Known simply by her artist mononym Dylan, 24-year-old Natasha Woods’ debut mixtape, The Greatest Thing I’ll Never Learn, peaked at no. 19 on the UK charts and marked Dylan’s last release as an independent artist.

Having been snapped up by Islands Records, Dylan subsequently toured with Ed Sheeran and collaborated with Bastille.

Dylan has somewhat of a conflicted creative life – self-described as a “wannabe rock star in a pop star’s body”, she has resisted her pop star potential in the past. But with her latest track, ‘Alibi’, Dylan has unabashedly embraced the genre. “It’s slightly different from my normal stuff,” she says.

“But I wanted to release something a bit more vulnerable. It’s the first proper love song I’ve ever released, so I’m really glad that people liked it.”

And she doesn’t just mean any old people, with the track getting the thumbs-up from amongst others Louis Tomlison, who shared it on Instagram.  “Oh, that’s mega,” she grins.

I ask if she was a “Directioner” growing up, to which she replies “Who wasn’t?” Although she does concede, “I was a bit late to the party, because I was one of those kids that was brought up on rock and roll. I was a stubborn 13-year-old, which meant I didn’t really listen to anything other than like AC/DC and Guns N’ Roses.

“I was also late to Taylor Swift as well, and as soon as I discovered her, that was it. Pop music was what I wanted to do, from there on out.”

These pop influences might surprise anyone who sees Dylan live. As she sashays onto the stage in tight leather pants and long, dirty blonde hair, she wouldn’t look out of place fronting a group of hairy musicians with cut-off band tees and red bandanas.

She acknowledges the contradiction. “I draw influence from the likes of Queen,” she says. “I want it to feel like a rock show. But ultimately, when I’m in the studio, I can’t write anything other than a pop song.”

When it comes to playing live versus writing in the studio, the answer for Dylan is easy. “I love playing live,” she enthuses.

“That’s my favourite thing in the whole world – just getting to dance and sing with people. I don’t think people come for my vocals, they come for the vibe.”

The artist has previously described cancelling shows as “a musician’s worst nightmare”, which she says is because “a lot of people use gigs as things that they really look forward to, myself included. Even playing the shows to me, it’s really important for my brain that I do them. We all get to have a little bit of therapy every night.

“What was so shocking when I first started releasing music is that people were connecting to words that I felt really alone about. Hearing people scream those words back, and how much they love the song and relate to the song, is great. It all makes us feel a little less alone.”

But is it tricky to act as therapy for the masses?  “If you have a fan base and you’re connecting with them constantly, it just becomes one big family,” replies Dylan. “I don’t think that fans are just looking for good music anymore, they want somewhere to call home. They want to belong to something too – that’s what’s really nice about social media.”

• ‘The Alibi’ is out now. 

Read the interview with Dylan and more in our current issue of Hot Press: