interviews
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Ozzy Osbourne earned four Grammy nominations for his Patient Number 9 album, and he tells Billboard that the nods were an unexpected, yet welcome, surprise.
“The whole thing shocked me,” he says in a new interview with Lyndsey Havens. “I mean, if I won anything for the album I’ll be floored.”
“That’s what I like about the business. It’s never short of — I love surprises,” he adds in the clip of the Q&A above.
Osbourne says he’s “kind of excited for being nominated for the best rock album” for Patient Number 9, which topped Billboard‘s Top Rock Albums chart in September. He’s also nominated for best rock song and best rock performance, for the song “Patient Number 9” featuring Jeff Beck, as well as best metal performance for “Degradation Rules” with Tony Iommi. (A full list of nominations for the 2023 Grammy Awards can be seen here.)
Asked whether he’ll prepare a speech or wing it on Grammy night, should he win any awards, Osbourne admits that giving speeches isn’t really his specialty.
“I’m not good at making speeches,” he says. “I always end up saying it twice or blowing it or whatever. I’m sure my wife will have it worked out. Behind me is my wife. My wife pulls my strings.”
Elsewhere in the interview, the 74-year-old rocker noted that the album’s title, Patient Number 9, is “me, I suppose. The last four years have been sheer hell for me. I’ve been in such a bad… healthwise. Plus I got [a] Parkinson’s diagnosis. But I’m, you know, takes a lot to hold me down.”
Watch the full interview in the video above.
Daniel Vangarde has lived a fascinating life. He’s lived at least three of them, in fact.
His first act was as a producer, A&R and all-around catalyst for some of the most popular European disco and funk acts of the 1970s and ’80s, shifting millions of copies. Since the late 2000s he’s been residing and working in a Brazilian village of 750 people, teaching English, computer literacy, vocational skills and a range of artistic expression.
Somewhere in the middle he gave birth to a son, Thomas Bangalter, who also made some decent records himself.
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Vangarde (born Bangalter) helped guide the early movements of Daft Punk, at a time when the pre-Homework duo had magic in their fingertips but hadn’t yet mastered the close control of image and narrative which forged their mystique. Vangarde doled out critical advice to Thomas, Guy-Manuel and a coterie of close friends in the ’90s Parisian scene, instilling in them the requisite knowledge to play the industry game on their own terms and better enabling them to sculpt their consequential destiny.
Then followed a high-profile battle with France’s publishing and rights society, SACEM, over both restrictive practices for modern artists and historical aberrations for post-World War II remuneration to Jewish musicians. Sufficiently content with both his own success and the imprint he left on the next generation, Vangarde retreated into silence, only fleetingly emerging when required (including a trip to the 2014 Grammy Awards, where he watched his son clean up). There were no plans to issue communiqués with the music ecosystem — until now.
Following a deal with powerhouse French label Because Music, the vaults of Vangarde’s Zagora Records have been busted open. The resultant compilation, Daniel Vanguarde: The Vaults of Zagora Records Mastermind (1971-1984), out Nov. 25 on Because Music, should re-situate him in a lineage of discotheque-pleasers with a taste for suave, symphonic and Star Wars-influenced material that bristles with joie de vivre. The comp is surprisingly tight for an era which left no excess untested; it’s not a stretch to say, from the colorway of his suit down to his perm, the Daniel Vangarde peering out from the cover might just have been the model for Disco Stu.
Having undertaken the grand sum of zero English-language interviews for 75 years, Vangarde made himself available to Billboard from the deep Bahian forests for an extremely rare and rather charming conversation about it all.
One thing that’s clear across your life is a fascination with culture and society outside of your own. You produced artists from the French Antilles and the West Indies, kickstarted a cossack dance craze in the late ’60s, and latterly founded an NGO. Where does this curiosity stem from?
I always liked traveling: I spent 10 summers of my adolescence in Costa Brava [Spain], visited Swinging London, and in 1966 hitchhiked from New York down to Mexico in order to visit the Tarahumara. Life felt like an adventure.
In 1971, I happened upon Guadeloupe and loved it — the people, the place, and the local rhythmic music, biguine, which I took back to work on in Paris. Throughout trips to Kathmandu, Bali and Malaysia in the ’70s, my love for African, Arabian, South American and other music outside the French or Anglo-Saxon tradition kept growing.
What were your dreams for the world back then?
Ah, that is easy. I was curious about the globe and completely against war. I was politically active from a young age. I was arrested during the student revolution in ’68 and spent three nights in a jail cell without light. That was very frightening. They say there were no deaths but I am certain this is untrue, there was great violence. For years afterward I had to cross the street whenever I saw a policeman, you know?
You had post-traumatic stress?
Yes, yes, it was this: it was post-traumatic stress. But I stayed against nuclear factories, against the Algerian War and successfully avoided my own military service. I did not change my point of view that mass consumption is a dead-end of civilization. In 1968, we had spiritual belief in a more open future. Today we have realism about our present moment, and that is what it is.
When you were 25, you and longtime collaborator Jean Kluger came up with Yamasuki, a faux-Japanese project whose only release is still pored over by record collectors and DJs like Four Tet. Why did you decide to jump into the deep end with such a specific concept?
After the success of “Casatschok,” I was mostly considered a choreographer. Shows about kung fu were beginning to sweep through television, so Kluger and I thought about creating a Japanese dance, which we called Yamasuki, but the great sound of the music caught on more. We really got into a Japanese mindset: I bought an English-to-Japanese phrasebook, we learned phonetic pronunciation and taught a children’s choir lyrics in Japanese. We even hired a karate master to deliver a shout of death [kiai] — except he had no sense of rhythm, so I would stand in the studio, cueing him when to shout… and trembling on the other side of the mic.
As disco became popular globally, and you had French artists like Cerrone winning Grammy Awards for Best New Artist, was there any competition or jealousy? Or did you regard them as your peers?
Peers, totally. There was no competition at all. If there was any competition, in fact, it was with American and English production. I never used a mastering studio; I would be there at the Phillips factory, watching the acetate get pressed, making sure the sound was impeccable. Cerrone, he was not a friend, but we would see each other at the discotheques when taking our new records to the DJ for promotion. The same applies for Jacques Morali {the disco producer responsible for the Village People] — at this time, for the French to have success away from home was a great feeling.
Some of the records you worked on were massive. “D.I.S.C.O.” was the third biggest-seller of 1980 in Germany and the fifth in the UK; the Gibson Brothers sold millions of copies; you’ve been sampled and covered by Erykah Badu, Bananarama, Roger Sanchez — it’s a legacy of success by any other name. Did that come as a surprise to you?
I will say that when I started to make songs, I wanted to write to The Beatles and tell them that there should be five members. [Laughs] I was this certain that I could bring something to them. I imagine that maybe everybody that records hopes that his music will be understood and appreciated by the public. But even if I was expecting success, I recognize it’s a great privilege to live your life off of music.
Daniel Vangarde With The Gibson Brothers
Courtesy of Daniel Vangarde
What was your relationship to fame throughout all this?
I only did one LP as a frontman, which had the privilege of being banned on radio and television. The lyrics concerned how France is the third biggest producer of bombs and mines. Of course, that’s a state secret, so the record was buried, and I was never a frontman again. But that’s alright: I was an author, composer and producer; an artisan. I sought no fame, no show business. A reporter asked me recently: “So you live your life in the shadows?” And I said, “No! I live in the light, normally, like you do.”
Interest in the Zagora reissue is however fun to me, because I was not fashionable at all. I produced La Compagnie Créole, a very big band in the ’80s, and we could sell out three nights at L’Olympia but I could never once get a journalist to come see the show. That’s just how it was then. If it’s not chanson, it’s not serious. In France, popular music is suspicious.
By the time your career wound down around 1990, was the love for music still present? Was it a creative rupture or a decision to be with your family?
Truthfully, I was not producing music that excited me, and I thought it unwise to carry on. When making a hit my hands would become wet while mixing, and a physical sensation would overtake my belly. So if I was not feeling anything, why would anyone else? Also, there was a new generation doing dance music, and of course this was very close for me.
Yes, on that note… perhaps no one in the last 10 years has done more to kickstart the revival of disco and analog production than your son, Thomas. Why do you think that era has swept back into the public consciousness?
I can see why. Nothing replaces rhythm. Songs that you can dance to, with a melody you can sing — not rap, not techno, not even Daft Punk can compete with this human response to a good feeling. There are different chapels today: you have country radio, rap radio, rock radio, but the old repertoire has maintained.
What aggregates the masses are famous hits, and disco was the last of this kind of music. When they decided that disco was over and they started to burn the records [1979’s infamous bonfire of hate, Disco Demolition], I thought it was a joke, because I never thought happy, dancing music could possibly fade. And when disco came back, I realized it hadn’t faded after all.
Your know-how helped ground not only a young Daft Punk, but also their peers Phoenix and Air, all of whom credit your advice with allowing them to navigate the music biz and retain creative freedom.
I think all artists should have this freedom. I helped Thomas, Guy-Man and their friends as much as I could to allow them to release without barriers. They were only 20 years old and the industry could have squeezed them — a normal contract generates interference between your work and the time it’s released. I made an introduction to my English lawyer, who is still [Daft Punk’s] lawyer today, and advised them not to let the author’s rights society in France authorize their music for film or publicity. My input was to help create a good environment that allowed them to produce freely.
Daniel Vangarde
Courtesy of Daniel Vangarde
Do you think the industry is a better place for young artists now than it was in the ’90s, or the ’70s? Or is it contingent on who you are?
That’s difficult to say. I think the music industry is in a terrible situation, not because of the internet, but because record companies and publishers didn’t know how to use the internet. When I helped Thomas set up Daft Club [a groundbreaking hub for digital downloads and fan service, released in tandem with 2001’s Discovery] even then, many considered the internet science fiction for geeks. And what was the result?
They should have contracted the hackers! The best guy from Napster should have been contracted by record companies to organize a new paid system. At a time when people paid $10-20 for an LP, of course they would have accepted paying $1 instead. But the industry did nothing, music became like free air, and once the value collapsed to zero for many years, it was hard to come back from this.
In the ’70s, the artistic directors of a record company or programmers of a radio station held all the control. So I didn’t think it was good then. But I can’t say it’s better today either. It’s difficult for true talent to break through or generate wealth in the same fashion as before.
As you’ve never given interviews, your working practice from that era is lost. I mean — Bangalter now rings with a uniqueness and star quality, so why did you use Vangarde as your professional surname?
I wanted to allow future Thomas to use Bangalter! No, I chose a pen name in case I had success; I did not wish to book a hotel or restaurant and be recognized. Why Vangarde? Originally I had prepared Morane, the name of a small French plane in the early 1900s. But on the day of registration with SACEM, this was already taken, so I was given one minute to change. I quickly thought of another plane called the Vanguard, and this stuck by complete accident.
You’ve been distant from your own catalog for so long. Why now?
I’m afraid it’s not very romantic. I have known Emmanuel [de Buretel, kingpin of French electronic music] since he was 25. When Because Music showed interest in buying Zagora Records and releasing some old tracks, I trusted them, and said, “You’ll be the owner of the catalog, so if you want to, yes.” As I have never done photos or interviews, I did not expect interest at all. I could even not remember some of their choices, so I had to go on YouTube and listen back as I was certain these were not my songs! To see any reaction has been a huge shock. Because made a very good decision.
So you never considered what you’d like your legacy to be?
I think I will not die. I have songs that I did 50 years ago that are still popular. If people are happy when they hear the songs and go to dance, or go to see the bands still touring, they do not die. This is the answer of my legacy.
And are you satisfied?
