‘I’m trilingual because I speak English and German – but also neigh. We could have done the interview in horsey.” Welcome to the world of DJ and pop provocateur horsegiirL, AKA Stella Stallion, the Berlin-based half-human, half-horse, whose potent mix of Eurodance, 90s techno, happy hardcore and gabba has polarised the dance music community. On one side of the paddock are her loyal fans, or “farmies”, who fully accept the horsegiirL lore – that she was born and raised in the idyllic Sunshine farms, surrounded by animal friends, and later discovered by local legend Whitney Horseton. Lurking on the other side, near the manure, are the dance bros who derided Stallion’s meteoric rise in 2022 – aided by viral sets at HÖR Berlin and Boiler Room – as a cheap gimmick that highlighted how far dance music had strayed from its roots.

“I don’t remember his name,” laughs Stallion, 26, “but some legendary DJ from, like, 1902, said, ‘This is the face of commercialisation.’” She’s speaking from Brazil, where she is currently shooting a video for That’s My Beach, a sunkissed pop gem taken from her forthcoming climate crisis-focused debut album, Nature Is Healing. “I had to laugh because at that point I was mainly playing small underground queer and trans raves. It just showed what they were actually protecting, which was a very different space to where I see myself.”

She admits that her early “very punk” style, both as a DJ and as an artist – via songs such as the pummelling equine anthems My Little White Pony and My Barn My Rules – favoured instinct over craft. “I didn’t let my inability hold me back,” she continues, dressed down today in a white robe, the brown mane of her horse mask only lightly manicured. She says the criticisms often came from technically proficient DJs saddled with dead dancefloors: “Who cares about the transition if your track selection and energy is off?”

One early fan, however, was actor Danny Dyer who Stallion spent most of the 2025 Brit awards chatting to, much to the bewilderment of viewers and the tabloids. She says she can’t remember what they were “bantering” about (“There were a few cocktails involved”) but she enjoyed infiltrating the mainstream. “I definitely didn’t ever picture myself being in the Daily Mail,” she whinnies.

Last year’s bling-heavy v.i.p. (very important pony), an EP led by the liquid drum’n’bass of materiaL hor$e was made in between DJ sets around the world, as Stallion battled encroaching burnout. Nature Is Healing, benefiting from time and space, is more nuanced and musically varied. “I’m a horse, I love to keep going,” she says. “Horses don’t stop. That is something I really had to learn.”

So she forced herself to take a four-month break from DJ-ing and the album was crafted between Berlin, LA and London alongside a coterie of forward-thinking producers including AG Cook (Charli xcx) and Margo XS (Kim Petras, Zara Larsson). There are flashes of club music: recent single Apple a Day transforms the “keeps the doctor away” idiom into a mutant, Scooter-esque happy hardcore behemoth. But the sonic palette is mostly more refined, taking in 90s Madonna (specifically Erotica and Ray of Light), Sophie’s liquid-pop and – shock horror – acoustic instruments.

A big fan of a concept, Stallion channelled her love of touching grass into the album’s 15 songs. “It’s a love letter to Mother Nature, to Mother Earth, and to every creature, every plant on this planet,” she says. “It’s my way of meditating on how we all exist in this world and how we treat our planet. I just wonder how intelligent a species really is when it’s destroying the very base that it stands on.” She means humans, not grazing horses.

On the featherlight UK garage bop track Organic Intelligence, which sits alongside PinkPantheress on the pop spectrum, Stallion sings the praises of a natural world now at war with AI, while the seductive Hands Hands Hands is about the duality of what human beings can achieve: “[Hands] are the tools that catapulted humanity forward, allowing humans to build things to heal people and animals. But also horrible things like missiles and guns.”

Stallion is clear, however, that she is more of an artist than an activist. “With climate activism,” she says, “there’s a real burnout phenomenon because the crisis is so big, and the challenge is so huge. I wanted to come from a perspective of joy, because joy can be a real motivator. Humour and playfulness are very, very serious tools.” She plays with a loose strand of mane.

Stallion is aware, too, that making an eco-opus as a globetrotting DJ and artist might appear hypocritical. It is something she thinks about all the time: “But there is a difference between travelling for your work and travelling for fun and holiday.” She leans forward conspiratorially. “I’ll say this now, so if I do this in 10 years, then you have every right to cancel me – ‘I don’t ever want to be on a private jet.’ But I feel like with artists, what do you want us to do? Play a set on Zoom? We tried that in the pandemic and it’s not the vibe.”

For now, Stallion’s vibe is to continue carving out a space for herself and her music. Earlier, while discussing Nature Is Healing’s grassy concept, Stallion was wondering if she would class herself as a hippy. Suddenly, as she describes her goals for the album, the fog clears. “I would like people to reflect on what a privilege it is to be a human,” she says, horse ears twitching. “And to love each other. So maybe that is the hippy talking.”