Emma G

Busking, hiking, gigging and couch-surfing: Emma Ghaemmaghamy is taking a fun-filled and spontaneous route through the United States to fame and fortune.

It was the advent of the 2014 general election that prompted the 27-year-old lead singer of the hard-rocking New Zealand band Static Era - and former Hamiltonian - to take her career on a sudden north-east excursion across the Pacific Ocean to North America.

"My former Static Era guitarist Chris Yong was running for Parliament with the Internet Party," she explains.

"When things fell through, I decided it was time for me to move on, feed my growing travel bug, get to know my family here in the States and pursue my music career over here.

The daring leap into the unknown has yielded multiple rewards, both personal and professional - the latter under auspices of her performance name Emma G.

Currently based in Washington DC, Ghaemmaghamy is working full time as a street performer, and playing music around clubs, bars and community events.

"I played the National Cherry Blossom Festival earlier in spring, the Music on the Mall as part of the Folklife Festival about a month ago, and have been featured on a couple of news channels here. It's all pretty surreal."

She also recently opened for Terry McDermott of The Voice and has an upcoming August 31 show at the prestigious John F Kennedy Centre for the Performing Arts.

"I'm writing a lot. I've released a solo acoustic EP already since I got here, and am recording my next one with a full band this weekend.

Ghaemmaghamy was a New Zealander of the Year Local Hero award recipient, honoured in 2012 for inspiring others through her music.

"I'm always writing, though my subject matter has evolved ... I try not to write much about love or relationships these days. I broke up with my boyfriend three weeks ago, and I'm totally undecided about whether to write a song about it."

So what does inspire her writing?

"Life," she replies, simply. "My interactions with people here are insane. I love it. I've written two songs recently about my experiences busking - Smile and I Can See You - and they're both pretty much about connecting with people.

"Americans especially seem to be really caught up in life and technology and social media. There's very little person-to-person connection. Which is when I come in with my smiles, and singing and 'hellos'. It knocks them for a six sometimes ... but I love it. And the number of thank you emails, handwritten letters, and Facebook messages I get from people leads me to believe I'm doing an OK job.

"One morning I was busking at one of my favourite spots, a metro station called Foggy Bottom, and Channel 9 news was there and I ended up being featured singing and having an interview on their channel and one other. It was surreal."

Her next step is recording and releasing an album and a music video of her track Wary ... "and have fun. Life is for living after all."

While not a household name, Ghaemmaghamy had a reasonably high profile back in New Zealand. She was a New Zealander of the Year Local Hero award recipient, honoured in 2012 for inspiring others through her music.

Despite living with a health condition, hydrocephalus, that had forced her to undergo 23 surgeries, including 10 brain surgeries, the former Fairfield College student established a successful singing career at a young age and placed in the top 10 in the inaugural Play It Strange songwriting competition in 2004.

"One thing about my condition is that it has taught me to take on and overcome adversity," she said in a 2013 interview with the Waikato Times. "It's given me an angle on life that you only live once and you need to make the most of the time you have got."

Although she admits forward planning is not her strongest attribute, Ghaemmaghamy applied for a job in Massachusetts before I making the leap States-ward.

"I landed in LA, stayed with family for two weeks, which was awesome. My mother's father was Iranian, so I got to learn more about that side of my heritage. I also did a bit of sight-seeing, street performance in Venice Beach, and catching up with old friends who live out in Hollywood and work in the music and film industries.

"However, I didn't feel much of a pull to live in LA. It's very plastic fantastic."

"[Then] I landed a second job in Connecticut at an outdoor science education camp called Nature's Classroom for another three month contract.

"It was between those two jobs, however, that I road-tripped to Indiana, and - long story short - broke down in New York state which somehow landed me in Washington DC. I fell in love with the city, and visited two more times while I was working in Connecticut before deciding to move here.

It's great, because the spirit of the city is incredible. The people are super nice, and really supportive of what I do."

She headed to Massachusetts to work at a summer camp for three months - "Literally just working at this camp in the Berkshires, taking kids hiking. It was an awesome experience being able to get lost in the forest here, and learn so much about the wildlife.

"I saw so many amazing creatures up close: I held snakes, stalked deer, giggled at raccoons and groundhogs, and even came face to face with a baby bear one morning when I got up early for a run."

She has also travelled through Pennsylvania, Colorado, Iowa, Indiana, Virginia, New Jersey, Chicago and New York, where she attended a taping of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert when Bernie Sanders was one of his guests.

"I'm enjoying learning about the different cultures here ... The most difficult thing is remembering to say 'bathroom' instead of 'loo', 'ground beef' instead of 'mince' and 'cooler' as opposed to 'chilly bin'. I say a lot of things that Americans just have no idea what I'm talking about.

"I've had some interesting people hang out with me while I've been busking, but they've been harmless enough. I saw my first gun while I was couch-surfing in New Jersey. They had an entire gun cabinet, and proudly showed them off to me and let me hold them. It wasn't so much scary - just strange."

Ghaemmaghamy said a return to New Zealand was on neither her short nor long-term agenda, although she is not ruling it out.

"I may decide to move home if I have kids, but I don't like to make plans like that.

"Life is an adventure. The best adventures have unknown outcomes." - Stuff.co.nz

Emma Ghaemmaghamy (pronounced gah (as in car) ma (as in mag) gah (as in car) me (as in me)) is currently based in Washington DC, where she works full time as a street performer and plays in various clubs, bars and community events throughout the city - and often
far beyond.