Yes, I’m very happy. I have the privilege to do what I want, and a good personal life… in the shadows. [Laughs] I have a good relationship with Thomas and now I have two grandchildren. One is 20 years old and the other is 14 — I love them. I go on being free and having my health. What more can I ask for?
While some of history’s greatest artists have a distinct look for fans to recall instantly, many musical greats are shape-shifting chameleons, finding different looks, styles and eras throughout their careers.
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TEN falls strictly in the latter category, with the Thailand-born K-pop star using his songs and music videos to express the different creative concepts, characters, and, at times, confusion inside his mind.
After trying out shouty punk-pop with “Paint Me Naked,” festival-ready EDM on “New Heroes,” and the hypnotic “Dream in a Dream” with fusions of traditional East-Asian instruments, TEN has paired sultry R&B sound with vigorous group choreography. His new single “Birthday” dropped as part of the NCT LAB project under K-pop super-label SM Entertainment to spotlight the different members in its ever-expanding NCT boy-band project that currently boasts 23 members.
While TEN has already proven his superstar status as a part of groups like WayV and NCT U, as well as one of seven members in SM’s K-pop supergroup SuperM that hit No. 1 on the Billboard 200, TEN refuses to sit comfortably as an artist.
“I get bored easily and the audience will get bored of me doing the same thing,” the singer says during a Zoom call from Seoul. “So I keep finding what kind of stuff I haven’t done yet.”
Wrapped in a flannel shirt for this giggly Billboard interview, TEN’s bubbly warmness strays far from the seductive, slithering soloist rocking chains and veils throughout the “Birthday” video. Even as TEN speaks with a lightness, there is compelling duality in his seriousness in accepting who he is while simultaneously wanting to level up in his work. Even when the star admits he’s lost inspiration, there’s still a guiding force pushing TEN into new, creative areas.
Read more from TEN on all the vocal, thematic and dance elements behind “Birthday” and what else is on the way.
Billboard: Congratulations on the new song. “Birthday” is your fourth solo single, what’s the difference this time compared to past releases?
TEN: This song has no connection with my past singles or whatever you see in “Paint Me Naked” or “New Hero.” They’re different in genre, style, makeup, and choreography. Even the use of my vocals changed. I’m not really interested in doing the same thing over again, like this deep and strong vocal that’s at the same time very soft. If you listen to the verses, I’m using a lower register and then a high falsetto on the chorus. I want to show the contrast between strong and soft.
I’m glad you brought that up because it was a great vocal performance and something we haven’t heard from you before. Was it a challenge or did you know how to approach it?
I did find recording the vocals very challenging because R&B is different, you know? “Paint Me Naked” is a pop song so you just hit the melody, which is simpler than R&B because when you sing R&B you need to have that delay and draw things out. At first, I was singing it similar to “Birthday,” but I thought, “This is not how I want it to sound.” So, we re-recorded after I listened to more R&B songs to see how they ride the rhythm. And I was trying too hard at first, but the next session was just chill; I just felt the lyrics, listened, and laid back.
There are many NCT members and a lot of SM Entertainment artists, but it seems like we can always look forward to a TEN single each year. Do these opportunities come because you always try to show something new?
I keep finding new concepts by watching movies, looking at tattoo pictures from Instagram, other artists’ photoshoots, fashion shows. If you see luxury brands’ fashion shows, they have their own concept and each year it changes. I’m into that. I’ll say, “Okay, I like this kind of stuff so let me keep it to myself, look at other stuff and mix it together.”
Do you save a lot of things on Instagram?
I take a lot of screenshots on my phone! I was even watching an animation recently and was like, “Okay, I like this concept, let me do it like this guy here, then let me use this color as an outfit…”
How much of your inspirations came out in “Birthday”?
I was very lucky at this time with all the people that help me make “Birthday.” They really asked for my opinions, “What kind of stuff do you want to represent? How do you want to express yourself?” I chose all four outfits. There’s the suit because I want to show a mature side of me. Another one had the chain on my chest, an essential look; I need one look that is very sexy. The other one is an outfit where I wear a hat and there’s a black sheet covering my face. It’s a traditional, flowy kind of outfit because I don’t want to only show mature sides.
I wanted to show the fluid side of me too. It was very hard to find a lot of references at that time, it took me a week to find everything that I wanted, but I sent it to my stylist and video directing team. They just say, “Okay, let us figure everything out for you.” We had a lot of talking going on during the making.
Tell me about the choreography.
This one is mainly by my friends Bada Lee and Jrick [Baek]. They really helped make my vision come to life. I told them how there are a lot of K-pop groups out there with choreography that has a signature move. But for this one, I didn’t want it to be like that, I wanted it to be like artwork. I want fans to see little sparkles in the choreography and say, “Oh, I like that moment.”
Do you have a favorite moment throughout the whole video?
Well, the first verse is very challenging for me. You can see the full choreography in the dance video and in the first verse there are so many B-boy-like moves. I got bruises all over my body, it’s very hard. But what was best about that is that I was working with my dancer friends on moves I can’t do alone. We’re all in contact as they pull me up, I kick out, there’s like a wave—it’s not just me doing the work but we are all connected as a team.
Like “Birthday” or “Paint Me Naked,” your songs are confident in their elements of sexuality. It’s not raunchy but very free and open. How do you prepare your mindset in these kinds of performances?
Wow, well, I don’t really think about that much. It’s like, “Okay, I want to wear these clothes.” It’s just me. This is my body and this is how I want to express it. Wearing too many clothes sometimes in dancing can block your body line. I don’t want to feel like I’m not confident with my body so I was like, “Let’s just do it.” That’s why I don’t really do fitness or try to build muscle for certain clothes. I’m skinny so that’s just me. I don’t need to build it up to impress someone else.
You want to show your natural self.
Yes, but maybe a little exercise for my belly fat. [Laughs] Just a little!
Oh, come on! Don’t worry about that. It sounds that you’ve found confidence in your own body which is great because many struggle with that.
It’s like, everyone has a charm, but I’m still trying to learn how to use mine. I also think about being seductive, right? In music videos, you can try everything—you can’t really do that in real life but there’s no right and wrong in the music video. It’s just, “Let’s try.”
It’s your opportunity to try things because everyone knows TEN’s personality as very bubbly. But on stage, you become very different.
Thank you. It just speaks to a different character of myself and the right time for me to express myself. I can’t do it at any time.
You mentioned you don’t want to be too covered up when dancing. I was wondering about the hat and veil look. Was it difficult to master that look?
The veil was not the problem, but the hat kept falling off while dancing. I had to fix my hat all the time, but it’s fun to dance with a hat like that. I felt like I’m a mystery guy and no one knows me.
Outfits can help people to feel more confident. A different outfit helps you represent yourself and your personality differently. It helped me become that character. Every outfit has its own reason that I choose it, and I like every outfit, but this time the hat outfit is what I really enjoyed wearing. It really helped me embrace the concept. “Birthday” has a very strong drum and bass sound, but that outfit kind of helped to soften it down and become a bit more mysterious.
After “Birthday,” fans were saying they want a full album from you. Would that be something you’d be interested in?
Yes, I would. I love working as a team, but I also want to do my solo stuff because you can put in your thoughts and personality. Even though I sometimes didn’t write my song, I can check out the demos and say, “Okay. I want to try this or try that.” And when you read the lyrics, it’s like acting. You’re trying to change yourself for that song as you work on it. It’s like, a song can be very groovy or hip-hop or—can I say swag?—swag.
I can simply work on the song process and it’s going to be a lot of fun. As a group it’s also fun, but it’s different. As a team, you put in the element of yourself but you’re still trying to be in motion with your team. Both are fun for me to work so I have to do both.
Speaking of your teams, do you have any teasers about what’s coming with WayV and NCT?
Right now, WayV is preparing for their new comeback. And I can’t spoil anything about NCT yet. If I spoiled it, Mark will send me a text, “Hyung! Bro. What did you just say?!”
We can’t have Mark upset with us. But as we look to the end of the year, are there any ways you want people to remember you in 2022?
Right now, I’m just focusing on myself. To be honest, I don’t know what happened to me but I need more motivation right now. I need to inspire myself. After I filmed “Birthday,” I lost track of something that I don’t even know so I’m kind of figuring that out. I want to improve myself in singing and dancing so I can get to do more unique concepts and better songs in terms of a different genre.
If I don’t practice for that, it’s going to be harder for me to do different kinds of stuff. So, that’s my goal for this year to improve myself and figure out stuff that I’d been thinking about lately. The process for “Birthday” helped me to focus again and be more creative with my work. It was like a fuel that helped keep my engine moving.
That’s very honest. Many struggled with motivation during the pandemic, for example. Do you know what happened? Or do you have advice on how to get over the hump?
I think everyone has that moment in life. So, I don’t really think about it that much, I just need to figure it out. I don’t know what it is and I don’t know if I’d be able to give helpful advice to those who might be feeling down because realistically everyone has their own problems or confusion that only they can relate to.
But for me, I sit down, breathe slowly and talk to myself by asking myself questions in order to break down the situation into small fractions and better understand. That does help me figure things out most of the time! Sometimes I have these moments but it’s happening to me, like, now. So, let me figure it out and then I can tell you next time.
After years of playing catch up, Louis Tomlinson is finally two steps ahead of himself.
The former One Direction member’s solo career thus far has seen him adopting a trial-and-error approach to discovering the exact formula that would bring out the best of him as a leading musician. He tested the post-band waters early on with collaborations that adhered more to what he thought was expected of him, then packaged his understanding of grief, resilience, and romance into his self-reflective debut album Walls. He only got to perform two live shows after the record’s January 2020 release before the pandemic sent him packing, but those stops in Barcelona and Madrid were enough for him to realize that was the secret ingredient: the fans, the volume, the energy.
Tomlinson kept the prospect of presenting his follow-up, Faith in the Future, to an audience at the front of his mind while creating the album, but he also gave himself the grace to allow the record to come to him in creative waves, rather than racing to an impending finish line. He didn’t need to catch up to where he, or anyone else, thought he should be: It was more a matter of coming to an understanding of a clear, cohesive goal and mapping out a blueprint to achieve it.
What emerged from Tomlinson’s intuitive writing and recording process was a pop/rock-oriented collection of songs that the singer says refueled his confidence and added layers of depth to the musical presentation of his mind’s inner workings. With the sophomore solo set arriving today (Nov. 11), the singer-songwriter answered Billboard’s 20 questions about communicating his creative vision to new collaborators, maintaining an authentic connection with his fans, and leaving ego out of his songwriting and live shows.
1. You’re in the process of filming a documentary – do you have a favorite music documentary that you’ve seen?
They’ve done two or three, but there’s an amazing Red Hot Chili Peppers one on YouTube, forget what it’s called. They’re making one of the albums. As a music fan, [it’s] just really, really interesting to watch through the process — and especially, you know, a band that are very different to anything I’ve ever experienced. So really inspiring and interesting.
2. How does the process of capturing your life on film contextualize how you reflect on your growth and progress?
It’s funny, really, because any time I’ve been watching different edits of it, you look at it in quite a clinical manner. You’re very aware that it’s you and it’s your story. But I think at the moment, because it’s kind of not finished, you’re looking with different eyes. So I’m sure once it’s finished and I really take all those emotions in, that it will be interesting, definitely. But at the moment, yeah, I’m just a little bit more clinical trying to work out exactly how to mold it.
3. How has using emotion and honesty in your songwriting gotten you to the point of being able to write a song like “Chicago,” or to incorporate reflections on platonic relationships like on “That’s the Way Love Goes”?
