JAMIE MCDELL: A New Kind Of Honesty
An interview by Bridget Herlihy.
Jamie McDell started making waves when she released her debut album ‘Six Strings and a Sailboat’ in 2012 when she was only 16 years old. Inspired by an adolescence that was primarily spent living on a yacht in the Mediterranean with her family, McDell’s musical aesthetic was shaped by the likes of James Taylor, John Denver and Jimmy Buffet, whose albums her parents regularly played.
On the back of ‘Six Strings and a Sailboat’ McDell became was nominated for three New Zealand Music Awards in 2013, taking home the award for Best Pop Album. Her sophomore album ‘Ask Me Anything’ followed in 2015, a period that saw her begin to spread her wings and explore further into the world of music. Unsurprisingly, McDell gravitated towards the environment that had given rise to much of the music she had enjoyed in her youth: Nashville. In 2017 she recorded her third album ‘Extraordinary Girl’ over the space of two days at the House of Blues studio in Nashville with Australian producer Nash Chambers. After relocating from New Zealand to Toronto in 2019 in order to be closer to Nashville, McDell began a new era of honest and unapologetic song writing that has largely been influenced by her experiences as a young woman.
Now back in New Zealand, McDell has just released her new self-titled album; an album that is a predominantly personal, autobiographical collection of thirteen folk/country/roots inspired songs that have been shaped by her life experiences, family, relationships and, perhaps most profoundly, a newfound depth of honesty. It is an album that she is very proud of, and is relieved to finally have it out in the world, especially during such a poignant time in her life as a newlywed.
Congratulations on both your wedding, and the release of the album. Wherabouts are you based at the moment?
I’m at my parent’s house in Mangawhai, so back in New Zealand. I’m usually based in Papamoa in the Bay of Plenty, so from one paradise to the other. We are back in New Zealand and probably based here for a while. We were in Canada mainly for the last couple of years and then Visas ran out, covid got a bit scary and we came back. We were so lucky because we got into MIQ in August last year, so we must have just been before the waitlists and everything started to get really full on. We were so lucky to sneak through.
It sounds like you have had quite a busy couple of weeks, getting married last week as well as preparing for the album release.
Yeah, it has been busy. The weekend before last we got married and went on a weeklong honeymoon and came back. So it has been an exciting time that’s for sure!
It must be quite an undertaking planning a wedding and also gearing up for the release of a new album?
Yeah – you think I would have planned this a bit better! [laughs] But it’s been good. We were actually meant to have our wedding a year before, but obviously, I’m sure like many people, we had to postpone it a bit. So I tried to keep it all pretty relaxed anyway so there wasn’t too much stress; which I will say is impossible with weddings! But we had lots of family help and stuff so that was all great, and its just been really lovely to just jump into some conversations about the album because I’ve been waiting to release it for a little while now as well.
Was the album also pushed back because of the pandemic?
Yeah – it was just that uncertainty around the release and how we might promote it, because everyone is wondering if we will be able to tour this record. I had put a fair bit of time into networking in the States and getting some booking agents and things over there, and we were hopeful that we might be able to release it and then do a bit of a tour around a few areas. Obviously those plans had to change, which, you know, no problem. With the music industry you are kind of adaptable at the best of times. So we just waited on it for a little while. And then, yeah, we found a home for [the album] with ABC and now felt like we… well I know I couldn’t wait any more. I’ve been really wanting to get this out there and just be able to free myself from it I must say! [laughs]
So the gestation period has been long enough and you were ready to deliver it?
Exactly. I think just because it has been such a personal record I have found it quite hard to move onto writing anything new whilst I have been holding onto it. I am looking forward to sharing it and being able to properly debrief on the last few years.
So the inspiration for the album, and the lyrics themselves, are really quite personal this time around?
I kind of have been putting it down to coming into my late 20s, and just being a little bit more curious about my journey, but also that of my parents and my peers. And also being more open and vulnerable in speaking about some of those things. I think as well with Nash Chambers – sonically and vocally– we’ve really celebrated some of the intersections in recording vocals and the tradition elements of country music, and that it is quite an authentic platform. So it’s all kind of wrapped together in this quite honest piece of work. I think lots of artists call their work honest, because it all is, but I don’t really know how else to say it; I have kind of just done everything I need to do on this record.
