WHO the f**ck are Joe Jazz?: First & Final interview
And so I arrived at the scene; the legendary windmill of Brixton. The hub of it all, whatever IT is. On stage I saw the drums and a violin or whatever it was as well as a guitar, a standard set up. The first listing read "The Joe Jazz Ensemble. Not Jazz as you know it.". I felt I knew exactly what I was in for and for that reason I wasn't particularly bothered about missing a song or two. Well I was wrong. Very wrong. A few drinks and even more cigarettes later we walked back in. What we witnessed was something nothing prepares you for. Not even litres of beer and probably not even in combination with a potentially lethal concoction of designer substances cooked in someone's kitchen. Truly not jazz as anyone knows it. I was shell shocked, almost hypnotized in a way. The drummer was not even drumming. The guitarist was wearing a fluffy dressing gown and minion hat whilst dancing the Macarena. The lead singer, pulling on the cord of the microphone lead around his neck. All wrapped up in the sound of universally relatable lyrics about doing drugs in the village and getting your friend's dog stoned. It was a beautiful mess. A truly original mix of electronic madness. The sound of a schizophrenic being lobotomised in a dark room or what happens inside of a jack in a box while it's being wound, about to go off. And I mean that with the highest regard. I turned to my friend and with a twisted grin I said: I don't care what it takes, we need these guys in our magazine. For they have it, whatever IT is.
After the show we found out that The Joe Jazz Ensemble was soon to be over. With only one song released, we felt it was all the more important to find some way of documenting the extraordinary madness we had witnessed that night. We managed to set up a final (and first) interview.
So let us introduce the Joe Jazz Ensemble: JOE (Joe Jazz), SELMA (Selma Sol), SOPHIE (Sophie Du Ry Antoinette van Beest Holle), LILY (Lil Monty) and guitarist Neil who was unfortunately absent at the interview.
So, how did you guys all meet?
Joe: I met Sophie about two years ago. I stole her chair on the “terrace” of our accommodation. She came back and said “can you get the fuck out of my seat”. Instead I just moved up a bit and she perched he end and we started to talk about music. And here we are.
Selma: Joe and I actually went to college together in Cambridge, but it was so big that we didn’t actually know each other, I only knew of him. We didn’t meet properly till later
Joe: I was library Joe
Selma: Yeah Joe was always in the library so everyone called him library Joe.
Sophie: Joe introduced me to Selma on the first night of uni.
Joe: I was in a band in Cambridge with De Niro for a while
And how did you all start playing together?
Joe: Well I was doing it alone to begin with, then I started making music with Neil and we started to play some shows together late last year. We thought it sounded really good but I wanted to bring it to life a bit more on stage as I think it's kinda boring just seeing two dudes - one with guitar and the other just flailing around. So I thought the easiest way of doing that was to expand the set up. I guess I just like to see more bodies on a stage. I think it just makes the whole thing a lot more interesting.
Lily: I think it was kind of just a natural progression really as we were all hanging out and playing together at random house parties, just messing about and having fun then we kind of realized it was actually quite a lot of fun and maybe something we should progress even further.
Where did the name come from?
Joe: The Pineapple in Kentish Town
Sophie: Well i mean Joe actually learnt piano through jazz so when we lived together so it kind of became this joke that at a party he would just start playing free jazz whenever there was silence
Joe: My bedroom was actually the living room so that's kind of where everyone would hang out so if I wanted time alone, I’d just start playing ‘Autumn Leaves’ really obnoxiously
Selma: There have been many stages of Joe. Library Joe, then there was Skater Joe and now Joe Jazz.
Joe: Next is Joe Drum and Bass
Influences?
Selma: There's a hell of a lot. Right now I’m listening to a lot of Rosalía. New stuff like Shygirl. Lots of Danish Rap as I’m Danish so it helps me feel connected when I'm over here. Also Fiona Apple. Björk as well. And I think in terms of cello influences I have to say Arthur Russell haha.
Joe: Bowie and a London act that me and Lily danced to and sang manically to before we knew eachother properly. I won’t name it.
Lily: Yeah that was so nice. It was so funny to dance with someone and know all the lyrics to the song and slowly realize that they know ALL the lyrics too and you just get more and more excited. I think for me I do really love London contemporaries, but I feel in terms of influences that sort of thing is really bound in this pressure and very stylised. The category of bands I'm really into are the ones making really good music but also not taking it too seriously. Metronomy are definitely my favourite band by a long way. I’m also very influenced by punk. I don’t listen to it so much anymore but my Dad was really into punk so I listened to a lot of that growing up. I love that whole scene and just seeing these people making music because it’s what they love more than anything and they don’t want to do anything else.
Sophie: Me and Selma live together so our tastes really overlap. I’ve also been listening to a lot of Rosalía and Shygirl. And then I guess I always like people who you can tell are classically trained in singing. I just love that ethereal sound - like Goldfrapp.
