Nashville, TN · indie rock · singer-songwriter

Samia

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Devastatingly specific lyrics — the kind that name a brand or a street — sung with unnerving composure, and screamed back by devoted crowds.

Samia is the recording name of Samia Najimy Finnerty, born in Los Angeles on December 12, 1996, to actors Kathy Najimy and Dan Finnerty, and named after her Lebanese grandmother, Samia Najimy. She moved to New York City at fifteen, attended York Preparatory School, and studied at the New School, where she formed a short-lived band, before later basing herself in Nashville.

She released a run of self-issued singles from 2017 onward, including "Someone Tell The Boys", which gained traction after appearing on Spotify's Discover Weekly playlist, followed by tracks such as "Milk" and "Django" and the 2019 EP Lasting Friend/Paris. Around the same period she was a co-recipient of the 2017 Obie Award for Best Ensemble for her role in the play The Wolves.

Her debut album, The Baby, arrived in 2020. Its opening track, "Pool", begins with the last voicemail her grandmother left before she died, singing a Lebanese lullaby, and Finnerty described the album's concept simply as "I am the baby." A companion release the following year, The Baby Reimagined, gathered covers and remixes of the record by other songwriters, and she also appeared briefly in the film Let Them All Talk.

Her songs sit between indie rock and folk-leaning pop, built on plain-spoken detail and close vocal delivery, with arrangements that shift from quiet, guitar-led passages to full-band swells. Samia writes largely about friendship, jealousy and self-doubt, and her records have been noted for their unusually direct, diaristic language.

In 2021 she released the EP Scout, and the following year she formed the side project Peach Fuzz with three other songwriters. Her second album, Honey, followed in 2023 after singles including "Kill Her Freak Out" and "Mad At Me"; she has described the record's mood as built on the idea that optimism is the saddest thing in the world.

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indie rocksinger-songwriter