Almost immediately after the installation and subsequent album release, COVID-19 swept the globe and effectively shut down life as we know it. “We put together this insane idea to be in a box where everything is white and made out of canvas, and we go through stages of anxiety for 24 hours and paint the entire room with all of these different mediums that we had,” she details to me. It all started at the top of 2020, following a joint album and art installation aptly named The Anxiety, which Smith produced with friend and longtime creative collaborator Tyler Cole. The song itself sounds like exactly what it is: an extension of the emotions coursing through this deep, soulful human at this crucial juncture. Deliberate in her delivery but not unauthentic or contrived. (And no, it’s not just a prop-she’s been playing the guitar since she was 13.) She comes off assured but not overly rehearsed. The accompanying music video finds our artist draped in the most deliciously alt-inspired looks, from spiked chokers to edgy utility pants complete with dangling suspenders and chains, while strumming away on her custom guitar. Proof of this theory came the very next day when “Transparent Soul”-the first single from Smith’s new album and her first official pop-punk creation featuring iconic Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker-sent the entire internet into a frenzy of questions, comparisons, and, not surprisingly, plenty of critical acclaim. I think I speak for everyone when I say this: If there’s one thing you know about Willow Smith, it’s that she’s an enigma you’ll never be able to put into a box, so a call to beware somehow feels more like an invitation than a threat of danger. But there was an evergreen fittingness to it that garnered thousands of likes, comments, and retweets. The message simply read, “Beware Of Willow.” No context, no clues. Smith’s big brother Jaden said it best in an April 26 tweet, which we now know was the eve of the release of his sister’s debut single and video for her latest musical project.

This time around, however, she’s not asking for permission. Even though she’s been there and done that, as they say, she’s only just getting started on this nuanced journey. So here she is, a nouveau punk, if you will, unleashing a musical prowess that, frankly, she didn’t know she had. “When you really just let go of all your inhibitions and can truly be honest with yourself, beautiful things can happen,” she tells me with a hopeful smile that I could just feel, even through the screen. But she’s forging ahead-boundaries be damned. “A lot of the time, Black people, in general, are shunned from rock spaces or metal spaces,” she says of this invisible boundary that feels all too familiar. And now, Smith is finally ready to embody a version of her musical self that’s always felt kind of off-limits: rock. After that whirlwind experience, the youngest member of the Smith brood took some time away from the musical limelight to reset before delving deep into a creative exploration to the tune of five albums and EPs spanning R&B, neo-soul, alternative, and an eclectic mix of just about every genre in between. “I think being exposed to so much at a young age and having to make really difficult decisions at a young age kind of bestowed me with this feeling of ‘You can't trust anybody,’” she shares.

But the singer has been candid about how tumultuous a time that was for her, despite it looking like every kid’s fantasy. We’re now more than a decade removed from “Whip My Hair,” the ubiquitous platinum single that turned Smith into a bona fide pop star at the tender age of 10. So many negative feelings stem from feeling like you’re the only one who is experiencing these emotions, and that’s just never the case,” she says. No one is exempt from feeling like they’re being drowned by their emotions or feeling like they’re being drowned by their confusion or their sadness or their external circumstances, whatever they may be. “If I can do anything, I want to show that we’re all going through it. That creates more problems in the future and more problems for our children and their children and their children,” she explains of RTT’s impact, especially where conversations surrounding mental health in the Black community are concerned. “We can have these conversations where we can process emotions together, and we don’t have to suppress them or push them under the rug. Smith has made her own foray into the talk-show space, co-hosting Facebook Watch’s Red Table Talk alongside her mother, Jada Pinkett Smith, and grandmother, Adrienne Banfield-Norris (more affectionately known as Gammy), and providing a Gen Z take on topics from love and relationships to race, privilege, and, perhaps the most salient topic for Smith personally, mental health.

Its a vibe willow