Would you say that this album is more raw and introspective than your previous three albums?
Its actually hard for me to say that because I have always felt that my song writing style is quite true to the experiences I’m dealing with at the time. But I would just say that with age comes a little bit more ability to articulate, and to also just tap into a little further to what I’m going through and the context of that. I do think I use a lot less metaphors on this record too, and was quite happy and excited about being more literal.
Drawing from personal experience definitely comes through in the lyrics, for example in the song ‘Poor Boy” which you wrote about your father’s story, and the story behind ‘Botox’, which I think is something that most people – especially women – can relate with to some degree.
I think that is an interesting one to bring up as well, because I know for me I have been on my own journey with Feminism, and understanding what it means to be a Woman. And that has been… you know that has its ups and downs as well, trying to find that kind of strength. But I think again what is interesting for me about being this age is continuously being curious and really wanting to grow, and I think that is where a lot of the stories on this record come from.
Hindsight can be a wonderful thing. Speaking as someone in their mid 40s, that curiosity and introspection and the ability to see – and hear – things in a different context or different light as you get older just continues to becomes more and more profound if you are open to it.
I’m excited to hear that because I have always thought…it has always felt to me that my best album will come when I’m probably like 55! [laughs]
The old cliché says that youth is wasted on the young! Would you say that this album sees you illustrate a new level of maturity in your song writing and lyrics?
Yeah, I’m happy to say that. I think it’s just like leaning into the age that I am and also wanting to make music that my peers can relate to as well.
When you say ‘your peers’, whom do you have in mind?
I suppose what I mean by that is sometimes I felt that the subject matter I would speak about in my previous records… like I know my fan base has been a little bit younger, and I think that is through my start and branding in the New Zealand Music industry. I just think that at this age I feel that my age group can kind of get involved and relate to the stories that I’m telling and the music that I’m making now. I think with a couple of releases I had earlier on I was always prepared that it would be made for a younger audience, and now I feel that it can spread around a bit more. I feel like I am finding my audience again, and it will be interesting to see how that develops through this record.
As you move into a new phase in your life, where you are in you late twenties and newly married, there must be a new sense of self-assuredness both personally and as an artist. You have worked with some very talented musicians on this album too!
Yeah, I think being in Nashville and putting time into spending time there, those connections and relationships just happened naturally. People said to me that I might go to Nashville and just maybe I would come across my ‘tribe’. And absolutely that started with [meeting] Nash Chambers. And from there he helped me get the musicians together. Its just incredible the access that you have to some of these players who have just jumped off tour with Alison Krauss, or whoever it might be, and their humility to then agree to come and lay down some music with a random Kiwi girl. That’s kind of the beauty of that place, I think.
Do you have any future plans – as much as anyone can have plans at the moment – to go back to Nashville?
It’s a little up in the air, but I think its is safe to say that as soon as it makes sense I will be heading back for sure.
You mentioned that you haven’t really been able to plan anything, or write much new material, until this album was released. Looking ahead a little way, do you have any ideas in the pipeline that you would like to undertake in the not too distant future?
There are a couple of songs that were written throughout this last year; there are only a few, but the few that I have come up with I am quite excited about. They do feel kind of special, and they are again a new kind of growth. So I’m really just looking forward to getting back into a writing zone again.
Will these new songs still have the same sort of sound? Your current album has been described as being ‘a modern journey through 70s folk and country blended with a healthy dose of roots and rock’.
Yeah – it’s got a bit of everything. [laughs] I don’t know; I think for me it always starts with the song, and that usually a vocal and an acoustic. Whatever genres or mix of sounds… they sort of find their way in there once I’m in the recording studio. But I think in general I do take a bit of inspiration and writing structure from country music more often than not. It could be in that tone, but I guess we will have to find out.
Jamie McDell’s latest album ‘Jamie McDell’ is out now on ABC Records. You can listen to it via all your favourite streaming services, and is also available on CD from your favourite physical music stockists.
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