’s brought her impressively sizable discography on tour, she’s had ample time to reflect. “It's very disorienting and strange. It kind of feels spiritual. I feel like being an artist is not all the perfection that you see in an image or video when I'm all made up and in a nice outfit. It’s really being in the back of a bus and not being able to breathe and looking out the window and there's nothing. Just miles and miles. That's a good foundation for art.”

This January, Gates is gearing up to release her next project. Titled I Am, the album has no features—a slight surprise considering she has earned co-signs across the board from current stars and legends. It’s 18 tracks. No features. I tell her that seems like a declaration of intent. 

“It’s definitely saying something,” she offers. “I worked with some legends, people I really respect. And Billy [Lemos].” We both laugh. “It’s just Billy Lemos, Black Noi$e, Jasper Harris, Emile Haney, and Leon Michaels.” These are the producers alongside Gates on Elite Vessel, a mix of indie-leaning and billboard-bound musicians who have provided the musical palette. I can’t help but think that in the past, this would’ve been the turning point where the artist would cash in on their goodwill and shoot for a big pop feature, catapulting themselves on to the charts. Times have changed. Gates seems to be betting on herself, her taste, and her artistic maturity, a bet that has worked thus far. And anyways, why use pop-crossovers to grow in stature when you can do that on your own? 

Given that she has had one half of the equation down for years (great music, relatable lyrics, humorous and authentic delivery), Gates has pursued and quickly gained a sizable online audience. Admirably, she didn’t attempt to promote her music through gimmicks like some artists are tempted to do. Gates’ personality, sense of style, and manner in which she carries herself are all reflected on her social media presence. 

You’ve probably seen her videos. Her awkward, endearing dance has become a recurring quirk of many in these clips. She is the main character in her artistic universe, like the music videos she stars in that caught rap fans eyes early on in her career. It all works and resonates because she is a genuinely funny person. People are just naturally drawn to an affable, self-deprecating talent that carries themselves like a pop-star. They’re drawn to her candidness, her ability to blend humor and darkness, her willingness to ask the hard questions.

“I’ve always made music to have a purpose, to give my life meaning, to wake up and have something to look forward to. I’ve really loved all the art that I’ve made up to this point. And it's really gratifying to hear people tell me ‘Oh, you helped me through this, or I went through this, and I used to listen to you every day.’ They’ve got my name or lyrics tattooed on them. It's crazy that it [the music] does the same thing for me and them.”

How does she reach these fans? One source is social media, and Gates admittedly contributes to her social media virality partly in response to keen direction by her label. Nonetheless, she’s also quick to take credit for the core of the success: the creativity. Last year, clips of Gates sitting on a couch with headphones in a glass box in Brooklyn proved a striking image to online music fans. This January, in the hours preceding the release of I Am, Gates will walk in a giant wheel at Jeffrey Deitch in New York. The performance pieces were her idea. A young artist engaging in performance art intentionally—especially when it aligns with a general creative vision and aesthetic framework—signals someone fully formed. Marketing aside, it all funnels back into the music.

Her discography is dominated by feature-less songs, a rarity in today’s streaming world that rewards collaborations. “I believe that sometimes the first take is the best take. I practice before I start recording, with the music on a loop, and I'll just sing the same stuff until words come naturally. By the time I’m actually recording, I’ve already sung it like, 50 times.” As an artist capable of both executing swooning hooks and flowing on her verses, she cuts out the archaic requirements hip-hop and R&B crossovers have often demanded. Gates does it all herself. That’s not to say this is an entirely unique skill; artists like Lauryn Hill, Queen Latifah, Missy Elliott, and more have defined the archetype of becoming an ambidextrous player in Hip-Hop and R&B. It will always be a sought after talent, especially in the pursuit of pop success. When it comes to her new project, she says, “It’s definitely more sing-y. More hook-y. But it still has the essence of what I am, which is a girl from New York.”

She shares the coveted rapper-singer-songwriter trait with many older artists, but the style of her beats make her a rarity amongst Gen Z rappers, even if she is heading towards a more palatable direction. She’s also not thinking of any examples from the past. “We’re just trying to have fun and make art. I know what I want, and I know what I want to sound like. Why would they ever bring anyone else up?” Point taken. I mean, her musical venn diagram is basically one of one. Gates’ projects are more of a reflection of a segment of the NYC hip-hop scene that isn’t defined by drill music, trap 808s, or digicore. She’s been in conversation with the drumless beats and soul sample crowd. She would sound at home over an Alchemist or 9th Wonder beat. Ultimately, though, it’s her blunt songwriting that has resonated with a younger crowd. 

Gates’ explanation for her songwriting process—like her explanations for most everything else in her life—is simple. She journals, noting feelings and experiences, and translates them to song. “I have a creepy little book, and I fill up the pages all the way sometimes. When I show people, they're like, ‘What the f–k, you need a friend, gang. This is triggering my trypophobia.’”

This is an indispensable part of her process. “It’s just a stream of consciousness. Whatever happened an hour before I got in the studio, or whatever was going on that second.” Her journal is also just a documentation of her life's events. "It feels like I'm time traveling or something when reading it, because it all just passes so fast that I'm just in these different locations.” The act of lyric writing, from pen to paper, allows her to switch her Queens-inflected flows based on the subject, deciding how humorous she wants to be, how coy, how vindictive. Take these lines on “I Just Can’t Be Alone”: “We could do some' sometime / Just not now, I'm busy now / Don't call my phone bugging out / Feeling stuck, please let me out / Wait, please, don't let me go / Hate, lust, love, I don't know / Can't deal with this shit though”.

Sober and straight edge, Gates quit everything at 21. It pays to lock in. She’s on a rare trajectory of potentially being both respected by devoted fans of hip-hop and becoming a known artist in critical and pop circles. She’s also demonstrably become a draw live, and it seems to be invigorating her. She isn’t intimidated by any crowd. “If they're there, then I know they like me,” she says. The live shows are yet another piece of the calculated, tasteful world-building at which Gates and her team have become known to excel.. No detail is spared: glamorous hair, lots of flowers, stage decorations. 

Despite the talent, the social reach, the aesthetic, and the world building, one can’t help but think that her ambition contradicts her introverted tendencies. Could being perceived this much be pleasant, or worth it? Then again, artists that audiences find authentic are often a combination of all of these things. That’s what makes them become universal. There’s a sort of alchemy in the process of leveling up pop-ambition, crossing the threshold into true fame, that is hard to understand. Is it a learned skill, or is it inseparable from the personality it’s reflecting? I don’t think Gates really cares about that dichotomy. She’s just doing what comes naturally, and coming of age in the process. “I've been taking this driving class, around my house, but they're definitely scamming me, because every time I go back, they're like, one more class. I'm like, bruh, I already took like 15 classes.” 

Lexa Gates knows exactly what she’s doing, and where she’s headed. As we finish our conversation, I ask her if she believes in manifestation. She pauses for a beat and thinks, before saying, “Reality is neutral, and you can impose whatever you want.”