This week I have had the absolute pleasure of listening to Chicago-based singer, poet and songwriter, Jamila Woods. I was unfamiliar with her work until now and let me tell you, it’s fucking cool.

There’s a lot of identity politics and black history put not just into her music but also the skits, intros and interludes on both of her excellent albums, HEAVN and LEGACY! LEGACY! On her latest single, Tides, Woods takes more of a r ‘n’ b lo-fi approach that shows the breadth of her talent.

What I find most transformative about this project is finding musicians who are not in my immediate orbit, and digging into a world I don’t know of. With Jamila Woods, you have a talent accompanied by a level of success that I wasn’t aware of because I’m a 35-year-old who doesn’t go looking for the cool stuff anymore and accepts that his taste in music hasn’t changed in close to 20 years. It’s such a gift, therefore, to find an extraordinary talent like this and revel in what they do.

Thank you for opening my eyes to this.

This week, I have mostly been listening to French singer-songwriter, Soko. My thanks to my good friend Steph for the recommendation. This feels very you.

Stephanie Alexandra Mina Sokolinski (great name) was born in Bordeaux, France – a place I only know of because of its association with the popular Booze Cruises of my childhood. She’s had international success, including collaborations and samples of her tracks so more should be known of her work.

Interestingly, she’s also appeared on bills with Peter Doherty, Babyshambles, Kate Nash, Nouvelle Vague, Daniel Johnston, Foster The People and Johnny Borrell so I’m amazed I’ve not seen her before.

When it comes to her music, there’s a Mac DeMarco surf rock coolness to what she does as well as that sexy French confidence which we certainly lack in the same way on this side of Le Channel. On songs like Being Sad Is Not A Crime and Sweet Sound of Ignorance, I can immediately hear not only why Steph recommended her but also why she thought I would too.

As ever, I should listen to her more.

This week, I have mostly a boil in the bag sack of rice (it’s too hot and my innards are soggy) but I have very much been enjoying listening to Cesária Evora.

Now, I don’t know much about Cape Verde so this has been a real education. In fact, what I know about Cape Verde couldn’t even fill the 4,033 square kilometres that make up the ten volcanic islands that make it up (thanks Google).

Evora (commonly know as Cize) was also known as the barefoot diva, for obvious reasons. Listening to her music made me want to kick off anything on my feet and dance around the kitchen. There’s such soul and groove to it. Everything feels better and connected when she’s playing songs like Sodade or Besame Mucho.

While it’s not immediately my taste in music (I’m an indie punk at heart), I always appreciate hearing anything with some heart to it, anything with something to say.

I was always going to love Françoise Hardy. She’s beautiful and French and her music has appeared amongst Wes Anderson’s best work. I want her to draw me like one of her French boys.

There’s a lot to be said for music from 60 years ago to which you don’t have a pre-existing relationship and love with a sense of family or nostalgia. As soon as I put her 1962 debut on, it was always going to be right. There’s a euro melancholy and a beauty to the richness of her voice that’s absolutely a bit of me.

Even with my high school understanding of French, there is so much to enjoy in the playful lyrics and flower power era instrumentation.

I’ve also found out that Hardy is still with us and somehow survived lymphatic cancer and being in a coma to then make a full recovery. I hope she is well and happy.

This week, I have been delving in the era of the Top 8 on MySpace with Emmy The Great. While I remember her work on Lightspeed Champion’s Falling Off The Lavender Bridge, this was the first time I’d listened to the English singer/songwriter.

There’s a certain (and I’m sorry for using this word) tweeness present in Emmy’s work albeit brilliant and poetic at the same time. It reminded me of all of the best stuff I was listening to over a decade ago when I was cool and current about these things. In hindsight, it’s odd that someone so prolific and talented slipped under my personal radar. There’s a lot of stuff to unpack across her albums, collabs and work on Austenland which is to be admired.

If Emmy The Great isn’t someone you’re aware of then it is certainly worth asking why.