That’s always been like me bread and butter, really – honesty within lyric. But I suppose I’ve used it in different ways over the years. I think for me, especially on this record, I didn’t want to make everything feel like a romantic love song. And there’s a way of talking about love without feeling so soppy and f–king romantic — like, look how we do on “That’s the Way Love Goes.” You’re talking to a friend who’s going through something about a relationship and still there’s an element of love in there, you know?
But I think it was just about me expressing myself and trying to think with a little bit more depth. I think it’s the easiest concept to come up with, probably – love songs. But I think I wanted to be broader on this record. I wanted to say more. I wanted to have more interesting concepts. But I do think honesty, it’s always kind of come naturally to me. What I did a little bit different on this record was I tried to write a little bit outside of myself and looking at other people and people’s situations, or imagining a different situation. So not writing completely from personal experience, trying to be broader with that.
4. What was the experience of creating Faith in the Future like in comparison to Walls?
I think that was a lot of me working out who I was coming out of the band. And it’s not to say I wasn’t true to myself in the band, but I was in that band and I was part of that band – it wasn’t just me. It took a second to me to work that development stage out, whereas I think I did have a clearer picture on this record. And writing the first album, I can’t remember the period of time that I wrote it, but it was a long period of time from when I wrote the first song, which I believe was “We Made It” to the last song, which was maybe “Only the Brave.” That was a long time in between that, and it meant that I didn’t really build up any momentum.
I’m immensely proud of those songs, but at times when I listen to the album, it kind of lacks that consistency and fluidity. And that’s because, you know, when I was writing the songs, it was over a big chunk of my life. Lots of stuff happening to me. So at times it was moving around conceptually. Whereas I think this record, every song is about something slightly different. But I think there is something, there’s the element of change that keeps coming back. There’s definitely a lot of nostalgia in there, because I’ve been thinking about getting older and all that kind of thing. So I think there is a kind of invisible concept that ties it all together, if you know what I mean.
5. Who are your dream collaborators?
I think it probably wouldn’t be a traditional collaboration. I mean, maybe like, a cool guitarist on the record or a co-producer who produced some of the albums that I love. I mean, Mike Crossey, he was kind of that guy – he produced “Bigger Than Me” and a few of the songs, you know, he’s worked with a lot of the bands that I grew up listening to. I’ve never really got me eye on collaborations, I think, ‘cause I did a bit at the start of me career. Now, it’s more about showing who I am. I’m sure I’ll come back around to that, but my brain’s not really on that wave at the moment.
6. Tell me about how you chose your collaborators for this record. What’s the most important aspect of an artist-producer relationship for you?
Well, first, I wanted to work with people who make the music that I really love listening to, and that hasn’t always been the case. I’ve also not been lucky enough to be in those rooms before this album, mainly. So the benefit of working with artists and producers that work within the space that A) I want to be in and B) that I listen to, obviously just everything just feels more natural. And also, even getting in the room with these people, it builds your confidence. You feel good about what you’re doing. And so in terms of the process, it wasn’t quite as regimented this time around.
When we wrote “She Is Beauty We Are World Class, “Saturdays,” “Silver Tongues” — it was over like three or four days. There was no rushing around for anything. Just when we wanted to write, we wrote. Because it’s difficult sometimes when you sit down in a session and you’re working from 9:00 til 5:00 and you think, “I need a song by the end of the day.” It kind of stains the air creatively. So it was nice with this album having the flexibility of taking the time with each song and not forcing and just letting it come naturally.
7. Because you had that space to experiment, were there trial and error moments where you tried something out that you thought maybe might work but didn’t as well as you thought it would?
For me, it was more in reverse. It was more about taking a risk musically, listening back to it and thinking, “Well, at the time that felt like a risk, but actually listening back, I think I can go further and further and further and further.” And that’s kind of the way that I worked with this record. There wasn’t necessarily anything that we tried that didn’t work out. I haven’t really thought about it, but I suppose I’m pretty lucky.
I think it’s because there was an element of trial and error — but it was much more trial and error on the first record. Whereas this, I had a clear idea of what I wanted, and because I had the live show fresh in my mind, I’m trying to create these interesting live moments. So I just had a much clearer picture in my head.
8. How do you go about communicating that idea of the live show to the people that you’re in the studio with in order to bring that to life?
It’s another massive benefit of working with artists. They know what it feels like to be on stage. They know about that connection, they know how important it is — they understand a setlist, they understand different moments in the show, etc., etc.. It’s a really natural thing. And also, you know, even not as artists, we’ve all as music fans had great experiences going to watch live music. So it’s just drawing on all those memories, really, and trying to capitalize on the unbelievable atmosphere of every show. The crowd. I’m so f—ing lucky to have such a great crowd at every show, so I wanted to make a record to match that.
9. Does that more live-oriented, industrial, Brit-rock sound communicate something through the music that a more structured kind of pop couldn’t?
For me, it goes back to what I kind of grew up listening to and still listen to today. I think on my first records, I was slightly closed-minded in terms of the sounds that I used. And I think it was important for me on this record to be more interesting sonically. And also, you know again, that serves the live show, that’s going to give more depth to the live show. So it was definitely a conscious decision while still trying to maintain an identity that kind of runs throughout the record.
10. What was the last song you listened to?
Let me have a look, I think you’ve got a history these days, don’t you? On your Apple Music? This better be f–king good now. Oh, “Notion,” Kings of Leon.
11. What’s your favorite album to listen to from top to bottom?
AM [by] Arctic Monkeys has got to be up there. Probably [their] Favourite Worst Nightmare, as well. Those two albums were absolutely massive for me growing up, so yeah, let’s go with them. Trying to think of a more recent one. The Snuts’ debut album, I absolutely loved. I loved their follow up as well.
12. You’ve gotten some pushback a couple of times from bands and artists in the more “alternative” or “indie” space for championing that music and trying to make space for those artists where you can while coming from a pop background. How do you think about the role that ego plays in an industry like this?
Maybe that’s just the nature of the beast. You know, I could sit here and say, “I wish it wasn’t there,” but I think it’s maybe always going to be there, to a degree. And there’s times where it frustrates me, but there’s also definitely times where it really f–king motivates me, you know — definitely gives me something to work towards in breaking down these perceptions and preconceived ideas that people have. Just because I was in a band then doesn’t mean that that’s me now. And you know, [there are] definitely times where it does my head in, but at the same time I like the challenge.
13. What does authenticity mean to you, and what do you think it means to your audience?
I think musically it would be hard to put it down to one thing. I think where it’s easier to kind of see is when there isn’t authenticity. Sometimes you can’t put your finger on exactly what that is. You know, it’s kind of a collective intention. It’s within the lyrics, it’s within your concepts, it’s within the way you dress. And that kind of builds up this image. I would even say that the authenticity stretches as far as my relationship with the fans – it’s incredibly authentic and incredibly rewarding, I think, for both of us.
I think it’d be hard to really just explain it in one thing, but I don’t really know any other ways. It’s kind of like, if you’re brave enough, it’s the easiest way to operate. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s sometimes a challenge. There’s definitely days where you get kind of tested. But you just kind of got to stay strong-willed and stay authentic. I think that’s the most important thing as a musician.
14. What’s at the top of your professional bucket list?
Probably [playing] festivals. I have a lot of great memories there as a music fan. Love spending time there.
15. Faith in the Future feels very conversational at times, while also maintaining a sense of introspection. How do you carve out a space for yourself while also leaving room for your fans to find themselves in the music, too?
That was important for me. I mean, conversational lyric – honest and conversational – is what comes naturally to me, lyrically. I wanted to write a little bit more metaphorically at times, like there’s definitely lyrics within “Silver tongues” that I think sound kind of random, but they meant something to us at the time. The first record, I explained what everything was about – but I also made it specifically only about me and my experiences. And exactly what you just said, I wanted to open up and give the fans room within these concepts that of course I can relate to, but so they can as well and it doesn’t just become completely autobiographical. Because, to be honest, that’s a little bit ego-driven, innit?
16. How are you approaching blending the worlds of Walls and Faith in the Future for the live shows next year?
Speculatively thinking about what this set might look like, I imagine it’ll be about 70% new songs, 30% Walls. It might even be more new songs than that and less of Walls. I like to do a long set anyway, but I’ll probably still do a One Direction tune — I enjoy doing them. We did a different version of “Night Changes” recently. It’s fun to reshape those songs and make them kind of fit in line with where I’m at musically.
In terms of the show, for me, the crowd do all the heavy lifting and I’ve just got to do a bit of singing and just enjoy it as much as I do. It’s my favorite thing to do. But honestly, the show is going to feel like a level-up this next tour. Musically, it’s going to be better. But honestly, the show lives with me and the fans and that connection. I imagine if I was, you know, a friend or a parent who came to one of the shows, that’s what they would come away from it thinking, and that definitely makes me really proud.
17. Which artists, dead or alive, would you love to see live?
Well, I mean, it’s really generic and obvious to me to say, but I was never lucky enough to see Oasis together. And I would have absolutely loved that.
18. When you’re looking backwards, there’s grief, and regret, and memories. But when you’re looking forwards, there’s a lot of uncertainty, but also optimism, hopefully. What keeps you grounded from spending too much time looking in any one direction?
I’d say I am an optimistic person, so my optimism probably helps with that. Because I think, you know, even when we get emotional on this record, I think there’ll be something within the sound of the production, there’ll be a lyric, there’ll be a melody that just kind of is there to inspire hope. So even when it gets a little bit darker emotionally, there is that hope at the end of it. And that was important for me across this record, really. In terms of staying grounded, I’ve just got a good group of people around me. I’m lucky for that. It makes everything a little bit more bearable.
19. When you think about legacy and impact – when you look back on your career years and years down the line – what do you want to be the most defining element of all that you’ve done?
I think actually, as much as this album is about the fans and about those live moments — when I listen back to this album, even today, what makes me proud is this is the record I want to make and I always wanted to make. So if I still have that feeling in two years, which I imagine I will, that’s how I want to remember it individually. That will definitely give me confidence for the rest of my career. And it already has. I really feel comfortable in what I’m doing and again, it all comes back to the fanbase. They’re the people who allow me to do what I want to do.
20. You have a 31st birthday coming up soon. What have your thirties taught you about yourself so far?
F–king hell, I’ve only been thirty for some months. What’s it taught me about meself? Maybe that I need to grow up a little bit.
Ordering a plate of flautas at his favorite Mexican restaurant in Lincoln Heights, Jean Dawson is in his element.
The staff quickly recognize him — not because of his growing popularity as a genre-agnostic indie performer, but as a frequent patron of the restaurant’s Sinaloan cuisine, which feels like home for the half-Mexican, half-Black American artist. He cracks jokes with the waiter in his native Spanish, oozing with charisma as he sips his watermelon agua fresca. (He finds it to be a little “too sweet.”)
Within minutes, it’s clear that Dawson’s personality is a far cry from the elusive, hard-to-define character he embodies through his melange of sounds. His latest album, CHAOS NOW*, has something for everyone, relentlessly swerving between indie rock, punk, folk, country and hip-hop. On cuts like “THREEHEADS*” and “0-HEROES*,” we find the 26-year-old Tijuana native yelling an anthemic chorus at the top of his lungs, sandwiched between rap-cadence verses. For the cinematic album closer, PIRATE RADIO*, he delivers gentle country-tinged melodies and reflective lyrics, a soft exhale to follow the high-intensity tracks before it. As the title suggests, CHAOS NOW* is beautifully impossible to place, and that’s exactly what Jean Dawson wants.
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“I don’t necessarily fight categorization — I don’t want to go to a grocery store where there’s gum in the milk aisle,” he says between bites of flautas. “Where categorization becomes a problem is when you’re pigeonholed into a certain category.”
