Not many words are needed to describe Issam Alnajjar. Young and undeniably talented, the 21-year-old singer from Amman is also known for his vulnerability; one that is just about mature enough to translate his life experiences into music that speaks to listeners his age and even older. Once considered a TikTok sensation— more notoriously after the release of his breakout single Hadal Ahbek in 2021— the spotlight that’s been put on the Jordanian-Palestinian singer-songwriter has been blinding. But despite all the exposure, the rising star appears to still have his feet on earth, making music to express what words often can’t.
“I make music for myself and for the people who enjoy it. It’s my therapy— it’s the place I always go to,” AlNajjar told MILLE. “I used to listen to music all the time when I was alone. That’s really when the love for music kicked in for me. I have been living by myself in Jordan since I was 14, without my family, and music really helped me get through a lot of the struggles I felt,” he added.
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Reminding us that behind the fame is still a young man figuring out adulthood, AlNajjar has always leaned on his music to make sense of it all. Thrust into the spotlight at an age when most of his peers were still piecing together who they want to be, the artist admits part of his adolescence were fast-tracked. “I lived an adult life from young. I had to learn a lot of things when I was young. I had to not live my age for such a long time. And although I’m 21 now, I feel like I’m much older,” he confessed.
That early maturity, and the emotional weight that came with it, finds its way into much of his music. Often circling the recurring themes of love and loneliness in his music, AlNajjar is, in many ways, a product of his environment shaped by the defining moments of his personal life. He acknowledges that loneliness had become more present, drawn out by past experiences that continue to leave their mark.
“Everyone’s out there looking for love, but sometimes that’s not the only emotion people go through. I’ve been living in L.A. for almost three years now, and honestly, it’s been a struggle trying to find love, feeling lonely, trying to make friends and really adapt,” he admitted. “I was feeling really homesick. All of these emotions were piling up, and I felt like I had to talk about them—to get them out of my system. Because when I write music, that’s how I cope. That’s how I process everything,” he continued.
Opening up to so many people at once —and knowing that what you say will live on forever—can be daunting. It’s like that awkward feeling of oversharing with someone you’ve just met, but amplified to 918,029 monthly listeners on Spotify. It might make anyone think twice about opening up. And though he’s still young, AlNajjar has been in the limelight long enough that we had to ask: does he ever regret revealing so much of himself in his music?
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His answer was simple—he doesn’t. In fact, he says that being behind the mic is where he feels most at ease. “I definitely don’t regret being vulnerable in my music. I don’t shy away from showing my real emotions. Sometimes I regret sharing that kind of stuff with people in my personal life, but when it comes to music, I love it when a song comes out and you can tell the artist really went through something. You just know it’s real. That makes me love the song even more. It’s the story behind it, and it’s what makes it relatable.
“I don’t know if relatability is always the goal, but it’s a big part of music—being able to not just feel something yourself, but also to make other people feel it too.”
The desire to make other people feel comes through in his last release, Ya Leil, which came out a little less than a year ago. The single pulls at the heartstrings with its themes of longing, heartache, and sleepless nights spent wrestling with memories. While relatability is important to him, he is also well aware of the power music holds when it comes to amplifying greater causes. One of those is Palestine—his homeland—which is currently enduring an unprecedented campaign of violence at the hands of occupying forces.
“As an artist, your voice and your music are all you have. I don’t usually like to get too political, because sometimes I feel like I don’t know everything. But ultimately, it’s about being on the right side of history—especially when it has to do with a part of myself,” he explained.
As part of the cohort of artists who came together for Rajeen—a song about the Palestinian struggle, exile, and displacement—he shares that while music is his personal outlet, it should also, as much as possible, serve as a platform to uplift the voices of those who are silenced. “Rajeen was crazy—seeing people’s reactions when they heard it for the first time… it was powerful. We were telling the truth, sharing the suffering of people who aren’t being heard, who are living through displacement. That’s what they feel. We didn’t sugarcoat anything. We said things as they are and then we let the art speak for who we are as people. I’ll always show that part of me—me being Palestinian. I’ll always represent that,” he concluded.
