Words and photography by Jina Kim

Krewella is a boundless electronic duo comprised of sisters Jahan and Yasmine Yousaf. The talented duo also uses their platform to make a positive difference in the world. In the “sidewalk talk” they speak about their impact on Pakistan and Women’s Health and how it contributed to their ‘most honest body of work.’

Watch the interview:

Jina: You recently went to Pakistan and started a women’s health clinic?

Jahan: We started it at the beginning of the pandemic with other family members and people who we had connected with online. Our team was for the most part we never even met each other, it was just communicating over WhatsApp and Zoom, coordinating every week, figuring out how to hire doctors, gynecologists and we brought the village its first ultrasound machine. So we do prenatal care, postnatal care, general health check ups for anyone from infants to people in their 70s come in. It’s all free. We give free medicine if there’s treatment required.

Jina: What made you want to start this?

Jahan: I think for me it was wanting to be involved with the community in need long term and sharing the resources that we’ve had access to and utilizing our platform which has been amazing seeing the reach that we have to fundraise and network and meet people that are willing to help out and give advice along the way like other people have started charities. And I just feel really lucky that we’ve been able to take care of ourselves and invest in health which it shouldn’t be, like you shouldn’t have to spend hundreds for it.

Jina: How do you think you’ve grown as a person since you first started?

Yasmine: I feel like Jahan and I, specifically as musicians, are probably more genuinely being ourselves in the studio than ever before and not over thinking as much. The other thing is I find myself wanting to come back to certain things I lost since we first started.

Jina: How do you manage to stay relevant in the scene?

Yasmine: Relevancy is so much more than socials, it’s like how you make people feel with your music, how you connect with people, when you are on social media are you using it wisely? Are you connecting with people?

Jahan: We’re talking about the feeling of fulfillment when you go to a show and fans sing your lyrics like to me that’s much more of a long term sustainable happiness rather than like the dopamine hit or the boost you get from knowing that your piece of content went viral.

“Focus on what’s important. Think about your family.”

Jina: What’s a piece of advice you’d give to your younger self?

Yasmine: Listen to your intuition. Don’t ignore the gut feelings, because they’re usually right.

Jahan: This isn’t worth stressing about. Focus on what’s important. Think about your family.

Jina: Where do you want to be in 5 years?

Jahan: I would like to have a better grip on stress or my perception of stress because alot of it is mindset. Definitely the way I see the world and things that feel out of control I’d like to have a better sense of managing my emotions around that.

Tell me about your new album ‘The Body Never Lies’

Yasmine: It is definitely a culmination of not only the pandemics work but also our entire career I feel we pulled so much inspiration from the early Krewella days, from the mid Krewella days, from experiences thats we’ve gone through over the last 10 to 15 years. It was a journey to make because I think we dove into parts of ourselves that may have been dormant or ignored –

Jahan: Or didn’t even know to express them or verbalize them.

Yasmine: Exactly, it was a really really cathartic. Probably the most honest body of work we have or up to this point in time because the next ones going to be even more honest so on and so forth.

Spotify: open.spotify.com/artist

Listen to their new album ‘The Body Never Lies’:
open.spotify.com/album

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