CHAOS NOW* reached No. 35 on Billboard‘s Heatseekers chart, with “PIRATE RADIO*” also appearing on the Adult Alternative Airplay chart. Following the release of his album, Jean Dawson clocked in at over 100 million career streams and tripled his Spotify listenership to 1.4 million.
Born David Sanders, Jean Dawson grew up between Tijuana and San Diego, having moved back to Mexico as his mother battled depression. “My mom carried the weight of the world on her back,” he explains. “But my mom also did everything in the f—ing world for us.”
After his parents separated, the singer-songwriter’s father would send money to his mother to help support their family, but even then, it was tough to make ends meet. “I woke up every day and made sure we subsistence ate,” he explains — clarifying quickly, “Meaning we would only buy the groceries for the day. As a five- or six-year-old, my grandmother would send me to the store around the corner to buy tortillas, eggs, ham — she’ll make breakfast, then for lunch I’d go back to the supermarket to get meat and seasonings.”
While his father was largely absent from his life, Jean Dawson’s mother did everything she could to keep her multi-cultural son aware of the entirety of his heritage. “I was a result of my mom’s love for Black culture and my dad’s love for Mexican culture,” he says. “My mom made us recognize that the world was gonna treat us a certain way for not only being Hispanic, but being Black. But one of the biggest things for my mom was like, ‘Never let nobody take away your Blackness.’ She’s like, “Because you are Mexican as f–k. But you’re also Black as f–k.’”
Navigating the in-between became commonplace for the artist, who went on to study film at California State University, Los Angeles before dropping out, and later released his first album, Bad Sports, in 2019. Since then, his sound has evolved with time, but the essence remains the same. Now, embarking on his sold-out headlining tour, he continues forging his own path while keeping in mind the greats who inspire him.
“I’m informed by Prince [and] Michael Jackson,” he explains. “Do I make music like [them]? Absolutely not. But I’m informed by the decisions they made, because they were so them. That opens up a space where you’re not dictated by your complexion or your appearance. Now, it’s going to be like, ‘What’s your spirit?’”
Jean Dawson caught up with Billboard to discuss CHAOS NOW*, his creative process, his upbringing in Tijuana and more.
How are you feeling about the way CHAOS NOW* has been received?
I always go with zero expectation. Maybe it’s just a defense mechanism to protect [myself]. I reference Prince, who said it best: “When you’re putting something out, you look at it as a success before anybody else does.” So my opinion was fully formed about my album before anybody got a chance to listen to it. We tried our very best to [make] something worth the minutes that you spend listening. I’m really, really happy and grateful.
A lot of people that I played it for, they’re like, “People are going to have a super-tough time understanding it.” I feel like there’s a weird consensus that the audience is not as smart as they are.
Did you ever feel any uneasiness about how the world would respond to what you’re creating?
How people receive me never instilled fear in my heart, because I didn’t care to begin with. I’ve gone through all of that. I was judged when I was in high school and middle school. I lost 100 pounds during my junior year of high school and came back extra skinny. People were like, “Do you have a brother that goes here?” I’m like, “It’s me, in a different form.” I found out the shallowness of the world when I was really young.
What was it like growing up in Tijuana?
A beautiful experience. Being a Black Mexican kid, I was always culturally uninformed. When I was here, I didn’t know how to be American. When I was there, I didn’t know how to be Mexican. We lived in a house that my great-great-grandfather built. Nothing fancy — when you used the bathroom, the toilet [didn’t flush]. It’s a very humble reality. My day revolved around doing a lot of studying because my tias were on my ass. I have been raised by women my entire life. My tias would take care of me around the time my mom was going through [something] that was very unfortunate for our family.
What was your childhood like?
We were poor as f–k. And not in a “I made it out the mud” way. That s–t sucked. My mama always had exactly what we needed, never more, never less. By the time I lived in the United States, I was a latchkey kid, so I was alone a lot. In fifth grade, I’d get myself up in the morning, make myself breakfast, walk to school, come back and make myself dinner. I was way too introspective way too young. It f–ked me up. I had my first existential thought when I was like, nine.
My mom worked two jobs: 7-Eleven and for the school district. I’d go to sleep by the time she got home, so I didn’t see her much. She’d just give me a kiss before she went off to work. Because my pops had worked for the military, he gave my mom money to support me and my brother. [But] in all honesty, my mom carried the weight of the world on her back. I don’t glamorize being poor.
Are you supporting your mom now?
Yeah! I fixed her whole house. She lives in San Diego. I’m trying to get her to move [to Los Angeles] because I want to have babies in the next few years. I want to be a dad so bad.
Were your parents supportive of you making music?
They had no f–king idea. My mom always knew I loved music. I used to rap when I was a little kid. When I was in the eighth grade, I was going over to my friend’s house to record, He taught me pretty much everything I know. He taught me how to record, how to count bars. We’d record on Magix Music Maker 6 with a USB microphone.
When it comes to CHAOS NOW*, what inspired your lyrics?
This album, I was having a really hard time toting a line that I was trying to create for myself. I wanted to use myself as a conduit to talk about something bigger than myself. Imagine writing a novel about yourself, without once saying your own name.
One song that stands out to me is “0-HEROES*” — what was the inspiration behind that?
I don’t want people to feel like I’m out here trying to save anybody. I have kids in my DMs saying “Your music made me not kill myself,” and I’m like, “Dude, so unhealthy. I get it and I really appreciate the sentiment, but you need to get help. You need to tell your mom and dad this. If you don’t have anybody, here’s this hotline.” So, I made the song. There’s this part [going] into the hook that’s saying, “Oh, I know I can” over and over again. Having a crowd of kids saying “Oh, I know I can” with this guitar ringing out, for me felt like I was doing something.
What’s your creation process like? Do you like making music with lots of people in the room?
If you’re here, it’s because you’re contributing something. The place is supposed to be a safe space for us to feel uninhibited. I have friends that really like having a bunch of people in the studio, because it adds to that quote-unquote vibe. But not me. We’re not hanging out as much as we are having fun and exploring our own abilities and propensities to do things. It’s kind of like a construction game. You’re not just sitting around on the job-site.
As a Black artist in an “alternative” space, what are your thoughts on how you’re categorized?
I cared a whole lot after my first album. People were like, “You’re pop-punk.” And I [associate] pop-punk to these Southern Californian, predominantly white boys that have gone through a very specific life that I hadn’t. I don’t consider myself punk. And at first, I wanted to control [the narrative]. I’m like, “No, I’m not that.”
Then what would you say you were?
I wouldn’t. I relinquished control. I’m not dictated by [any] perspective. I feel like once I [categorized my music], it would sully it. What I follow a little bit is Freddie Mercury. Freddie was like, “I’m gonna make this ballad album. I’m gonna I’m gonna make this club album. I’m gonna make this thing that’s acoustic-sounding.” He was touching everything in a way that’s just Freddie. So, what do you call Freddie? Well, Freddie was a star.
Do you want to be a star?
I want the music to be bigger than me. The disassociation of myself from the music. I romanticize the everyman, because I don’t live it.
It’s also because I grew up with very humble beginnings. The idea of what a star is, to me, is profoundly confused. It’s very hard for me even to be considered important. I’m important to myself. I’m not a fatalist in any kind of way. But I want to be as big as the world wants me to be. Because then I can open up institutions to help kids make music. Like a sick, state-of-the-art musical recreation center for kids — because I was a rec center kid. I want to have my famous friends come in once a month to talk to these kids for 20 minutes. That’s one of my life’s goals.
What are your goals as an artist?
I think about this a lot. My ethos was to be a proverbial sledgehammer to the door that people have to knock on. I don’t want that door to ever be closed. I want that s–t to be stuck open so you could just run in. It became less about genre-defining and [more about] generational-defining.
But no matter what I say I want music to accomplish, it’s not up to me. I’m just the conduit. What it does for people is definitely indicative of what they need. What I would hope is that music just serves as a supplement. You plug me in and whatever you need me for that moment, that’s what I’m here for.
For the majority of his now-decades-long career in music journalism, Stereogum writer Tom Breihan didn’t consider himself a historian — certainly not like his father, an actual history professor.
“When he retired, his colleagues threw this big party, and one of them made this speech, clowning him for stopping at the side of the road and reading every historical marker… and I was like, ‘Oh, every history professor doesn’t do this?’” he recalls. “He was that big of a history nerd… I was never interested in it at all. I hated it. And when I started writing about music, it was always [about] what’s happening right now, this moment.”
And yet, when Breihan releases his first book (on Nov. 15), it will be that kind of historical compendium. The Number Ones, based on his popular Stereogum column of the same name, dives into songs that have hit No. 1 throughout the 63-year history of the Billboard Hot 100. Despite starting as a series of short-form song reviews, “The Number Ones” has since grown into a set of thoughtful, funny and thoroughly researched essays — zooming in on the tales behind the hits’ creation and release, and zooming out on their larger place in pop history, both in the short-term and the long-term — tracing a non-linear but ultimately fairly comprehensive history of modern pop music in the process. The column’s following has grown along with it, and even expanded to the site’s comment section, where several regular Stereogum readers are contributing their own parallel commentaries, tracking other chart-toppers and notable releases occurring contemporaneously.
While Breihan’s triweekly column will ultimately hit on all 1,143-and-counting No. 1s in chronological order — he started with Ricky Nelson’s inaugural Aug. 1958 Hot 100-topper “Poor Little Fool” in Jan. 2018 and most recently caught up to Eminem’s “Lose Yourself,” which first bested the chart in Nov. 2002 — the book edition of The Number Ones focuses on 20 particularly pivotal No. 1s, ranging from The Beatles to, well, “Black Beatles.” And though a large part of the regular column is Breihan’s own song analysis and personal feelings — including anecdotes from his own life, unfiltered praise and/or criticism, and a whole-number final rating from 1 to 10 (“Poor Little Fool” scored a 3, “Lose Yourself” a 9) — the book version finds him more in that professor mode, telling the stories of the songs and their cultural contexts without devoting as much space to his own personal takes. (“I figure nobody’s buying the book to read about me,” he explains.)
Regardless, both the book and column are fascinating looks at the last six-plus decades of popular music through the prism of Billboard‘s signature songs chart, digging into the nooks and crannies of both the music and the chart itself as the subject requires. Below, Breihan talks with Billboard about the genesis and growth of his column and subsequent accompanying book, while also sharing his feelings about the Hot 100 as it currently stands, and what he thinks (or hopes) the chart might look like in the future. (Ed. note: The conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.)
When you first started the column in 2018, were you thinking of it as a compendium, a history of pop music? Or were you just thinking, “I’m gonna review these 1,100-whatever songs…”
Not at all. It was just reviewing the songs. I’d been reading Tom Ewing’s column Popular. And it was a really fun read, he’s a great writer. And I was just like, “Well, is there a version of this for the U.S. charts? Is there a Wikipedia page for No. 1 songs?” And obviously there is. And I was sitting there and just being like, “I don’t know what this song is, I don’t know what this song is, this is a gigantic iconic song that everybody knows, and here’s another one that I don’t know what it is…”
And so it was like a “Let me kind of educate myself” type of deal. And in the beginning, I was not writing these long, exhaustive, explainer dealies. That kinda evolved over time. But the column told me what it wanted to be, eventually, I guess. If that’s not the most pretentious thing that anybody’s ever said.
Did you go in with any kind of Hot 100 knowledge? Obviously, you know about pop music, but knowing about pop music and knowing about the specifics of Hot 100 history are pretty different things. Would you have been able to say, like, what the longest-running No. 1 ever was? Or who had the most No. 1s?