Prior to heading to the States in late 2014, Ghaemmaghamy, 28, established a profile back in New Zealand as vocalist for the hard rock band Static Era. She was also a New Zealander of the Year Local Hero award recipient, honoured in 2012 for inspiring others through her music.

She has fast become an established and much-loved personality on DC's busking circuit, where she is known as the Kiwi girl who plays great songs and gives great hugs.

"It's great, because the spirit of the city is incredible," she said in a 2016 interview. "The people are super nice, and really supportive of what I do."

Ghaemmaghamy's All Roads Lead to Home tour begins with a show at Hamilton's Nivara Lounge on September 7. There is also a September 15 gig at The Yot Club in Raglan, and numerous other dates in Mount Maunganui, Taupo, Wellington, Queenstown and Oamaru, among other centres.

Fans of her hard rocking days will also be keenly awaiting a September 9 reunion with her Static Era bandmates, at the Ding Dong Lounge in central Auckland.

Tickets for those shows can be found on undertheradar.co.nz and more information can be found on her Facebook page. - Stuff

Emma's coming home but not as we knew her.

The former lead singer with Auckland rockers Static Era, Emma Ghaemmaghamy has transformed herself into a soulful pop diva with her latest single King For A Day since moving to the United States in 2015 in search of new challenges.

Her New Zealand tour, All Roads Lead To Home (not Rome) will also be a challenge within itself with 17 dates in 23 days for the once self-professed gym junkie.

"I'm actually freaking out so much about not having enough time to stay fit and focused on this tour," she says. "I think it's going to be a balance between driving, playing and stalking as many Krav Maga and Crossfit gyms as possible when I get home. While I'm not quite as fit as I used to be (I was spending between 2-4 hours at the gym a day, back when I lived in Auckland), I'm still super active and train (mostly Krav Maga and a bit of weights) 3-5 times a week. I'm definitely going to need it when I get back to Aotearoa – especially with all the driving."

Not only will the tour be a chance to catch up with family and fans but for Aucklanders-only there's a reunion gig with Static Era.

"I'm so excited to be doing a show with my boys at Ding Dong Lounge on September 9," she says. "The main tour kicks off September 17th, so I'll still be pretty energetic at this one, ha ha. But seriously, it's gonna be epic. Dave (Rhodes, drummer and audio engineer) has been focusing mostly on his work at Depot Sound and recording in Devonport, and Chris (Yong) and Victor (Pesch) have been tearing it up with their new project Metaract (other band members are Sharne Scarborough and Clayton Gould). They've been kicking ass."

When she moved to the US, Ghaemmaghamy caught up with family and took seasonal job opportunities while busking on the streets in whatever town or city she found herself in.

"My mum is from Pennsylvania, originally. So yes, I have family in Iowa (my Norwegian side – my mother's mum), and LA (my mum's Iranian dad's side). I've caught up with most everyone since I've been here, which has been an awesome journey of self discovery, as I slowly put the pieces together about who I am. After all, the Maori saying goes 'you don't know where you're going unless you know where you've been, and you don't know who you are, unless you know where you're from'. That was actually one of the main catalysts for me moving here in the first place, that and music.

"As far as 'making money', I worked for six months on the East Coast (Massachusetts and Connecticut) as a youth worker/teacher but, since moving to DC, I've invested all my time, energy and soul into music. It's been awesome.

"Music has always been about growth and development for me but I've always had a bit of tug and war between rock and pop. King for a Day is definitely one of my poppier songs, but a lot of my stuff these days is a little more Pink meets Adele meets Tracy Chapman, which I like. It's got a hint of aggression and sassiness but with a funky edge. It's been a pretty crazy journey in a lot of ways. I'm digging up songs I wrote years ago that just were Static Era-ble but now – living in DC – I've also been featuring on a whole bunch of funk, hip-hop and rap songs, which is hilarious, since I've never really been about that life.

"I do have one rule and that's that I won't partake in any songs that are derogatory towards women, race or sexual preferences, and that contain the N word. And it's working so far! Public Enemy are working on a remix of one of my rockier solo songs Superhero.

And despite now living under the Donald Trump administration, Ghaemmaghamy has nothing but warm fuzzies about her new country of choice.

"You know what? Almost every single person I've run into since November 8 (which happened to be my birthday – ugh!) has been the loveliest human. I feel like we're in the beginning stages of the next political uprising – where young people (and older!) are starting to stand up and really fight for their beliefs and ideas and what is right and wrong.

"It's been pretty intense, so far! Especially as a lot of my music is surprisingly political like Superhero [which is about using love as a superpower to win out over hate, bigotry, racism and sexism], or Sold (Take A Shot), which is my anthem to women in particular with the messaging of 'my body my choice' I wrote it in response to an A&R rep for a big record label here who told me he'd sign me if I sent him nude pictures – sigh." - Sunday News

Originally from New Zealand, Emma G., as she calls herself, always has her business cards on hand—marketing savvy that has led to performances at the Kennedy Center’s Millennium Stage and a congressman’s party. Emma G.—whose grandmother was an opera singer—has performed pop and soul hits, plus songs she has written, around the world, but DC stands out: “I get hugs daily.” - Washingtonian