This summer everything has been all ‘Barbie this…’ and ‘Oppenheimer that…’, but the true one to watch was Prime’s adaptation of Red, White & Royal Blue. The queer rom-com gave us representation, laughs, love and a flood of tears. If you caught yourself crying at that scene too, just thank Vagabon aka Laetitia Tamko whose beautiful version of ‘If I Loved You‘ provided the perfect soundtrack moment.

Today the singer/songwriter/producer releases new album Sorry I Haven’t Called via Nonesuch. Previous work has, by her own admission, been more ‘introspective’ but this album finds Vagabon in a flirtier state of mind. Opener and first single, ‘Can I Talk My Shit?‘ gives you coy but confident, toying with you and seducing you in equal measure. ‘Carpenter‘ has Vagabon open to…well, everything and ‘Made Out With Your Best Friend‘ is that bitch.

Co-producing Sorry I Haven’t Called with Rostam (Carly-Rae Jepsen), the duo has created this textured journey filled with nods to Jungle, Afrobeat, House, Trop Pop – as wildly playful as her new lyrics and as fun as her image makeover.

Currently touring Europe with Arlo Parks, Vagabon is soon heading back to the US for her own headline tour before returning to Europe to play dates with Weyes Blood. Loverboy catches up with her to talk about this new era, coming for the gays and no longer being a wallflower.

Now Laetitia, first up, there is the small matter of giving us the soundtrack to the key cinematic moment of the summer! Congratulations! We really needed Red, White & Blue.
Absolutely. We need more queer, gay rom coms! It’s such a sweet movie. ‘If I Loved You’ is a beautiful, gut-wrenching song that I really wanted to do justice to, in my own way. So I’m glad the Director, Matthew Lopez, was happy with my version and put it in a pivotal scene.
I think Matthew had been a fan for a long time because the rough copy of the film I was initially sent, already had ‘Fear and Force’ from my debut, over the scene I would be working on. I was like, ‘Oh, that’s cool!’

How has the fan response been for you?
It’s an honour to serve the Red, White & Royal Blue community. One was like, ‘Oh, so you’re the one who has been making me cry! What’s your address? I’m sending you my therapy bill!’ Haha…I’m not currently singing the song on tour but the fans really dictate my world so if they ask hard enough…who knows?!

Tweeting in our request as we speak. Now on to Sorry I Haven’t Called! It’s such a gorgeous journey. ‘You Know How’ and ‘Passing Me By’ are our current highlights…
Those are wonderful favourites. ‘You Know How’ is just so playful and flirty but also complex and it has depth. It’s the first time I have done a French chorus! Everyone should hear that! ‘Passing Me By’ always gives me chills when I sing it live. It’s just my heart on a platter. I love making bodies of work with different highs and lows.

And how did you decide on the singles to stand outside this body of work?!
I think of singles as seduction and the whole album as falling in love. With this album being my first in four years, I really wanted to say something with the singles. We’re entering a lighter, more playful mode now for me and I’m inviting the fans in with ‘Can I talk my shit?’

The album was written in Germany. It’s definitely giving that energy.
What’s funny is that I was actually in a little village in the countryside working on it. But of course I’ve always been a fan of Dance. Songs like ‘Water Me Down’ at the very beginning of my career were suggestive of my love for artists like Moodymann and Aphex Twin. From there I’ve expanded on that. 

Oh, we love Moodymann too! How is it being a female producer in the music industry now? Are women being credited enough?
That’s a great question. You have a poster of one of the icons of music production, Bjork, behind you. I do feel that as a female musician, I would not want that part of my identity to be stripped away from me, just as I equally wouldn’t want singer or songwriter stripped away either. What is helpful for me is to work with people who see me as such, so that I am not written out of my own history.

You worked with Rostam this time but he only came in right at the end.
Yes, I can imagine it’s kind of fun to come in at the end, like, ‘OK, you already went through all that messy, traumatic part, let’s get to the fun stuff!’ Meeting Rostam a year after working on the album, was like breathing new life into it. He is so talented and we really understood each other. 

If you are looking for future collaborators, we reckon you and Loraine James would create something wonderful.
Oooh, I am definitely a fan so that would be amazing. We are mutuals on Instagram, so I should tell her I’m coming to the UK.

We’re out here manifesting this! We need to talk about the visuals for this era too! The album artwork is so major!
It’s a concept from my twisted brain! I really wanted to catch the eye of anyone who sees it and make them wonder, ‘What is this album about? I can’t tell what genre it is or when it came out.’

For your last album, you went through a survey with Pitchfork to see which flower you would be and you were a wallflower! What would the app say this time?
Definitely not a wallflower! Haha…she has shifted once again. I would be a ranunculus, this flower that looks gorgeous fresh or dried so even when I am tired I would look good! It has one thousand and one layers that keep opening and opening…

Talking of appearances, you’re experimenting more with a high-femme aesthetic this time around…
In the past, my work has been introspective so the visuals have been very raw. But this time it has been so fun to enact this different, playful character. It’s provided me with this fun kind of armour to go back out there after a four year break.

Have you noticed a shift in the fan base with this new sound and image? Maybe more of us gay pop boys lining up. Haha…
Hello, I am knocking at that door! When my team asked me, ‘What do you want to accomplish with this record?’ One thing I said was to hear ‘Made Out With Your Best Friend’ in all the gay clubs! That is what I want! Haha…
The fan base is shifting and I think the people who have been with me since album one are open, smart and nuanced, like, ‘Hell, yeah, we love this!’ Then there are new people coming to it like, ‘Oh, I think she is talking to us!’ I am making this call to the people I want to see at the shows dancing and where I want to hear these songs. The people who are here for the fun, the theatre, the drama of this short life we have!

And so are you somewhere on the rainbow spectrum too?
It’s so funny, because I once read this interview with Ice Spice, where she was talking about the kind of guys she liked and then added, ‘Girls too.’ I love that today we are all just like, ‘Yeah, I’m open. Hello!’ I struggle with labels. I understand why people need them. I know how they can contribute to safety. I also think they can sometimes be reductive. It depends who is labelling me and how. I think people who recognise each other, just see each other.

Also being from Cameroon, I need to ask, are you familiar with one Bebe Zahara Benet?
Cameroooooooon?! Haha…I still announce it that way when someone asks me where I am from.

And finally, we are named after the biggest-selling single of 2001 and so always ask, what is your favourite Mariah Carey song?
I love The Emancipation Of Mimi. That’s like cannon for me. As a songwriter she is brilliant because she will use words that you wouldn’t expect. In fact my song ‘Lexicon’ is this joke, only with myself, that lexicon is just such a good word in general, but using it in a song is fun. You don’t think of using songs with the letter x in it. But Mariah will use words like incessantly, undoubtedly, regrettably..words where you think, ‘No way can that work in a song.’ But she finds a way to make it sing well. Endless admiration for her!

Sorry I Haven’t Called is out now.