Parisalexa Talks Cars, Switching Lanes and New EP, ‘Finishline’

Los Angeles-via-Seattle-based songwriter and performer Parisalexa is one of the hardest working musicians in the business. She’s one of those people who has two albums in the can whenever she releases her next project. She dips and dives between genres and she’s seemingly always about to go into or come out of a recording studio (her social media is always full of words of wisdom, too). But this work ethic doesn’t just suddenly come to somebody; at least, that’s not how it happened for Paris.

It’s something that began early and was fostered from a young age by her parents. It’s something Paris invests in daily and has ever since summer music camps and after-school theater rehearsals. Now, for the diligent 23-year-old, the work is paying off in spades; she’s making a name for herself on the west coast and beyond. So, it’s no wonder that the fast-moving artist’s latest EP Finishline, which is set for release Friday November 12, is, well, racecar-themed.

“I was exploring independence on this project for sure,” Paris tells American Songwriter. “I was moving from state to state by myself. I spent a lot of time in my car, and the theme came up.”

Paris, often on the move, says she wrote songs as she commuted on her regular three-hour drives. The brain can get a little wonky on those long hours with nothing but highways and bumpers ahead. So to keep her sanity, Paris leaned in and focused on her specialty: lyric writing. Paris began to picture herself like a racecar driver and the songs born from those automobile singing sessions became the foundation of her newest six-song EP—songs like the twisting and turning “Vroom,” the manic-lovely “Overdrive” and the banger “Finishline.” But as a songwriter, Paris traverses her own fine line. The music she produces is both lively and contemporary. But it also carries with it a mature message.

“That is how I’m hoping I come across to other people,” Paris says. “Something that sounds fun to listen to—that doesn’t sound like a lecture. But at the same time, it can make people think about different elements of their daily life.”

First and foremost, Paris considers herself a songwriter at heart. She’s a frontperson, producer, former-and-perhaps-future actor, but at the core, she’s a composer of songs, and especially lyrics. She’s a communicator of ideas; her mediums are melody and clarity.

“We have people’s attention,” she says of herself and her peers. “I don’t take that lightly.”

Though she was born in New Jersey, Paris’ family moved to the Seattle area when she was 8 years old. She says her mother tells her that she was humming before she could talk. Her parents, though not musicians themselves, would fly around the country to various music festivals, and a creative spirit was fostered in Paris’ childhood home. She started to play the piano when she was 3 and her folks noticed both an aptitude and a passion. They fostered it and put Paris in progressive summer theater and music camps in schools like Cornish and Berklee. Paris loved to perform but she loved the musical aspects most of all.

“Eventually,” she says, “I’ll come back to acting. But right now my focus is on music and making my own music.”

To date, Paris has worked with famed artists like Ciara and Normani and she was one of the featured songwriters on NBC’s popular reality show Songland. Many who’ve followed her know her as an R&B singer, but more recently, Paris finds herself adapting her sound or genre to whatever she’s trying to express in a given song.

“I’ve been exploring a lot of alternative music,” Paris says. “I am really excited about being able to bend within the genres and cater to what I’m talking about. If the song lyrics are lending themselves to something that sounds a little bit more abrasive, I’m excited about having the opportunity to communicate in that way, sonically. That’s where I’m at right now.”

Paris acknowledges another freedom she experiences these days that others before her may not have; one in which she has the latitude and liberty to participate in different styles of music and express a multitude of ideas, should she wish. In decades prior, her racecar may have only been limited to one lane, so to speak, if even allowed to hit the pavement. Today, though, Paris is working on jingles, voice-overs, collaborating with new artists, and just generally experimenting with her talents. She welcomes it all as she continues to travail in the “universal language” that is music.

“Historically,” Paris says, “we haven’t always had the ability to be in multiple different genres. It’s a really cool opportunity in 2021 that I, as a young Black girl, have the ability to create whatever I want.”