Yeah, yeah, I could’ve said all that, because most of the records were pretty recent, and within my living memory. ‘Coz the way the charts have been collated has changed so many times, and obviously, like, when Mariah Carey comes within shouting distance of The Beatles for the most No. 1s, that becomes a news story. I’ve been living in the music press ecosystem for a long time, and I’ve absorbed a lot of this stuff, both as a fan and as a writer. But actually boring into the nature of the way the chart has changed has opened things up for me, and has just been an interesting way of looking at things, that I hadn’t really done beforehand.
When you talk about that ecosystem – when do you feel like it became a thing for you and your peers that it was actually common knowledge, and an actual sort of shared language, about what the No. 1 song was that week, what the No. 1 song of all-time was, that sort of thing?
I don’t know when that became something that all my peers paid attention to. I can say that when I started writing about music, I was into that right away. I started writing for Pitchfork in 2004, and my whole thing at the time was like, “I don’t care about indie rock,” y’know? I did care about indie rock, but I wasn’t interested in writing about it.
I went in there with a chip on my shoulder. I was trying to kind of push my way in as loudly as I could and be like, “Petey Pablo is more interesting than Bright Eyes!” or whatever. And then when I was at The Village Voice, I had to write a column every day. And a lot of the time, when I couldn’t think of anything to write about, it would be like, “Well, let’s talk about what’s in the iTunes top five this week. What’s Flo Rida’s deal? Let’s figure him out.”
I think working in the tradition of rock criticism, where a lot of sort of underground or trendy stuff gets lionized, I think it’s really interesting and important to keep at least half an eye on what is actually popular at any given moment, and to try to see like what that’s in conversation with, and where that came from, and maybe see where things are going through that. I’ve always thought it’s been part of the job, I guess.
When you’re signing up to do a column like this, you’re signing up to write over 1,000 mini-columns – and you might not have had a sense of how big they would get, but signing up for 1,000 of anything is a pretty big investment. What gave you the confidence – and maybe even more importantly, what gave your editors the confidence – that you would be willing to stick with this project for years?
I wonder if anybody thought that I would actually stick with it. I don’t know if I thought I would stick with it. I thought it was a fun thing to do, because I was noticing I had dead time in the afternoon, where I wasn’t working on some other column. I don’t know why Scott [Lapatine, Stereogum founder] thought that I could do this. I was pretty much just in Slack one day, like, “Hey, I wanna start doing this. Can I start doing this?” And he was like, “Yeah, sure. You wanna start on Monday?” And I was like, “Uhh…. today. I wanna start today.” And he was like, “Oh. All right… go ahead.”
You know, I’d been working at Stereogum for a while at that point, and whatever – I get bugs up my ass about things, and I get big ideas. And Scott is a really good boss, and he lets me go off when I get fired up about something.
Was there a particular period of pop history – or maybe even one column specifically – where you remember writing about it and thinking, “OK, now I understand what this column is or should be”?
There were some songs where I felt like… I need to step up to this song. I really need to work on this song, because the song demands it. Like, “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” was one of those. And “Dancing Queen” was one of those. “These songs are so good, and their stories are so interesting, that I really need to write.” And I haven’t gone back and looked at those columns, but I hope they hold up. Those were the ones where I was really like, “I’m gonna really put my whole foot in. I’m gonna really work as hard as I can. I’m gonna figure out my calendar, and be like, ‘This is what I’m doing today.’”
I definitely wanted to ask about the most controversial ratings you’ve ever given, either on the high side or the low side.
Oh man. The one – I think it’s just kind of a little meme for the commenters now — is that I gave “Magic” by Olivia Newton-John a three out of 10. I didn’t have any idea that anybody has any emotional attachment to that song! I don’t think I’d ever heard that song… it just floated right by me. And then the other one that gets brought up a lot: I gave “Penny Lane” a six. I just don’t like that song. Yeah, it’s important, but there’s certain Beatle eras that just don’t – they’re not my bag, necessarily. And so, obviously, I know if I’m gonna give a Beatle song a rating out of 10, like – who am I? But that’s the fun part, you can just be like, “I much prefer ‘Jump’ by Kris Kross.”
Is there an era that you’ve enjoyed writing about the most or the least?
We’re heading right into the period where I was out of college, and I was like, drunk and out in the world all the time….
But that can be a good thing or a bad thing.
Oh, it’s a good thing. I love it. Where I was like, “Jesus Christ, I didn’t know Usher was this good!” Everything on the radio sounded awesome to me. That’s like my ‘60s, is the early 2000s.
And what about the period where you’re like, “Man, don’t want to go back there ever again”?
I’m a little trepidatious about 2010s stuff. Where it’s a lotta like, EDM and Macklemore and whatnot. I don’t know what that’s going to be like.
The ‘70s-into-early-‘80s soft-rock era was pretty rough. That was not my favorite. But even when I don’t like the songs, I feel like the stories are a lot of fun. Every one of these songs has a story and most of them are ones that I didn’t know. So when I find them out, it’s fun to get in there and be like, “Oh, that’s who Leo Sayer was!”
What’s more fun to write, a 10 or a 1?
A 10 is way more fun to write. I mean, a lot of the 1s – you’re getting into R. Kelly or whatever. Some of that stuff is just depressing. Or like…. I wrote about “One Week” by the Barenaked Ladies. Which is a song that I just can’t stand. And there was some satisfaction in trying to rip a hole in it. But I still had to listen to that song a bunch of times! That wasn’t something that I wanted to do. And so I think you can see me taking out some of that frustration in the writing.
There has to be one song that you’ve written about, where looking back on it, you just go, “Man, I had nothing to say about that song.”
Oh, it happens all the time. That’s the challenge. I recently wrote about “Foolish” by Ashanti. Which is a song I never liked, a song I kinda always ignored when it was on the radio — it would just fade into the background. And so the challenge is to be like, “Well first off – how do I write about the song itself in a compelling way? What do I find about it that’s compelling enough to sink my teeth into?”
And also – the stories involved, the people who made it, the currents that brought it up to No. 1. Like, what was happening in the timing? That stuff to me is a lot more interesting a lot of the time than the song itself. And so, when I write about the 14th Mariah Carey No. 1 – it means that I have to get real invested in Mariah Carey’s whole story. I was always interested, but I was never like, super-dialed in. But now because of what she did, and because of the nature of the column, I gotta get real granular: “All right, here’s what was happening with Mariah Carey in the Spring of 1994″ or whatever.
When did you first start thinking about it as a potential book?
I didn’t. My agent, Jack Gernert — who’s younger than me, and was in college here in Charlotte when I moved here — was like, “Let me take you out to coffee. I think this is a book.” And I started thinking about it, and he really held my hand through the process.
I never have to worry about writers’ block, because there always has to be like, five things written right now. But sitting down to write a book proposal, I freaked myself out so hard. But y’know, it’s – I’m lucky that enough people who kinda know what’s going on read the column and were into the idea, that they were able to kinda help me turn it into something. I didn’t know how that would work — it was a lot of, “Who am I to do this?” But I’m super-glad that it’s happening, that I did it, and that I had enough help to really make it work.
When did you settle on the 20-column format as the guiding principle for the book?
When Jack took me out to coffee, we started talking about it, throwing ideas back and forth. We didn’t come up with a hard number of how many songs it would be, but – driving back to my house that day, I was already putting the list of songs together in my head. And that list changed a little bit, but not that much. And I already had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to write about, and how it would all kind of flow and connect.
Is there one that you’ve been showing people the table of contents and they go, “Really, that song? I don’t even remember that song,” or “I wouldn’t have expected that song to be one of the most important No. 1s ever”?
Well, when I mention Soulja Boy, people think that’s funny. I think “Rock Your Baby” by George McCrae is a song that a lot of people don’t necessarily know, but in terms of when it came out and what it represented at the time… that’s a song that I’m using as a way into disco, and to talking about disco and why disco was important. And so because of when it came out, and when it hit No. 1, that song is ultimately more important than “Stayin’ Alive” or “I Will Survive” or one of these songs that everybody knows.
When you look at the Hot 100 charts today, in the streaming era, obviously they’re very different than the years you’ve been writing about – in terms of albums charting 16 songs at a time, and the durations of songs staying on the chart, and so on. How do you compare the charts today to the ones you’ve been writing about for the last couple years?
I’ve got a friend who’s a college professor, right? And we’re out to dinner a week or two ago, and he’s telling me how one of his getting-to-know-you things with his new students is he has them write down what their favorite music is. And the last time he did it, not only did he not know what most of the music that people wrote down was, but the kids didn’t recognize each others’ favorite music. Everyone has their own thing – they’re into like, Japanese chiptune or whatever the hell. My son listens almost exclusively to British rap cyphers about anime. There’s so many, hyper-niche things that – to the people who are into them, they’re like the biggest thing in the world, and to everybody else, they don’t know that they exist.
And so I think it’s kinda interesting that old music is more popular than new music now, to an extent. Maybe it’s always been that way, but it really seems like it’s that way now. Like, the Harry Styles song that was No. 1 for a million years this year [“As It Was”]: I couldn’t tell you how that song goes. And certainly that has something to do with me being an old man now, but I think nothing is as culturally present as it used to be. The world itself is so much more fragmented.
So when something like “Running Up That Hill” happens, people get real excited about that. Would’ve been cool if it went all the way to No. 1. But that it went as far as it did is also really cool. And that something like that can happen is really cool too — that something that can just bubble up out of nowhere like that.
Obviously your column is very successful, but do you think part of that is nostalgia not only for the specific songs you’re writing about, but for the monoculture in general? For the time when a No. 1 song in the country could be known by everyone, and sorta unavoidable to everyone?
Absolutely. I think that that is a huge part of it. And one of the things that’s been interesting in the column lately is that the songs themselves are losing some of the regular readers. So some of the older readers or commenters who have been in it, and reading about the stuff from the ‘70s or ‘80s – they don’t know any Ja Rule songs. They’re like, “What the f–k? Toni Braxton? What?” And y’know, these are songs, as someone who was out in the world at the time, and young — it certainly seems accurate to me that those songs were No. 1. Those songs were all over the place.
Is the plan to go up to the point where you’re eventually going to be writing about the song that’s No. 1 that very week?
Yeah. I wanna get it there, for sure. I don’t know what I’m gonna do after I get it there… but yeah, I wanna catch up.
And keeping this in mind, are you now following the Hot 100 a lot more closely? Are there any artists or songs that are kind of on the verge now that have never been No. 1 before, and you’re like, “I kind of hope they get there, because they seem they’d be really interesting to dig into like that?”
Well yeah — like, Dua Lipa has to get there, eventually. I would be shocked if I did not end up writing about her at some point. I’m mad at Lil Baby for releasing all these underwhelming-ass singles. I want him to get there, because I think he’s kind of a generational artist, and I think he should be in the whole historic conversation. But to do that you need that song.
I’m very curious if “Unholy” makes it. I think it would be cool if it did. [Ed. note: After our conversation, “Unholy” did actually go to No. 1.] But then there’s also like, “Is Morgan Wallen gonna get there? Am I gonna have to deal with that? Am I gonna have to deal with OneRepublic?” And also, what’s gonna catch that Kate Bush wave next? Because that’s not done. It’s gonna happen more.
You mentioned that you don’t really know what happens after the column ends. I’m sure you must’ve given some thought to something like going through every R&B No. 1, every modern rock No. 1, every No. 1 album – have you ticketed a likely sequel yet?
Yeah, I’ve thought about rap songs – I think that would be fun – but I feel like maybe I’d lose a whole lot of the audience, and maybe not gain back another one. I think alt-rock would be super-interesting, but it would turn into such a tragedy. It would become just this unrelenting parade of mush. If I did that, I’d have to give myself a real cut-off point, and go, “I’m not gonna get caught up, I’m gonna go as far as – whatever, ‘04, maybe.” Whenever Seether shows up, I’m leaving the party. Like, I’m out.
