Jorja Smith: Dreamland
From 10 Magazine, 2018
When a 21-year-old woman is dominating the UK R&B scene, she’s bound to be busy. And Jorja Smith is very busy, leading the pack of Brit women taking over. We do love female supremacy.
Yes, Smith is in her own lane, but other artists like Ella Mai and Mabel are coming up with her. It’s the rise of independent women to reign over the R&B scene in the UK, and we’re into it. We’re also very into Smith. She’s soulful, she speaks her truth, writes her own music and is tough. Our kinda woman.
Smith is busy when she calls me. She’s racing through an airport in Switzerland, where she has just performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival and for Quincy Jones’s 85th-birthday celebrations. She’s on her way back to London, where she’s moved from her hometown of Walsall and, in a few days, will be heading to Los Angeles. One might think she would be coming down from the high of releasing her debut album, Lost & Found, in early June, but there’s no comedown. Instead, she’s off on a whirlwind tour that will take her around the world for the rest of the year. Intense, overwhelming, but essentially the dream. There’s grit to Smith, a strong sense of independence, and when we ask her who keeps her grounded, she doesn’t miss a beat: “Me.” It’s very much what she’s about – owning it, expressing herself purely through her music, writing and performing. It’s the life she’s always dreamed of. She does it all in a tracksuit, braids and sneakers – the JS uniform. She describes her style as “whatever I want”. It’s the key to her fullthrottle success: playing it by her own rules.
Smith began singing when she was young. “I think it was really natural, I used to make a lot of noise when I was younger,” she says. “I’d start writing stories but never nish them. I learnt to play the keyboard at eight and would mess around with chords. Then, when I was 11, I wrote my rst song and I just haven’t stopped.” When asked about her mentors, she lists the English-Irish singer-songwriter Maverick Sabre as well as her mother and her father, who was part of a neo-soul group – “They’re the ones who told me to follow my dreams.” And so she did, moving to London in her late teens, juggling a job at Starbucks with songwriting. And then, suddenly, she was featured on Drake’s More Life album and working with Stormzy and Kendrick Lamar. A solid start that escalated quickly, one that she’s always asked about, but honestly, it seems unnecessary to focus on this when she’s now in her independent prime.
It’s clear what Smith is all about on her album, which steers clear of any features and is very much a journey – and fight – of self-realisation. She describes it as “an introduction to Jorja Smith. If you don’t know me you can get to know me.” A whole lot of smooth, jazzy R&B beats flow, working so well under her raw but perfectly polished voice – one that’s been compared to Amy Winehouse’s. So it makes sense that the most animated Smith gets when we speak is about Winehouse, who she says is her hero. The album that she praises for changing her life is Winehouse’s debut, Frank; her favourite Winehouse song is You Sent Me Flying. So what is it about her music that resonates so deeply? “The fact she’s so honest in her lyrics... She’s very vulnerable. You listen to her and you can literally believe everything she’s saying. You don’t feel alone. I think it’s very important. The lyrics, the way she writes is incredible. She’s so honest. You can’t take that away from a person.” It’s that vulnerability that pulses through Smith’s music, too – she’s made sure of that – and is probably a big part of why the internet has fallen in love with her heavy, heartbreaking love songs that fuse fluently into political, hard-hitting thoughts.
If writing is one of the most honest forms of self-expression and Smith’s greatest strength, it seems lucky, then, that she cites her greatest weakness as overthinking: the gateway to a great song. “Having the ability to be able to get everything out that’s in my head gives me the best feeling – making music is my outlet.” Life is ideal right now.
The plan is on track. She’s writing more, working on the next album. There’s something quietly powerful about Smith, she champions herself, is totally headstrong. “Be you, because you can’t be anybody else,” she says. “You’re you for a reason.” She’s right. Her only goal is to “be happy”. Good goal. What’s the best part about being Jorja Smith? “Best part about being me... Oh God,” she says. “Right now I’m just doing what I want to do. Living the dream. It’s my dream.”