Joe: Yes, Goldfrapp, especially now with Sophie's vocals - I really want to channel that Goldfrapp epicness and that vocal sound on Utopia
Sophie: Also Laurie Anderson is really cool. She has done some really interesting stuff where the vocals will be chopped up. I really love this kind of thing when people use the voice as more of an instrument and experiment with it. It can be so much more than just sustaining nice notes.
Your music is very a mixed bag of sounds and influences. How did you actually land on that specific sound?
Selma: It always starts with a backing track
Joe: Yeah. But before that I always start writing on the piano as that’s where I feel most comfortable. Then experiment on top of that. I just wanna take these compositions and songs I write on piano to places I’m not capable of reaching alone. In the past that’s meant expanding through experimenting in software, taking stuff to its extreme - not necessarily so it's all super maximalist and in your face but more in a way of transforming apiece into something so completely different to what it would be on piano. As we move forward I think we’ll start writing collectively and then I’ll produce it from the mess we make.
Yeah you guys have a very interesting soundscape. There’s lots of different components going on at the same time but it comes together into something very interesting. We haven’t heard anything like it.
Joe: well i take a lot of that inspiration from Hyperpop in general
Sophie: Oh yeah that's a big one! Like Charli xcx
Joe: Yeah it's just that complete creative freedom within the genre of pop. I don’t want to make straight up hyperpop but would like to use some aesthetic elements. I think the current soundscape is a reaction to how good guitar and band music is at the moment, and how good Hyperpop is and how good club music is. I want this project to excel in all these areas without being limited to one. I think that’s our primary goal.
So ‘Infographic legend’ is currently the only song you guys have released. What’s the story behind this song?
Joe: Despite how funny it is and how it doesn’t take itself very seriously, it is actually about a friend of who went into rehab for drug abuse. I think the lyrics and sounds and everything do have to have some kind of emotional resonance within me but I try not to dwell on the sadness of the situation. I wanted to mask it in some way and have people enjoy that song as a piece of comedy or as a lamentation on village drug abuse or you can just think it’s shit. That song isn’t going to define our sound- we do want to move forward from that but it but it was really important to release that because I think it’s really good. It marks the beginning and end of the Joe Jazz project. On to bigger and better things!
Have you thought about recording any more of the songs on your set?
Joe: Well the dream would be to combine everything so far into an album and release it under ‘Joe Jazz' and then move on to the new project and put all this stuff to bed. In a way this is a bit of a shame because all the stuff in the current set is what I have been working on and writing for years, like the progressions and motifs. But I'm hoping going forward we will be working on the same motifs but building upon it and have more of a collective as we haven’t had much time as a group.
Selma: Yes we’d like to start making more songs from the bottom up rather than having a backing track so have everyone start with the instruments they have first and go from there really.
Joe: Then I'll create a track around it. For me I think it will still work to use a backing track because you can make it sound so modern and that's pretty important to me.
So let’s talk about the next project.
Joe: Oh the label will kill us if we talk about that!
Lily: It's kinda what Selma said with going from the bottom up. Not only with sound but kind of with everything. We have all known each other a long time but it's been kind of drippy -we’ve known each other from differentplaces and our paths have crossed but now it's finally coming together as something we are all really into and enjoy and want to continue with. So now I guess we are at the point of discovering what is going to be us - what are our influences, what do we want our single cover to look like, what should we wear. I think we are gonna have some big meeting about all of this stuff
Joe: With the label. All sat round a big table in big suits.
Sophie: I think that's definitely a huge part of the whole thing - the visual part and how we are all representing ourselves.
Selma: Our visuals will definitely have a lot of hyper pop influence as well.
Lily: Yeah, its like you know when you see a band and there's a saxophonist or whatever who wears really funny trousers - you're excited to see that as well as everything else.
Sophie: i mean there was a point before i started singing on your tracks where i would just sit on stage and would just press the backing track then just read music production and that was part of the performance
Lily: she was the drummer that never drums
Joe: I never want to lose that aspect of the band.
Lily : I remember there would be people that would come up to me that didn't know I knew Joe - and they'dcome and talk to me about the performance and be like ‘there was this drummer but she didn't drum!’
Joe: But the next project will be great. We should have a fresh batch of material ready to gig-test in late June. Then it’s about finding an upward trajectory. I know we are capable of producing a great LP, which is what I want to make. We’ve been cucked by the pandemic as ideally we would be at this two years ago, but we’re only just getting this chance. It’s about carving out a niche and getting better at what we do.
Any small bands you’d like to shout out?
Joe: We are the smallest
Sophie: Yeah we need a shoutout
Joe: I’ll shoutout Monty
Lily: Yep that’s my solo stuff
Joe: I saw Skrot recently who were wicked.
Lily: There's a band called Final Boss Type Zero from Iceland who I think are so amazing.
Joe: Also, I have to mention Pink Eye Club - Hero of the Windmill, Popstar of the Universe.
You can catch the Joe Jazz ensemble for the very last time at The George Tavern on June 5th. TICKETS HERE:
https://dice.fm/event/ykwpa-glitch-magazine-live-5th-jun-the-george-tavern-london-tickets
WRITTEN BY NORBERT WOLEK
PHOTOS BY BAXTER ADAMS