Tkay Maidza

Tkay Maidza has made a habit of defying expectations. A rare hip-hop artist signed to famous art-pop and alt-rock label 4AD (home to Pixies and The National), she has also moved savvily across diverse subgenres of rap and electronic music. Born Takudzwa Maidza in Harare, Zimbabwe in 1995, Maidza relocated to Australia as a child with her family and wound up in Adelaide to study architecture at uni. While still a teen, she released the local club-rap sensation “Brontosaurus” in 2013 and quickly pivoted to a career in music. The next year’s “U-Huh” went platinum in Australia, and soon she was guesting on Troye Sivan’s first album and tapping Killer Mike for a spot on her own full-length debut, 2016’s Tkay. Rather than rush right into a follow-up, Maidza spent three years exploring her African Australian experience via bold experiments in genre across a trilogy of EPs called Last Year Was Weird. After supporting Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa, and Lizzo on tour, she released the Flume-produced single “Silent Assassin” in 2023 and devoted her second album, Sweet Justice, to cutting ties with toxic figures from her past and enjoying renewed creative freedom as a result.