I think it would be interesting to look at the albums that have gone diamond. Which is a little bit less of a chronological thing, but – what does it mean when something has that level of sustained interest, where it really really breaks through on an overwhelming level? And there, when you deal with that, you get artists like Shania Twain, who came close, but she never got a Hot 100 No. 1. Led Zeppelin. Stuff like that I could talk about that I don’t get to talk about in the context of this column.
Do you think a Hot 100 No. 1 is going to mean the same thing a generation from now that it means today?
I think probably right now, most people don’t care if Billie Eilish gets back there, or whatever. She has people who do, but I don’t think that the general public does. But something like the Kate Bush story caught people’s imagination in such a big way. And I think the Steve Lacy story is doing that in a different way at the same time. And now you also have stan armies, which is a new development. And they care very much. They care overwhelmingly, whether or not they can get their people up there.
So I think right now, there might be more interest in it than at any time that I can remember. I don’t know if that’s gonna sustain necessarily, but I could see it sustaining. I could see it increasing. I hope it does, because it’s just a fun thing to keep track of. And I think the way the internet works, people love numbers, and they love progressions, and they love treating things like sports – and this is a thing people can make bets on, they can make their fantasy drafts or whatever. It’s one more fun running story line that’s available to everybody.
Also – I don’t know that the general public cared about political polling the way they did before FiveThirtyEight and stuff like that. So anytime you can throw like, numbers and corruptions of justice or whatever into the mix, people get emotionally invested. And that’s all you can ask for from any cultural thing right now. You gotta get people emotionally invested. And the pop charts do that. And I don’t see why they should stop doing that.
Stereogum belonged to the Billboard-The Hollywood Reporter Media group from December 2016 to Jan. 2020.
Listening to Jean-Michel Jarre speak is like hearing a pitch for a French arthouse film that is sure to be a frontrunner for an Academy Award. An early pioneer of electronic music, Jarre’s experiences start in the aftermath of WWII and traverse many cultural and musical eras, across continents and key moments of global change.
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At 74, Jarre only looks to the past to tap into ideas that he can reimagine in the most futuristic way. This is what he has done with Oxymore, the 22nd album of his half-century-spanning career. Out today (Oct. 21), Oxymore is built upon stems and samples from one of Jarre’s early mentors, Pierre Henry, the godfather of France’s musique concrète movement, under whose tutelage at Paris’ legendary Groupe de Recherches Musicales Jarre cut his electronic music teeth.
Continuing the exploratory and experimental ethos of what he learned from Henry, Oxymore, taps into immersive audio possibilities. Conceived in 360 spatial audio and binaural, the album was mixed in binaural and Dolby Atmos at Radio France’s Maison de la Radio et de la Musique — one of musique concrète’s homes. Taking this same boundary-pushing ethos to the live space, Jarre is presenting Oxymore live in-person and as a VR experience. For the latter, he has created Oxyville, a VR world that include a custom avatar of himself and which invites viewers to become active participants in the experience.
Jarre speaks to Billboard from his native France, where despite designer shades covering his eyes, his excitement and passion come through loud and clear.
1. Where are you and what is the setting like?
Paris, in my flat, where I live and where I have my home studio. My real recording studio is outside Paris, not that far. I’m in the 8th district. Every Parisian seems to think they are living in the center of town. The 8th district is nice, because it’s on the west side and easy to get to the airport. It is business, but cool at the same time.
2. What is the first album or piece of music you bought for yourself and what was the medium?
The first record I bought was a single from Ray Charles, “Georgia on My Mind”/“What’d I Say.” I’ve always been fascinated by textures in music, even at an early age. What really impressed me about Ray Charles’ sound was, he was definitely working on texture, his voice, but also his sound as a producer. He was producing sound in a very innovative way at that time — still in some aspects innovative now, this mixture of spiritual with R&B and street art. He had this paradox. My new album Oxymore is the idea of putting two things together which are not meant to be together. Ray Charles is a very good example of an oxymoron by putting groovy textures and spiritual aspect, but also, joy and melancholia. Happy songs, but behind them sadness is hidden. I have really been touched by that.
3. What did your parents do for a living when you were a kid?
My mom was a quite an extraordinary woman. She was a great figure in the French Resistance during the war. She was caught by the Nazis three times, and she escaped three times, even from the deportation camp. She was the central character in my childhood, because my father left us when I was five years old, and I didn’t have any contact with him for a long time. He was kind of an abstract figure for me. My mom played, with great talent and subtlety, the role of a mother and a father. When you are an only child, it’s always a problem to have a mom not being too invasive, too intrusive, and too protective, or not enough. She managed this beautifully, and I really respect that.
We were like a duet, where each of us was concerned about what would happen if we were to lose the other one. We didn’t have lots of money. We were living in the south of Paris, in a very small apartment. At a very early age, I was concerned with trying to help her financially, to try and get some jobs. She always took care of me saying it’s very important to her for get me a decent education.
My father was a great soundtrack composer, Maurice Jarre. He wrote Dr. Zhivago and Lawrence of Arabia.
4. What was your parents’ reaction when you started doing music?
My mother was very open to arts. She opened my eyes and my ears. One of her best friends was a totally crazy woman called Mimi Ricard who opened one of the most influential jazz clubs in Paris, called Le Chat Qui Pêche, The Fishing Cat, where people such as Don Cherry, Artie Shaw, John Coltrane and Chet Baker were playing. My mom would visit her friend, and I would go down to the cellar where these musicians were rehearsing.
For my 10th birthday, Chet Baker sat me on the upright piano, and he played for me. That was, for me, my first emotion in terms of the impact of sound on your body, my first physical experience with music. Every time I think about this, I still feel the air of the instrument on my chest. Because he knew I was interested in music, and he told me, “Melody is very important, but what is even more important is to escape from the melody as soon as possible. That is what jazz is all about. What is important in jazz is sound.” This is something that I always kept in my mind. The electroacoustic music I make is quite close to jazz, because it’s all about textures. It’s all about sound design. Jazz has been quite influential in my life.
My father and I had a total absence of conflict. It’s better to have conflict with your father because at least you have somebody to build yourself against. The absence is something much more sneaky, much more difficult to deal with. It’s like a black hole. You have to build from nothing rather than from something, or against something.
We bumped into each other maybe 20 times in my life. Each time, he would ask questions, but in a polite way. It took a long time for me to accept this. I felt resentment for quite a long time. I realized later — and this is the advice I could give to lots of people, because, as Freud says, we all have problems with our parents, and it’s absolutely true — you have only one father and one mother. Whatever you do, you are the result of that. The earlier you accept this, the better you will feel for yourself. If my father was not able to express his emotions or his feelings — because it was the same with my half-sister, she was exactly in the same situation as me, so it was not because of me — probably something we ignored happened to my father when he was a child, which is why he had a handicap on the heart side. I was like a son without a father.
5. Did you have a job before you started doing music in a professional capacity? When were you able to leave the job and focus on music full-time?
I had lots of small jobs to help my mom. She had a stand at the French flea market, which was really cool and fun. The flea market was where you had lots of artists and writers. I was helping her every weekend, getting up quite early to put the stand in the street. Some people were selling paintings. I was doing some painting, but a kid of 13, 14 has no credibility, so I invented a fake older brother, and I pretended I was selling his work. And I sold some of my art so I was quite proud.
I played in rock bands. We were beginners in college, getting a little money in local clubs. When I studied electronic music in Groupe de Recherches Musicales in Paris, it really changed my life. I started to get money by writing music for commercials, producing artists, doing pop songs, writing pop songs for singers, music and lyrics. I built quite a reputation as a lyricist in my 20s when I wrote big hits in France. I went to L.A. to produce French artists. It was in the days where if you had hits, record companies gave you lots of money for studios and to spend time in studios. I spent time with the best session musicians in L.A., like Ray Parker Jr. and Herbie Hancock. It was a great experience for me. I learned a lot about the studio and how to produce a record. But I always had this idea of creating a link between experimental avant garde music and pop music, which I explored in my own recordings.
6. What was the scene like in Paris when you first started making music?
When I was a teenager we had lots of contact with rock music, American bands and British bands. It was a time where we had a very famous concert hall called Olympia where you had lots of unknown bands. The beginning of Pink Floyd, the beginning of Soft Machine, The Who. Olympia was open most of the time until 4:00 in the morning. This was the music of my generation, but it was not an evolution. When I went into electronic music, I thought, “This is my own revolution. This is where I can bring something different from what I listen to.” It was also in the middle of all the student revolutions in Europe and in the US. It was cool to rebel against everything, including the establishment of rock. Electronic music for me has really been the perfect opportunity to lead my rebellion.
7. What’s the first non-gear thing you bought for yourself when you started making money as an artist?
I think it was a car. I have a passion for old cars. I found a French car from the 1930s. It was an amazing car. I was so proud of it. Cars motorbikes, especially in the ‘60s, were a symbol of escape and freedom — particularly when they’re a convertible.
8. Was there an album that got you into electronic music?
When I started, there were no albums of electronic music. My first attempt at electronic music was by doing it at the music center lab where we were stealing oscillators and filters from the radio station, which were made for maintenance and not at all for music. We were just a bunch of crazy kids doing music with what was considered machines, not instruments. They are still called machines.
9. What the last song you listened to?
Just before this I was doing a radio show called Open Jazz for the release of the album. I had a very interesting session with talking about jazz, and they played an Ella Fitzgerald track. It’s not necessarily what I’m listening to, but it’s what I heard two hours ago.
10. What’s the first electronic music show that really blew your mind?
I’m saying this with humility, but it was my first show, which was in front of a million people. It was in 1979. It was the first time there was such a massive audience, and the first time dealing with mapping, giant projections on buildings, a format which is now very linked with electronic music.
At that time, to perform my music, you didn’t have a lot of choices. In Europe, small halls more for theater or jazz or rock, or you have this kind of multiplex hall where you have Tupperware or Toyota conferences and basketball, and you play music in this place where you have very strange vibes.
I really needed something else. This is the reason why I started to be involved in outdoor concerts. I always liked the idea of one-offs. You have no second chance for the audience or yourself. After COVID, we changed paradigms so much, we are somewhere else.
11. Is VR figuring largely into how you’re moving forward?
I’m very involved with VR, and I’ve done quite a lot of concerts in the past few months in VR. It’s democratizing a great deal for people who have ideas for stage design or architecture. You don’t have any gravity so you can play with things you cannot play with in the real world. People that were isolated for geographic reasons, social reasons or reasons of handicap can be connected live with other people, there is the social aspect of it.
When we presented the beta version of Oxymore earlier this year, we invited guests and fans. We had a Q&A session after. The beauty of VR is we were in the same room and there was a guy from Shanghai, another guy from Rio and this girl from Manchester, very energetic, asking lots of questions. I talked to her after and discovered that she was paraplegic. It was the first time she went to a gig in her life, and she was dancing. This is something which is quite great about the possibility of VR.
12. What is the best setting to listen to and experience electronic music?
Because of the COVID period where everybody changed their relationship with digital interfaces, the development of VR and the metaverse is going to be part of our DNA as creators, and also as an audience.
I’m much more interested to develop my music, ironically, and go back to what sound is all about. What I mean by this—and this is linked to my album, when we talk about VR, immersive worlds, everybody’s talking about visuals, and very few people are talking about sounds. We forget that the visual field is 140 degrees where the audio field is 360 degrees. Stereo doesn’t exist in nature. When I’m talking to you it’s in mono. The real thing is the 360 relationship we have as human beings with our ears and the environment with the sounds of our day-to-day life. It’s quite strange that we’ve had, for almost centuries, a frontal relationship with music.
