Jasmine Thompson is BACK! And she’s brought her new EP ‘Colour’ along with her. The record was co-written alongside music producer Eg White to curate a track list of 5 songs that are a reflection of the new era that she’s beginning. CelebMix sat down with Jasmine to talk about all things new music, working with Eg White and her future plans.
How does it feel being back on the music scene with this EP?
I honestly am so excited, I am proud of this EP and very proud to come back. As you may know, I took a break from music (back in 2017), and I feel energised and refreshed and ready to be back to work on music.
What was the message you wanted to get across to your fans with this record?
Each song is individually giving its own message, but I hope that each listener has their own independent ideas of what the song means. The whole EP is kinda about coming from a darker place and really sharing a positive look on things but also acknowledging the fact that sometimes some things don’t always go to plan but that you can always come back and try again. But for me, I hope that the listener enjoys it for their own reasons and connects with it and that they can apply their own stories to it as well.
Let’s go through the track-list of ‘Colour’ with me and what it was like writing and doing the production:
“[For] ‘Loyal’, it was kind of written in two different parts. It was first written around the end of 2017, just as I was taking a break from music and I was in a relationship with this guy and it was really just the honeymoon stage of the relationship. I went in with music producer, Eg White, and we started talking about the idea of trust and we had this idea of layering saxophone on a guitar harmony engine and that’s the beginning chord which takes you through the whole song. During our first day, we wrote the first and second part of the chorus and I then didn’t see Eg for about four, five months and over that time, I ended up leaving the guy I was with and there was a different story. So when I came back with the producer [Eg], I said to him we need to find a new way of describing the song because it doesn’t feel right to pretend it’s still going on and the story still applies. Eg White, had managed to find a beautiful little interlude section, where he made a piano solo and it had space and emptiness. And then we returned to the third verse with a completely different outlook and it was kind of the opposite of the scenario and it was saying: ‘One day we wake up and we realise that we care about the person that you once were and not who you are now and that things change and people change, but you’ll still appreciate the time that you guys had together.’ We ended up in the next couple of months working on production and redoing vocals, etc.
[For] ‘More’
This song was written towards the end of the EP and we kind of had a deadline of when we wanted to finish it. Eg and I sat down and I told him we were missing a sound. It was important to me that when you do a group of songs to say that you want to have a good balance of production and different moods. So I said that I’d love a song that kind of sounds like ‘Paradise Circus’ by Massive Attack. It’s one of my favourite songs, I think it’s really beautiful. The production and the melodies are really gorgeous and so moody. So I said to Eg I thought it would be great if we tried to replicate that and make a song like that. We started coming up with a kind of darker chord patterns where it came out to be quite self-destructive and self-loathing. It was very much based on escapism. Eg and I ended up getting quite lost in it and when we came back to it; eventually I came up with the idea of flipping the song completely. So, in the production there’s almost like a half-key change, all the chords are really weird and complicated. Eg and I just sat down at the piano for about an hour trying to figure out where the chords should go and it just hit! On the very last day, before the song went into the mix we had a week of trying to finish off the production and as we were finishing more, we didn’t know how to finish the song so there’s a song that I wrote two/three years ago and I’ve got a voice note of it on my phone and I played it to Eg and it’s got a very similar concept and a similar key. So I sent him the voice note which is just me singing with piano and we put it on at the end of the song. I always wanted to do one of those, so I stuck it on at the end, re-recorded the piano over it and added it on top and pitched up the vocals. It was nice because it was kind of like an ode to younger me I guess. It was really fun!
Talk me through the music videos for ‘Loyal’ and ‘Some People’.
The concept behind these two music videos, for me I love expressing things through visuals. The way I came up with ‘Loyal’ was I kept listening to the song a lot and I kept imagining these two dancers around the room turning and turning and I found these video clips on Instagram and kind of paired it with the song and it all kind of made sense and it kind of went from there. I was looking through a list of directors as well and I saw this one guy (SASHINSKI-Jonas Blue, Snakehips) who had worked with one of my friends who was also an artist so I reached out to them and they confirmed that the director was a great and really cool guy. So I emailed the director and sent him the song ‘Some People’ and we came up with a beautiful and chilled concept and we were kind of on the same page about exploring that visually. We wanted to explore young couples and young friends and it was just a very nice and simple video. We had super 8 cameras getting involved and this really beautiful flat in East London and it was just a really nice day. It was probably one of the best video shoots I’ve ever been on, everyone was so fun and happy and chilled. It was really cool to do and it just all got done quickly and it was really nice that everything was really organically done as well.
