Hitting the Australian music scene with a fresh R&B sound, Jada Weazel is an up-and-coming artist ready to define the music of our youth. With musical icons such as Aretha Franklin and Whitney Houston as her first inspirations, it was only a matter of time before she started creating a new sound of her own. Now, coming fresh off her first opening for an international artist, Jada is prepared to make her mark. Her new single, ‘Otherside’, is an upbeat, happy, feel-good song with popping synths and a spirited chorus. Sitting down with Farrago, Jada explores her artistry and talks about her new single, which is out now on all streaming platforms.
KIEN-LING: I can see in your Spotify bio that you’re inspired by a similar sound to Aretha Franklin, Whitney Houston, and some more recent R&B artists like Snoh Aalegra and SZA. Where exactly do you draw your inspiration from them?
JADA: I think for me it’s actually just the storytelling of their music. The first Whitney Houston song I can think of is ‘It’s Not Right But It’s Okay’: it’s so story-telling driven. I’m not a vocalist like Whitney Houston or anything (I wish I was!), but I draw a lot of inspiration from them through their storytelling and their writing. I’ve always listened to R&B growing up, and it’s the genre that I listen to every single day, and it just comes into the sound. It’s something that I really strive for in my songs because I listen to it a lot!
KIEN-LING: What is something that you like to write about in your songs?
JADA: I sing a lot about what goes on in my life—my EP No Peace stemmed from a lot of dark times when I was in my younger adulthood, so I speak a lot about my trauma. With ‘Otherside’, when I was going into the studio the day I was going to write it, I felt for a while like I was okay, but a lot of trauma crept up on me. I was just ready to write a song that helped me feel good, knowing that there is a light at the end of the tunnel; something good coming, instead of just sitting in my darkness for so long. ‘Otherside’ is about showing and knowing that there’s another side to the darkness.
KIEN-LING: How did you get into music growing up? How did your surroundings influence the kind of music you make and the subject of your songs?
JADA: I’ve always been a singer—my dad’s a singer, and he would write his songs with his guitar and I’d be singing with him. I had a little notebook that I would write in, and it was nothing amazing at all—my little brother actually called me a few weeks ago saying he found my old tape recorder, and I’ve got a bunch of voice memos on there, and he said ‘some of them are really good!’ and they’re really not good at all! I was always creating something, whether that was writing it or seeing it. I think the writing didn’t start seriously until after I went to study music in Brisbane, and I was around a lot of creative people, and I realised I was ready to write my own songs instead of covering songs for a set list. And I just happened to go through a lot during the process of the EP, and it just all happened!
KIEN-LING: Your new single ‘Otherside’ is set to be released today. Can you tell me about the inspiration behind the song: what it’s about, how it was produced, anyone you drew inspiration from?
JADA: I went into the studio one day and I was really upset—I actually cried before the session—because I felt a lot of things weren’t going my way. But instead of sitting and dwelling on that feeling, my producer said ‘I think we need to brighten the mood up a bit!’ and he started playing this more upbeat tune than what I usually write to. I just didn’t want to dwell on anything, and be optimistic about the situation I was in. With ‘Show me the otherside’, that lyric was just very optimistic for us, and we clung onto it and went with it. The chorus melody just soars, and it sounds beautiful; it was something that made me feel better about the situation, and I don’t always want to write sad songs. And the lyrics are really fun: it’s the best of both worlds. I just wanted to have fun that day in the studio, and I think it comes across in that song!
KIEN-LING: Is that why the song is named ‘Otherside’?
JADA: Yeah! You know how they say the grass is greener on the other side? It’s not always, but that’s what I wanted to say in the song. I wanted to have fun with this one.
‘Otherside’ is out now on all streaming platforms.
Photography credit: Minori