The fact that you can deal with a totally different space is a game changer. It’s what I did with Oxymore. The specificity of Oxymore is that it’s the first album totally conceived and composed from day one in 360. It’s a totally different approach to music composition. We really have the feeling for the person to be inside the music, and that is the future of electronic music.
13. You’ve already implemented these ideas in your presentation of Oxymore?
What I am doing for the release of the album in Europe is a series of showcases almost in the dark where there is nothing to look at. The only experience is about sounds and multi-channels with 20 PA systems around the audience. The visual side will be VR where I have built imaginary city between Metropolis and Sim City where I am going to play live, and at the same time, in VR. VR is going to be another mode of expression, not weakening live shows but reinforcing live shows like cinema reinforced theater.
14. You said you kept the immersive audio component in mind when making Oxymore?
Yes. For centuries in electronic music the sounds you were using were fixed forever by the person who devised the piano, the clarinet, saxophone. Suddenly, you can become your own craftsman. This is another way to get lost. At the same time, it’s a new territory to explore, a new way of writing and expressing your imagination and your ideas. I felt a huge sense of freedom with this process. It was a huge relief. If I put all these elements in stereo, I would fight a lot to try to make them not a mess. Every sound has its own space, its own place. It’s like putting your head inside a painting. It’s very liberating.
15. Does the fact that immersive audio has moved away from being just for audiophiles and become very accessible as it gets integrated into basic consumer products motivate you to work more within it?
I feel very privileged to have been to have to have lived three moments of disruptions. The first one was the emergence of electronic music. The second one was the emergence of digital era with computers. And the third one is the birth and the dawn of immersive worlds. This one is probably the most crucial one. For young artists today, it’s a real opportunity because big moments of disruptions are always very positive for artists and creators.
16. What is one thing about electronic music now that is far better than it was at the start of your music career and what is one thing that is far worse?
What is far better is what would take me two hours can take me two seconds. I started with tape recorders and when I wanted to make a beat, I had to use scissors and tape to physically edit the tape to make a loop. That was quite time consuming. Now I just do it with a few clicks. The downside of this is because everything can be instant, you have less and less time to think about what you’re doing, because you’re almost doing things before having finished your thought. Every musician will tell you this is the problem: The time between the idea and the realization of the idea is long. Now, we have the reverse problem. The gap in time is quite interesting for maturing an idea, to make it different.
17. What was the best business decision you ever made?
To sell my catalog this year. It’s in keeping with a sense of nostalgia, and also, to reset and to feel, in a sense, like a beginner. It gives me the freedom to do whatever I want.
18. Who was your greatest mentor, and what was the best advice they gave you?
My best mentor was my teacher at the Groupe de Recherches Musicales, Pierre Schaeffer, the father of musique concrète. This whole Oxymore project is a tribute to this French way of approaching the roots of electronic music. By actually dealing with sounds rather than notes and injecting the sound design approach to music composition, people have no idea about how big their contribution is in the way we’re doing the music today,
He told me two quite important things: Don’t hesitate to go to the unexpected, to mix the sound of a bird with a clarinet, to mix the sound of a washing machine with a trombone. This is what Oxymore is about. And he said, don’t waste your time experimenting, because your path is to create a bridge between the experimentation we are doing is here in this group and pop music and the audience. That helped me save a lot of time.
19. What’s the best piece of advice you’d give your younger self?
What people don’t like in you, do it, because it’s yourself.
20. Your life would make a great movie, don’t you think?
That’s very nice. What you’re saying is very touching. There are two categories of people. One category is people thinking that their life is so interesting that it should become the most beautiful movie. The other category is people who probably have a more exciting life, but they never realize it because they’ve been the main actor.
Betty Who is an undeniably big presence. As a woman standing at 6’2”, the 29-year-old Sydney, Australia native has spent a lifetime knowing she’ll inevitably draw attention any time she enters a room. And this phenomenon holds true as she walks into New York social club Ludlow House on a rainy Wednesday on the Lower East Side.
Over the last decade, Betty’s height has also become an elemental characteristic to her brand — that of an Amazonian pop force she describes as “sixty percent lesbian singer-songwriter, forty percent Britney Spears superfan.” On stage, she entrances as a statuesque blonde who’s become a regular on the Pride circuit and a must-see performer for pop obsessives known for her energetic, dance-heavy show, replete with muscled backup dancers, costume changes and unabashed celebrations of queer joy.
However, as she curls up on one of the exclusive social club’s lush, velveteen couches, Betty isn’t dressed to put on a show. Instead, she’s decidedly casual for the day, layering a cozy red sweater on top of a loose, white button-down and black slacks. Pairing a single strand of pearls with a blue trucker hat emblazoned with an oil and gas company’s logo, the whole look projects effortless, gender-neutral cool.
Betty, who was born Jessica Newham, is in New York for just one day to discuss her new album – the appropriately exclamatory BIG!, which arrives Friday (Oct. 14) via BMG – as well as her newly discovered mission as an artist. “Why am I here?” she asks rhetorically. “I think it’s to provide community and try to wipe out the feeling of aloneness and otherness that so many people have when they’re not seeing themselves reflected back.”
When it comes to feeling uniquely isolated, her height and gender naturally play into the equation. “I have had that experience so singularly and specifically being a very tall woman,” she says. “But also, like, so many people feel exactly the same way about themselves that I do. Mine happens to be my height. Other people’s is about their hair. Or their weight. Or their feet… So now if I’m put in a power position to be like, ‘Look! I’m queer, I’m different and I made it here because I embraced it as opposed to ran away from it for a decade,’ I guess that’s what I’m trying to manifest.”
A key part of bringing that newfound goal to fruition meant reaching another level of vulnerability in her music. Take BIG’s title track: a tender, diaristic centerpiece on which she boldly proclaims, “If legends are loud and built to stand out, guess that’s who I’m meant to be/ Ten feet tall and I’m proud of it/ You can’t make me smaller, you’ll never make me fit/ ‘Cause baby I was born to be big” over smoldering synths, blazing guitars and the crash of gargantuan drums.
From the beginning of her career, Betty’s music has always been rooted firmly in the sounds and styles of modern pop. As a student at Boston’s Berklee College of Music, she obsessively studied Billboard 200 chart-toppers like Spears’ Femme Fatale and Katy Perry’s Teenage Dream alongside erstwhile producer Peter Thomas as a kind of blueprint to follow on her 2014 debut Take Me When You Go. But after creatively parting ways with Thomas after three albums and enduring the COVID-19 pandemic, it was an entirely different sort of artist who made her stop and reevaluate her musical vision in late 2020.
“I had a moment driving back from Michigan to L.A., my mom and I did a road trip. Driving. Cooked. Long, long three days,” she reflects. “And we were listening to [Kacey Musgraves’] Golden Hour. It was before Star-Crossed came out…listening to the song “Mother” with my mom. And so she starts crying and I, like, almost had to pull over ’cause [then] I’m crying.
“And I was like, ‘I think this is the thing I wanna do: have feelings and share them and impact people,” Betty continues. “I don’t think it’s about the wig that I’m wearing on stage.’ Whoa. Who knew? Not me…I had my priorities really mixed up for a long time.” That emotional revelation courtesy of Musgraves led to Who holing up in a cabin in Park City, Utah for two solid weeks with her three co-producers, including Boys Like Girls frontman Martin Johnson, to create the album that would eventually become BIG. And instead of taking sonic cues from pop princesses of the 2000s and 2010s, Who found inspiration from a completely different set of references, like ‘80s rockers Kenny Loggins and Journey.
“There’s a lot of testosterone in the music,” she says. “Which is what I wanted. Some of the music that I care the most about is that, like, kind of intense, super coked-out ’80s sound, so overtly heterosexual that it is inherently the gayest thing ever. That’s one of my favorite sub-sects of culture.”
Instructing her co-producers to “think of me as a gay man instead of a queer woman,” the unique approach harnessed a completely new, masculine kind of queer energy in Betty’s songwriting, and even challenged the singer’s perception of her own gender expression by the time the record was complete. While she insists she feels entirely comfortable and authentic using she/her pronouns, songs like album highlight “I Can Be Your Man” — a slinky kiss-off which finds her helping a friend through a breakup by coyly taking the place of her now-ex-boyfriend — helped move her along a path to reject traditional precepts of femininity, ones she so often felt both bound to and stifled by as a female pop star.
“I was just like, ‘Oh, I actually just have to stop subscribing to a bunch of the stuff that I thought I had to be as a woman, and figure out what that means for me,’” she says. “And a lot of it is pulling away from femininity and exploring my masculine side. And then that’s allowing me to come full circle back to my divine feminine sensuality – sexuality stuff that has made me a lot more clear about what that is and what’s really powerful in me about that. But I definitely live outside of the binary of gender, that’s for sure.”
As a body of work, no pun intended, BIG! is also a particularly marked departure from Who’s last album, 2019’s Betty. And though that LP bears the singer’s name, she says it now represents something like a time capsule — one of a particularly difficult chapter in her life after being dropped by RCA Records in 2017. “I was in so much pain when I made that record,” Who says of Betty. “I was pretty in survival mode. And also very in a desperate attempt to prove myself to everybody else. All I probably did was prove myself to myself, that I could make a record without the help of a label.”
However, when she looks back at Betty with the benefit of hindsight, the singer admits the project’s 13-song tracklist, which includes fan favorite tracks like “Ignore Me,” “Do With It” and “The One, feels varied to the point of incohesion. “I think when I listen to it now, I hear all the different wigs I’m trying on, you know what I mean?” she offers. “Of course they’re all different aspects of my personality…But to then try and tie them all together with a short little skirt and a microphone on stage, I look back at her and I literally do not recognize her from where I’m sitting now.”
It’s by design — albeit also somewhat ironic — that BIG! feels, in many ways, more intimate and personal than its independently released, self-titled predecessor. This summer, the album roll-out for the record began with lead single “Blow Out My Candle,” a triumphant anthem that finds Betty fearlessly confronting her critics and non-believers. She insisted the track be the starting point of the album’s overall narrative, and had a particular statement to make in the accompanying music video – choosing a utilitarian leotard and bright track jacket as her only wardrobe pieces, as she belts out, “I won’t stop runnin’ down that road/ I’ll keep dancin’ till I die/ You can blow out my candle/ But you’ll never put out my fire.”
“I’m really trying to get very realistic and self-aware,” she says months after the visual dropped. “And the ‘Blow Out My Candle’ video was a really big part of that, where I was like, ‘I’m gonna be in a leotard, but it’s not because I’m giving sexy kitten. I’m giving, like, ‘Here’s my body. Here’s my face. Here’s all of it in 360. I’m not hiding behind stuff or at an angle that makes me look thinner than I am. This is me.’”
The wistful “She Can Dance” — a kind of autobiographical elder sister to the LP’s title track — soon followed, though Who describes her feelings about the song as “tumultuous,” despite it being the label’s favorite track on the album altogether.
“I wanted to write a brand statement [for the album],” Betty says of “She Can Dance” – though in the process she inadvertently ended up essentially putting her life story to music. And with lyrics like, “Couple records come and gone/ Never thought it’d take this long/ Sometimes I wonder who the hell I’m foolin’/ Got no trophies on the shelf/ Record deal went straight to hell/ I swear to God, I don’t know what I’m doin’,” it’s easy to see why the song would leave her feeling exposed.
Yet Betty’s commitment to radical authenticity — in both her music and her personal identity — remains immutable and bigger than ever, no matter how many growing pains or as yet unforeseen obstacles remain in front of her.
