This year, Jorja Smith has been stacking praises and collabs. But today she releases her debut album and it’s time now, more than ever to finally get to know her.

It was during the Paris based festival We Love Green and I didn’t quite know what to expect before our meeting. Here she is, soft-spoken, slightly childish with a shyness that fades away when she proudly talks about the starting out of her career and the music she has been making from the beginning. She feels weird about festivals because -as an artist- you are always assuming people are not coming to see you perform and that they’re just waiting for the next big act to make its apparition. “But then I guess, they are here to see me.” 
Unfortunately I couldn’t see her perform that night. I was more focused on my fasting than anything else, including her. “Don’t worry about tonight”, she said more sorry than I was, “I’m coming back to Paris ! My show will be better.” The words floated in the room for a couple of seconds and with confidence she smiled at the irony of the situation. That joyful facial expression felt like a punch in my face and I almost took it as an excess of confidence. But deep down, I knew she was right because -then- Lost & Found will be released. After that, Jorja genuinely asked how my Ramadan was going and we talked about our religions. She really seemed interested in me and in what I had to say. You know, like those people who seem to feed themselves off stories they are hearing on a platform track or in the back of a taxi. “I don’t really like the idea of giving or receiving presents for Christmas. I think it ruins the essence of it”.

A lot of people may have heard that song, and they wouldn’t have known what my music was like. So here it is, this is my album.

From the first track you get this running stream of references coming though your mind : from the intro that goes up to the melody and the drums that reminds me of Amy Winehouse, to this kind of spoken word. Followed by “All falls down…” that comes later in the track that could make you think of Lauryn Hill, or the theme of love that makes you believe Adele could have wrote it. But comparisons are meaningless to describe an artist of her dimension and the music she has been offering to the world thus far. Just like collaborations and co-signs, you may have been introduced to Jorja Smith through her collaboration with Preditah, on the garage infused “On my Mind”. Or more probably thanks to her highly acclaimed appearance on Kendrick Lamar’s Black Panther soundtrack song “I Am”. If not, Drake was the first megastar to work with her on his latest project “More Life”. About Kendrick, she keeps a fond memory : «We tied in on so many levels. He is a Gemini. I am as well. […] He told me, maybe we’ll be working on something for the Black Panther movie and then he said, «The title will be « I am »». So we just wrote. He left me in a room so I could sing melodies to his beat and it was like the beginning of what the song is today. And then we just wrote together and it was really cool. I want to work with him again.» About Drake, she is mostly grateful : «I guess, being on More Life is such an amazing opportunity, like me, Skepta and Giggs. So many british artists, that was crazy. And it opened up to a lot of people, a whole new world. They could have listened to it and say they didn’t like me, but they did. A lot of people may have heard that song and they wouldn’t have known what my music was like. So here it is, this is my album.»

An album with no features, that she chose to put out when she decided she was ready.

I’m 20, 21 next week. And these songs I’ve written from 16 to 20. So it was never like “I’m going to write now”, because I need to write songs. I just write. And then last year I said to my manager that I wanted an album.

Why ?

Well, I wanted to put out something big. And he said « Ok, here is a list of the songs you wrote. Choose what song you want for the album ». That was difficult. And then I wrote some new ones when I was twenty and then I also wanted those tracks on the album.

Which ones are they ?

“The One” and “On Your Own”. They are the newest ones.

“The One” is my favorite.

You know when I hear that, I think of Sade sometimes. Something of seeing her live. I just hear that, I just think Sade. Listen to it again, and you might think the same, I don’t know.

No, I think I get it.

I think it’s the beat !

The beat ! And maybe because of the strings. The violin makes the sound melancholic and the beat makes you want to…

…move, but yet, you’re sad.

How did you write it ?

That was funny. So it’s produced by Joel Compass. He’s my boyfriend. But he wasn’t at the time we made it. The night before, we had a conversation about why I didn’t want a boyfriend. Actually, I wanted him to be my man but I was trying to act detached. Also, I was going on tour so I was like : “I don’t want you to be my boyfriend, but I don’t want you to talk to anybody else.”

