Tyla admits that she’s still getting used to being scrutinized by the public.
The singer opened up about dealing with coverage and opinions related to everything she does in an interview with British radio station, KISS XTRA. “For a while, I just felt like, damn, relax,” she revealed around the 8:50 mark. “Because, I don’t know. It was just getting annoying.”
“I kind of had to get used to people just being interested and embrace it now, but at the time, I was like, ‘Y’all gonna analyze every little thing I do?’” she added. “For a while, I felt weird about it, but then I just realized that you kind of have to do what you want, do it the way you want, and everyone’s going to have their own take on it, their own opinion on it, and that’s okay.”
Tyla’s had to deal with a lot of controversy in her career so far. It started with a TikTok video from 2020, before she became a star with her breakout hit “Water,” in which she shared that she self-identifies as a “Coloured South African” because she “comes from a lot of different cultures.”
During a 2024 Breakfast Club interview when she was asked to explain what she meant by that, Tyla evaded the question and later addressed her identity on X. “Never denied my Blackness, idk where that came from,” she wrote. “I’m mixed with Black/Zulu, Irish, Mauritian/Indian, and Coloured.”
Tyla had another highly scrutinized moment during the 2024 MTV Video Music Awards when she won the trophy for Best Afrobeats Video and opted not to hold up the “Moon Person” statue because it was too heavy for her.
After receiving the trophy from presenters Lil Nas X and Halle Bailey, Tyla remarked, “Oh my gosh. You guys know me and holding awards. I am not strong enough,” causing Lil Nas X to grab the award for her after Bailey opted not to take it.
The moment led social media users cracking jokes about Halle potentially shading Tyla, but the latter hopped on X to shut down the rumors. “Y’all make everything weird…” she wrote. “I was not asking my girl Halle… We just girls, STFU I WON A VMAAAA.”
Bailey cosigned Tyla’s message by resharing it with her own comment. “Exactly,” she wrote with two heart emojis. “Love u babes congrats.”
Tyla previously shared her thoughts about adjusting to fame in an interview with The Los Angeles Times. “It’s been scary, because not only did my life completely change, I’m in a different country and so many things are different culturally that I’m still trying to navigate,” she said. “I’m learning in front of the world. When I make mistakes, it’s going to be a thing that everyone sees, and some people won’t ever forgive. I didn’t expect it to be this hard.”
