Sunday, May 29, 2022

Doja Overload

"Just Google 'Chinese Crested,'" Doja Cat says, instructing me to find an image of the dog of her dreams. "They look like they're 90 from age two weeks. They're like old people," she says with endearing wonder. I've been talking to the superstar-in-the-making for a few hours now, with the 26-year-old rapper and singer zooming from her Buenos Aires hotel. Her camera has been off, but that inimitable gravelly Southern California tone of hers has been coming through loud and clear. Massive crowds will be gathering that night for Doja's first stop on her Lollapalooza South American headlining tour—which, when later streamed on Twitch, will show a swell of 100,000-plus fans singing along to her monster hit, "Get Into It (Yuh)," and Doja, in black distressed-denim pants lined with liquid pink spandex, banging out a drum solo intro to her fan-favorite jam "Tia Tamera."

While our conversation has flowed easily between the Grammys, touring, and the success of her 2021 album Planet Her, she's particularly excited to speak about this "really, really ugly dog that's dope." She hopes to make one her own after completing the 18-city After Hours Til Dawn tour with the Weeknd this summer. "Honestly, that is it," she tells me. "I want to finish this tour up, kill it, and see my fans happy. And then I want to start writing again. I'm going to finish this next album, and then I'm going to get the fuck out for a second. I want to disappear for a little bit and just do things like wear slides and go to the farmers market. I don't give a shit about vegetables, but how fun! And I want a dog, too. It's fucked up that I don't have a dog. It's not fair. I want to take care of a dog. I want to raise it and run around in the grass and touch it." (She may get the chance to unwind sooner than she'd hoped: On Friday, Doja announced that she was canceling her summer festival appearances and her tour with the Weeknd due to tonsil surgery and recovery. "I feel horrible about this but can't wait for this to heal and get back to making music and create an experience for y'all," she said.)

Naturally I'm intrigued, and when I type her desired breed into the search engine, I let out a knowing laugh at the image results. Of course. The hairless doggo, often deemed the "world's ugliest," is an odd little fellow—half cat, half potato, with puffy tufts on its paws that Doja likens to "hairy boots." "I think it's beautiful," Doja coos, and I believe her. Such a creature would not only be the perfect foray into dog ownership for the bona fide cat lover (if her stage name didn't tip you off, she owns two cats and wants two or three more), it's also so damn meme-worthy—a canine primed to go viral, as many of the things in Doja's fun, frenetic, bonkers world often do.

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