So how long was the production process of the EP?
Some of the songs on the EP are 2/3 years old. The song ‘Colour’ is two or three years old and the last song ‘More’ is older. I’ve been working with Eg White for quite a while and some of these songs have been saved in the back of my mind, waiting for the right opportunity to come out with them. We started really properly working on the EP probably around April and June (2018) and then Eg went away for two months so it dragged out the process a little bit and when he returned we were all really trying to get the wheel turning to get it finished. We finished the production at the end of September or October.
How does this EP compare to ‘Wonderland’ and ‘Adore’?
I guess I’m a lot more secure in what kind of artist I would like to be. When the last two EPs came out, I was a lot younger and I do really appreciate the two EPs that came out and the experiences that came with it. I had a great time touring around Europe and Asia and just having a really great time and a really incredible career at such a young age. But for me, it never truly represented what I wanted to be as an artist. I spent every day thinking about the lyrics and coming up with the meanings for the music videos and finding the directors and going into the session and doing the production with Eg. There was a lot of control and I had more freedom, whereas the other two I didn’t have as much. This EP represents me 100% and I’m more secure in who I am now.
Who is your favourite artist that you’ve worked with so far?
I love all of them 100%, I’ve had so many funny stories with and different experiences with. I’d probably say that I really love working with Felix Leone who I did the remix for my cover of ‘No Body’. He’s super switched on, he’s a lovely guy and we both were really excited about music and having fun. He’s a really intelligent person and we still keep in touch all the time. He’s always sending me over new music that he’s excited about. Such a lovely guy!
Eg White has worked with so many people in the music industry, how did it feel working with him?
When I first met Eg, he’s a very interesting character, in a really positive way but sometimes people don’t really know how to act around him. Just before I met him for the first time, I remember cause when I was younger, I was quite anxious and very scared of people and my managers were scared that he’d be the kind of person that I’d get scared of. So they said to me, just be careful. He’s a big guy, he’s had a lot of success before, so act accordingly and do your thing. As soon as I went in, it was so much fun, I just thought he was this guy who just loved music. There wasn’t this air about him that showed he had so much success, and he was this big guy. He was so humble and so passionate about music, it was incredible. When I was about to take my break, he was very comforting because he kept saying ‘If you’re not happy, then you’re don’t have to do this’, and I was really worried that for someone who’s big in the industry and has had a lot of success, I was worried that he would want to stop working with me and that I would lose someone quite important to the team. We spent every day having fun, there was no pressure. I thought I must be doing something right if someone like Eg for him to have that much faith in me. It made me feel very comforted.
What are you listening to at the moment?
At the moment I love-I never know how to pronounce his name, but Lauv and he has a song with Troye Sivan, ‘I’m So Tired’, it’s my favourite song at the moment, it’s hilarious! My flatmate and I play it all the time, it’s gotten a bit bad. It’s really catchy and I love it. There’s a British artist ELIZA, she’s just released a new album and it’s gritty and dirty and smooth. Everything is very well-done, her voice is insane her lyrics are beautiful. Other people are Paolo Nutini and Joe Cocker who I love as well.
What’s next for you? Will you be touring anytime soon?
It’s definitely a conversation that I’m trying to finish. I do really want to do more tours and maybe just do a couple of support tours and sort of getting out there. Being able to perform live again has been so fun but nothing confirmed yet. I’m definitely going to be trying to do some more shows soon. Really over the next couple of months I’m just gonna be putting out more content, there are a lot more videos to come out over the next month. I am mainly going to be actually in London doing more writing probably with Eg White, probably a couple of other producers as well.
Jasmine Thompson’s new EP ‘Colour’ is now out on iTunes and all streaming platforms. Listen to it on Spotify below! And let us know on Twitter @CelebMix what your favourite track was.