[laughs]…basic girl stuff.

Yeah ! And he was like “Why am I gonna wait around for you if you don’t wanna be with me ?”. In my head I was like « Yeah I want you to do that » and I said, “You know, I’m doing it for you”. I played myself… So we had this conversation, and the day after we had a session with Amanda Ghost and Maaike « Kito » Ebbing. When I arrived, they already started writing this idea so they played it to me. They were like, “it’s about when you meet the one, and it’s not the right time or you don’t really need them”. And me and Joel were like “Oh my god”. But it is such a honest song. I mean, my songs are all honest. But for that one I mean, every line means something. I guess it’s because it’s so recent as well. So yeah, that’s definitely how I felt. And it was sad because I went away on tour and he still had to work on the song. So he just heard me singing about him.

[laughs] That’s a nice trap.

But it’s good now !

Love is all over her album, in many forms : content, exclusive, unrequited, broken, gone, romantic, egotistical, lost and found. “I love love !” she claims happily. But some tracks are out of this theme. Even though I thought of one, she corrected me by admitting there were in fact two : “Blue Lights” and “Lifeboats”. Both are societal, the first one gets more political. It takes roots in many things Jorja saw or studied, from the videos of the Grime artist Ghetts (“Rebel”) or Dizee Rascal’s “Sirens”, JME’s documentary about police brutality on Noisey to her own essay and survey on young boys (from 11 to 17) relationships with the police. Or from the time when -being nosy– she found a knife in the bag her friend forgot at her place. “I was scrolling down George’s [Poet, producer of this track, ed] Soundcloud and there was this one called « Dreamy Keys » and that ended up being the « Blue Lights » instrumental. I just started to sing. From everything that I have been reading and learning about and everything I’d learned…All of it are put in there. And I just ask, why should you have a conscious when you have done nothing wrong ? That’s the whole point. Why ? And it hasn’t changed. Because we are still asking why and I wrote this two years ago. Well, almost two.”

About the reception of her debut album, Jorja doesn’t seem to be worried : “I think they’ll like it », nodding and then adding, « People come to my shows. I saw that on tour. Since my show is like my album, then hopefully people will like it.”
As we were done talking about the album and having a little time ahead, I couldn’t leave without mentioning her first EP,Project 11.

I was working with Charly, who’s the producer. I was working with him even before I moved to London, actually. And then we just wrote songs.

Your whole life is about writing songs.

Yeah. That’s why, that’s how I’m feeling..I came back home to Walsall and we already put out three songs, there was « Blue Lights », « A Prince » – which I wanna redo because it’s a crazy song. Why ? Because I’d like to add a band – and then I put out « Where Did I Go » and then the EP. I wanted to put out more than one song. I was listening back to certain songs and I was like : « Oh, these fit really well together. EP ! »

And this song…

“Carry Me Home » !

The first part !

So, Thea Gajic made it, she’s amazing, she does the spoken word.

I always thought it was you…

Lots of people do but it’s Thea. Maybe in the deluxe version I will put a full live version so you could hear her ! It’s Thea. She’s a director. She’s sick.

Talking about directors, did « Where did I go? » was your first video ?

No my first video was « Blue Light », and then « A Prince ». « Where Did I Go? » was the first time that you really saw me that much. It was just me and my big head you know.

Sorry if I’m wrong or forgot about it but did you direct it ?

No don’t worry. I just filmed myself. I filmed with my camera on my stairs.

[laughs] Why ?

I was singing a song and I wanted to make something so I just made that. And I had an empty house. This is it. And I sent it to my manager. And I was like, « I wanna do something like this for the video ». My manager was like, « Ok, let’s just use this ».

And it ended up being good.

Thank you. I’ll do more directing. I have so many ideas. But it’s just time… I don’t have time but I’ll make time.