This week I have been listening to Tracy Chapman. Now we all know Chapman right? It a god-given right that we are born with some awareness there but each person has their own story.

I believe I first got into Tracy Chapman when I was at university because someone I fancied who had been on a gap year gave me a copy of her greatest hits. They’re married now, not to me, and the whole album had pretty much been wiped from my mind until I listened through this week and returned to those days, half a lifetime ago now and was lost in the luxury of her voice.

There’s a lot to be said for Fast Car and Talkin’ but there’s so much more to discover in Tracy Chapman’s back catalog too and this was my opportunity to dig in.

While I may not find myself listening to this every week, there’s something so powerful and joyous in the music she makes that I can’t help but love.

This week, I have been listening to singer/songwriter/actress, Ingrid Michaelson. While I am now very interested in tracking down her romcom, Humor Me, it’s more a case of rumour me when it comes to the stories that she has started working on a musical adaptation of The Notebook.

While it’s clear from her background that Michaelson is very much a twirley, there is a MPD element to her music that means it wasn’t too much of a surprise to discover she had worked with Zooey Deschanel – chief kook.

It’s on songs like The Lotto, Be OK and To Begin Again that her voice shines through, and obviously, that is what we are here for. There is something incredibly charming in her songwriting and that’s a rare thing.

A playlist of my Music Jar 2022 is available here

This week, I have been listening to Yebba – an artist I hadn’t heard of and was unlikely to if it wasn’t for Becca’s recommendation. She’s a lot better at

identifying these new trends in music and knowing about what is cool. 

Yebba is a singer/songwriter from West Memphi who has worked with Sam Smith, Stormzy and Mark Ronson (amongst many others) but it wasn’t until now that I had the chance to listen to her. 

Her debut album, Dawn, was released in 2021 and is a beautifully composed and eclectic mix of songs including Love Came Down, All I Ever Wanted and my personal favourite, October Sky. She worked alongside everyone’s favourite DJ, Zane Lowe, on the project which speaks volumes about the calibre of her performances and general skill. It’s fair to say that her voice is amazing.

Yebba is definitely one to watch and I’m glad to have been introduced to what she does. 

This week has been my triumphant joy to listen to nothing but Paramore.
Now listen, due to me being so indie that it hurt at the time, I wasn’t allowed to listen to Paramore at the time although I do remember “Barry the Castle” (Brick By Boring Brick) as a colleague called it being played on Radio One on repeat in 2009. It turns out, that like now listening to Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance and the like, I missed out on some fun and heartfelt music that was only a hop away from what I was into anyway.

It definitely benefits us all that the lines in the sand have been washed away when it comes to music tastes. It’s never been as fine to listen to whatever you want as it is now and that is a wonderful thing.

For those of you who still have questions, Paramore are originally from Tennessee and formed in the mid-2000s to change hair forever. Their style and sound has changed over the years but there is no mistaking a Hayley Williams vocal. While my limited Google searching shows there have been some personnel changes over the years, something beautiful and consistent remains, and that is a dedication to great hooks, pogo ready pop punk and bright colours.

This week, I have been enjoying the music of Brandi Carlile. Carlile, from Washington, Seattle is a legend in the field of Grey’s Anatomy as well as being a gay icon. Whatever you do, don’t get her mixed up with Belinda Carlisle, who performed Heaven Is A Place On Earth and is probably also a gay icon.

She’s one of those artists that I knew the name of but never took the opportunity to listen to. That’s what the Music Jar is all about though – finding out more about artists that I should know more about and expanding my knowledge on music away from my go-tos.
While this might not necessarily be a bit of me, I can appreciate the space that Brandi has formed in the world and how admired she is as a result.

Songs like You and Me On The Rock and The Joke do a fine job of setting the tone on a legacy of music that sits behind Carlile but it isn’t immediately for me. That’s absolutely fine. I’m glad I learnt something this week and that’s the very least I can hope for.