Rochelle Jordan - Play With The Changes [CD]

YOUNG ART RECORDS

£9.90

Format: CD
Catalogue No.: YAR028CD / YAR28CD
Barcode: 192641602344
Release Date: 19 Jul 2024
Genre: Experimental/Electronic

Los Angeles-based artist Rochelle Jordan announces her new album, Play With the Changes, out April 30th on TOKiMONSTA’s Young Art Records, and today presents new single/video, “NEXT 2 YOU.” For Jordan, a desire for sonic expansion has long been embedded into her fusion of futuristic and ancestrally soulful R&B. To hear a Rochelle Jordan song is to absorb a blend of sampledelic 90s pop, vintage UK house and garage, 31st century electronic bangers, airy late night ballads, and progressive hip-hop. On Play With the Changes, Jordan showcases not just her own personal evolution, but a path to pushing sound forward. Produced by KLSH, Machinedrum, and Jimmy Edgar, the album presents her as a modern heir in a lineage of powerhouse vocalists with style and imagination: everyone from Whitney Houston to Celine Dion, Aaliyah to Amerie, Kelis to Mariah Carey.

Following singles “GOT EM” and “ALL ALONG,” “NEXT 2 YOU” is an alluring R&B track backed by a 2-step beat and radiant, celestial synths. The accompanying video was directed by Lissyelle Laricchia. “When KLSH first played me this beat, I thought it was so jarring and unconventional that I fell in love with it,” says Jordan. “It really took me back to the days when I obsessed over Deadmau5 and Artful Dodger, but this was a very futuristic sound I hadn't quite heard before. It's as strange as it sounds, as it feels, and is as beautiful and unique as I love for my music to be. As far as the lyrics go, the song is about what it says. I'm trying to get next to you."

Born in London to British-Jamaican parents, Jordan and her family relocated to the eastside of Toronto in the early ‘90s. Her father, a drummer, encouraged her love of art and instilled an appreciation for Northern soul, and Jamaican reggae and dancehall. Bleeding through the walls of her childhood bedroom, the adolescent Jordan soaked in the record collection of her older brother: funky UK house, nocturnal drum and bass, garage, and all the gospel samples contained therein.

Jordan’s first releases ROJO (2011) and Pressure (2012) revealed an effortlessness to her left-field R&B sound, blending sultriness with grit, confidence and a playful experimental streak. After relocating to LA, Jordan’s career swiftly elevated. She toured with Jessie Ware, collaborated with Childish Gambino (Donald Glover) on his 2014 Grammy-nominated album, Because the Internet, and landed a stint doing voice over work for the Adult Swim show, Black Dynamite, where she appeared in a memorable episode featuring Erykah Badu, Chance the Rapper, and Mel B. of the Spice Girls. Jordan’s first complete statement, 2014’s 1021, produced the acclaimed singles “Lowkey” and “Follow Me.” Pitchfork named the latter one of the most essential post-Drake Toronto tracks, calling 1021 “one of the best Canadian contemporary R&B albums of the last five years.”

After a contemplative period marked by spiritual and artistic growth, Jordan returned with a slew of ethereal soul - collaborations with Jimmy Edgar, Machinedrum, Jacques Greene, and J-E-T-S. It all led up to the radiant breakthrough that is her new album, Play With the Changes.
Defying categorization to create a project full of slinky, dancefloor-packing burners that channel her U.K. roots, Play With the Changes is reminiscent of Jordan’s childhood nights spent listening to her brother’s 2-step hymns from the other side of the wall. These are songs of experience: grappling with depression, homesickness, and struggles with an industry that rarely has room for true originals - especially ones who write all their own music. But they are unmistakably songs of triumph.

TRACKLIST:
1. LOVE U GOOD
2. GOT EM
3. NEXT 2 YOU
4. ALL ALONG
5. BROKEN STEEL FT. Farrah Fawx
6. COUNT IT
7. ALREADY
8. NOTHING LEFT
9. LAY
10. SOMETHING
11. DANCING ELEPHANTS
12. SITUATION