“I’m allowing myself to be seen,” she says. “It feels like the journey to BIG has been gruesome. It’s like that shedding of snake skin. It’s not, like, painless in the middle of the night for me. It’s like the Hulk ripping off clothes, like, fully screaming as I’m becoming my final form.”
Stream Betty Who’s BIG in full below.
Kerri Chandler is an innovator. The legendary DJ and producer, who is looking at 30 years of house music in his rearview, is an out-of-the-box thinker who doesn’t see limitations, just new frontiers.
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Case in point, his latest album, the 24-song Spaces and Places — his first since 2008’s Computer Games. Space and Places was not created in Chandler’s elaborate home studio in New Jersey — which is on par with any commercial studio, and leaves quite a few of those marquee locations in its dust. Instead, over the course of two years, Chandler traveled around the globe, recording the songs for Space and Places at clubs in various cities.
Printworks and Ministry of Sound in London, The Warehouse Project in Manchester, Rex in Paris, Plano B in Porto, Sub Club in Glasgow, Halcyon in San Francisco, Output in Brooklyn — it’s all just a smattering of the clubs that Chandler took over for Spaces and Places. The producer, 53, set up a mobile studio in the middle of each of these clubs when they were empty, tuning each song to the actual venue. The result is a wholly unique collection of house music that gives an aural snapshot of the iconic clubs.
Zooming in with Billboard from a hotel room in Paris on one of his endless DJ dates, the always affable Chandler delves deep into his past to uncover his present.
1. Where are you at the moment?
Where I am mentally or where I am actually today? Both? I’m in Paris. I play Badaboum tomorrow, one of my favorite places. It’s sold out, so I’m happy. I just left Lisbon. Same thing, sold out. I guess people want to get out after the pandemic, and I’m happy they want to see me. That’s a blessing.
Where I am mentally is I have this album out and it’s all been zooming by so fast. The vinyl is coming October 14, but the digital releases is out. It came out on my birthday, September 28. I gave that to myself as a birthday present.
2. What’s the first album or piece of music you bought for yourself and what was the medium?
I have to really think about this. It was probably when my dad first took me to a record store. I don’t remember what it was, but there were a lot of 45s, a couple of dollars here, a couple of dollars there — run home and put the little spindle on.
I think one of my first ones — and this is probably why I love this record so much, is John Coltrane My Favorite Things. That’s my benchmark. And when I could get another record, my Bob James one. That has got to be my first record that I really fell in love with and I had to have it, and I still have it. I had Bob James’ Sign of the Times, so that was a blessing.
3. What did your parents do for a living when you were a kid and what do they think of what you do for a living now? With your father being a DJ, your situation is a little different from most DJs.
My dad was a DJ. My mom was a stay-at-home mom. My mom wanted me to stay far away from DJing. She didn’t like the whole lifestyle, the party scene, any of that stuff. My dad was like the Ibiza DJ before there was an Ibiza DJ. If my mother could have it her way, she wanted me to be a conductor. She got the next best thing, I’m a producer. But she’s proud.
My father passed away. He got hit by a truck back in 2017. He went to the grocery store to grab a few things, some milk and some popsicles. He just wanted to have a little walk, and that’s what happened. He crossed the street, and a truck came running around the corner and hit him. It literally ran him over. He was alive for a couple of days, but he would have never been the same after that. His quality of life wouldn’t have been great.
4. Did you have a job before you started doing music in a professional capacity? When were you able to leave the job and focus on music full time?
I don’t tell too many people this, but I used to be a welder. I was way underage to get hired, but they hired me and taught me, and I had a wonderful time. I had friends and the boss just took me in like family. My friends who were doing the pressing machines had no fingers. I thought I had to look the part, so I had a lumberjack shirt on and my welding glasses. My friend runs up to me and starts slapping my shirt. I pulled my goggles up and my shirt was actually on fire. I didn’t realize my lumberjack shirt was mixed in with polyester. I love welding. I still weld every once in a while as a hobby.
After that, I was a travel agent and I did odd jobs on the weekend. I was an engineer really early and DJed on the weekends as well. 15, 16 is when everything started getting serious, and I stopped the other stuff and I started just doing music.
5. What’s the first non-gear thing you bought for yourself when you started making money as an artist?
I’ve always been fascinated with Porsches. That’s the first thing I did when I got my hands on some money. I bought a Porsche. I just turned 18. I just got my license. I always thought that car was like Batman or something. The first week I got this thing. I was driving, wasn’t going fast or anything, I was turning this corner and I flipped the car over. I got out the car and everything was fine. I’m looking at this thing, black with red interior and thinking, “This is a sign I shouldn’t have this car.” I gave it to my uncle. It was the dumbest thing I’ve ever bought.
6. If you had to recommend one album for someone looking to get into dance music, what would you give them?
The one for me is Larry Heard’s Fingers Inc., Another Side. That, to me, has just had so much incredible stuff on it. Classics, the whole album.
7. What was the last song you listened to?
Can I include my own? The last song I listened to was the one I did with my cousin Aaron Braxton Jr., “Back to Earth (Find Your Peace) [The Knockdown Center].” It’s on my album. I was watching the video, Dolby just put up a feature of it. It was just really heartfelt for me, because my uncle passed away not too long ago, and I told my cousin to write about it.
8. What’s the first electronic show that really blew your mind?
Kraftwerk in 2009 at Flow Festival Helsinki. When I saw that, that blew my mind. The robots and the way they did the things they did, I was just sitting there with my mouth open half the time. I was so happy to be a part of any of it.
9. What is the best setting to listen to and experience dance music?
Definitely in the club on the right system. That’s my favorite thing.
10. What was the scene like in New Jersey and New York when you first got started making music and DJing?
It was everywhere. You could hear it on the radio. You could hear it on the streets. You could hear it in cars going by. You woke up to it. You went to sleep to it. You could turn on a radio station, and you’d have a wonderful friend and mentor of mine, Merlin Bobb, and his cousin, Tony Humphries, was on the other station. D Train was on mainstream radio. Everything from [the record label] Prelude was being played. We had Chic. That’s what we were hearing all day on the radio, Black radio. You’d go to the record store and pick it up. There were DJs everywhere playing house music or house parties and roller-skating rinks. It was so commonplace that it was the soundtrack to everyone’s life.
11. How did the idea for Spaces and Places come about?
I’ve always been a proponent of: If you’re making house music, you should hear it on a dance system. It all started for me back when we were doing Shelter [in New York.] [Producer] Merlin Bobb asked me to do a theme song for the club. I wanted to make sure that this song was tailored to the system so it sounds better than anything you could play in here — especially if it’s going to be the theme song for the club.
I went in with some gear, and I EQed the room the way it would be if you were DJing. I listened really carefully and I tuned everything on that song to the sound system in the room. It just sounded incredible. Everything matched. Everything made sense. I had so much fun doing it, I made up my mind that anywhere I go, I need to make sure that the system is right, and I do soundchecks.
12. So it’s fair to say that you’re pretty obsessive with this stuff?
It got to the point where I’m so spoiled with sound, because my dad and my cousins and uncles do sound systems and lighting. It’s a family business, and I want it as best as I can get it. To this day, I’ll either repair the sound systems or I’ll re-EQ a room. I’ll bring more gear in and leave it at the clubs. I take sound very, very seriously. Even in my house and the studios I’ve had, have always had club systems. When I went to Ministry of Sound, I fell in love with the place so much that I built that system in my studio.
13. How did that turn into you making the entirety of Space and Places in clubs?
Since I was on the road so long and touring, by the time I got home, I was exhausted. I’m in these clubs all the time. I have relationships with these clubs. I had so much fun doing songs in the clubs. The first one I asked was Plano B in Porto, Portugal. I took a bench seat, right in the middle of a room, sat there, and I made this track called “Sun of Sound.” I called my friend up, said, “I need some lyrics with it, can you send me some stuff?” He did lyrics really quick. Now I’m putting them to the song in the club. I’m having fun, and it’s our own little party this place. I’m playing on the weekend, but there’s nobody there. It’s just us going for it. I was like, “This is so much fun, I wonder how many other clubs I could do this with?”
A couple of my other friends have clubs that I have relationships with. And they were all like, “Hell yeah! What do you want us to do?” I came a couple days early, and every single club bent over backwards to let me have the space to do the album. It took me a couple of years to have it all together. Every single club had their own personality. Even going back to Ministry of Sound, the first club I played abroad. I saw all these emotions come back to me for each place.
14. What are some specific characteristics from the clubs that ended up in the songs?
Some of these places had singers that come from the area that I’ve known for a long time. They all have their unique thing. I’ve taken tones from each of these places to build the music around.
One of my favorites was Sub Club. There are two things that are integral to that place. One is, there’s a bingo hall outside of the club. When you’re waiting in line, you can hear them calling the numbers. If you go downstairs, there’s a train terminal behind the building. So sometimes, in the middle of the night, you feel the train rumbling through and it just shakes the whole damn building. I took all of these elements and I put them into the song.
15. Were the songs completed in the club, or did you work on them more in your home studio?
Most of these things didn’t take me more than a day and a half to do. I had all this inspiration and the tones from the club. When I went into each of these clubs, I did a convolution, which is a recording of the sonic character of a room. I run a filter sweep, a white noise and a pink noise signal, and it gives me pretty much the data program of the room. I usually do that for every club. I do it at soundcheck, even the ones that aren’t on the album, just so I have a reference of what I just did. I can go home and my system at home will mimic each one of the clubs if I ask it to. I can put Ministry of Sound on my computer at home, and it’ll turn my sound system into it sounding just like Ministry of Sound. If I want DC10, it’ll go on DC10.
16. You are one of the first people to represent Dolby Atmos in a club setting, and Spaces and Places was mixed in Dolby Atmos. What are your thoughts about the broad adoption of immersive audio?
It’s kind of an easy game changer because you don’t have to get anything. You already have it. You have an iPhone. You have Tidal. You have Apple Music. You pull it up on your phone, you put your earbuds in, it’s done. That’s what sold me on it in the end. I don’t know anybody who even has a 5.1 system, the simple surround sound. Maybe they have one of these sound bars. When they told me you can now do it with headphones, I was like, “Okay, that’ll work.” It is so simple now. And this is where it’s all going.
But if you hear the album on an actual Atmos system, it’ll blow your mind. It really is incredible.
17. What is one thing about dance music now that is far better than it was at the start of your music career and what is one thing that is far worse?
They’re both the same answer. The convenience of bringing music to a club is way better. I can have my whole collection on a memory stick if I wanted to. But at the same time, it made everyone a DJ. It made it much better, and it made it much worse.
18. What’s the best business decision you ever made?
The best business decision I’ve ever made was to make sure to learn business. Learn how taxes work, learn how to set up your business properly, not to put anything under your own name, make sure that you know how to keep the money that you make. Taxes are very important, even international taxes. Get a good accountant, that’s the best thing I can tell you. Don’t count the money before it’s there. That’s another thing: Don’t live beyond your means. I’ve never done any of those things, but I’ve seen people thinking it’s never going to be a rainy day, and they end up crashing, burning and destitute.
19. Who was your greatest mentor and what was the best advice they gave you?
My grandfather, more so than my dad. But also my dad, even though he’s given terrible advice at times. One thing in particular, and we would always joke about it: “The squeaky wheel gets the oil.” If you’re not going to say anything, no one’s going to notice you. That’s one thing I live by. You have to speak up. Because if you don’t try something, if you don’t do something, you’ll get passed by. It’s not just going to come to you. You have to be a little aggressive in what you do with yourself. What I got from my grandfather was: “Become the best person you can be, and stay humble.”
20. What is the best piece of advice you’d give your younger self?
Be careful who you trust.