Terfèle Sur Quatre Feuilles

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While she appeals to the frustrations that some listeners may share about men, Nakamura also has a softer side. Last month, she released a song called La Dot, about falling for a guy, getting a dowry and wanting “the dream life”. This might seem at odds with some people’s vision of female empowerment, but as a young French Malian woman, Nakamura has her own vision of fairytale romance that speaks to a generation of young women from north and west African backgrounds in France. It takes strong sense of autonomy and self-respect and mixes it with traditional values passed on from older generations.

Born Aya Danioko in Mali – Nakamura was adopted as a stage name, inspired by a character from superhero drama Heroes – she came to live in Aulnay-sous-Bois in the suburbs of Paris with her family when she was a baby. Her mother was a griotte, a traditional Malian poet or singer. “If you come from a line of griots you’re automatically categorised by that,” she says. “They tell people’s stories in the villages, and basically performed the role of the media for previous generations.”

This played a big part in Nakamura’s life growing up in France. “On Sundays, the family would come together to eat a big lunch, or if there was a wedding my mum would sing there. They were ‘real’ [traditional] weddings too – that is to say, the groom’s family would have go and pay the family of the bride the dowry in order to marry her.”

In her house, uncles and aunts played a big role in teaching the younger ones about Malian culture. Did these women influence the no-nonsense attitude in her music? “No, that was me,” she says. “I’ve always had quite a strong character, ever since I was little.” She is interrupted by her two-year-old daughter. “It’s like having two jobs,” she says of her life as a parent and a rising star. “I work with my family; it’s very complicated but it’s OK.”

Nakamura pushes back on the suggestion that she is continuing the griot tradition, clarifying that what she does is a little different. Her song about Grammy-award winning Malian singer Oumou Sangaré pays homage to a woman who she grew up admiring, and Sangaré features in the video for the track. “She’s a singer, a businesswoman and she really represents Malian women,” she says passionately. “I really went into fan mode when I met her – she was so beautiful and she really got what I was doing.”

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