INTERVIEW: Jess Ribeiro talks her music and appearing at Wanderer Festival in September: "My music is shaped by the environment around me, so wherever I am, that has an influence on me."
Australia’s Jess Ribeiro is the kind of artist that you are never quite sure what you will get with each release - in the best possible way. Never beholden to genre, her sound has evolved and changed multiple times and she has a remarkable talent to authentically inhabit any sound she chooses.
Her debut album My Little River was released in 2012 and is an award winning collection of country-folk music. 2015’s Kill It Yourself moved Ribeiro’s sound into dark and moody indie with hints at times of soul and jazz. Her most recent collection, 2019’s Love Hate, is probably her most eclectic to date, with the appearance of electronica alongside rock infused country and indie.
Earlier this year she released the single ‘In Love With This Place’ which has an indie feel as its foundation but sees her continue her subtle flirtation with electronica. It’s a gorgeous track with a strong political message at its heart. “Bummed out by the current state of the world I sat by the water and imagined politicians “doing time” in nature,” Ribeiro said on the song’s release. “Imagine if no decisions could be made until you had spent time consulting with the natural world. I feel like the people in charge of our planet are disconnected. If they entered deeply into a sincere relationship with nature, they would start making thoughtful and lasting choices.”
This September 23-25, Ribeiro will be playing at the inaugural Wanderer festival, held at Pambula Beach on New South Wales’ Sapphire Coast, alongside artists including Sarah Blasko, Jack River, Isabella Manfredi and Confidence Man. The boutique festival is a celebration of music, art, culture and place founded on the core tenets of sustainability, community and creativity. The line-up was curated to transcend genre and demographic, and alongside the music there will also be a diverse arts program that brings together theatre and comedy, circus and cultural workshops.
We recently caught up with Ribeiro to find out more about her career and performing at Wanderer.
Hi Jess! So lovely to see you today. How are things in your very kaleidoscopic musical world?
Things are really good. I'm finishing an album and mixing that at the moment. So hopefully, by the end of this week it's off for mastering. Which is exciting.
That's very exciting, please tell me about that!
Well, next year, there'll be a new album out, possibly there'll be a couple of couple of new singles before the end of the year, but I'm not quite sure. I'm working on finishing this new album and I'm sure that we'll play a few of those new songs at the Wanderer Festival in September.
I love this! You once said that making a record is a lot like falling in love. Have you felt that with this latest creation?
These new songs came from 2020, just before we went into lockdown. And I was staying at Simon [Daly]’s house who is the founder of Wanderer Festival. He has a beautiful shack in Apollo Bay and he offered for me to go there and spend some time writing new songs, which I did. That was two years ago and that's where these new songs have sprouted from and a few [of them] will be debuting at the Wanderer festival next month. Other than that, we'll be playing music from the most recent release, which is Love Hate, and then Kill It Yourself, which is the one before that.
How gorgeous is that? I'm hoping there is room on the album for April's ‘In Love With This Place’. What a song!
Thanks so much! It was shortlisted for the Environmental Music Award.
It's such a song, it's a song everyone needs to hear. Can you talk me a little bit about where the track came from?
The song came from having time out in nature. I had the great privilege of staying out just past Apollo Bay, spending a week or two out there. It was so blissful reconnecting with nature, after living in the inner city for 20 years or something. It came after we had all of those really intense bushfires, it was just this moment in time of reflection, I guess. It had been such a full on summer period, and so many people had been affected by the bushfires. There was this kind of unease, just before the pandemic was kicking in. I was really down and being out in nature was so beautiful. All you would see on TV, in regards to news, were these men in suits, who seem to be quite far removed from nature and perhaps from communities and the priorities didn't seem to be in line with what I value as a human.
It's such a gorgeous track. How important is it within your career as an artist to draw attention to those social issues that you face and you see our world facing?
I'm a pretty reserved person and I value self expression and creativity to try to transform all of my frustrations. I use music for my own personal understanding of what's going on in the world. My personal thoughts sometimes come out in song, not always, but sometimes. In the case of this particular song, I was deeply touched and I just felt despite all of the terrible things that are happening in the world, there's still these really beautiful places in nature that need to be cared for and protected and for us to immerse ourselves in those places, if we have the opportunity, is really health giving, for us too.
Gorgeous, now, your vocals are next level and your tracks are always very cinematic. Where did your passion for music originate?
At home with my family probably. And just having a curiosity, you know, just loving music as a child and really just wanting to be a storyteller. And being attracted to writing.
You started out in country folk with My Little River, and you then moved on to a little rock-alternative country for Kill It Yourself. And then we had this just eclectic, heart cannon of Love Hate. How do you feel you've grown as an artist as you've experimented with your sound and your releases?
I'm really shaped by the environment around me. So wherever I am, that has an influence on me. And that's good and bad, but my surroundings have a really big impact on the kind of music that I play.
If that's the case, when you're writing or going into the process of writing, do you intentionally surround yourself with certain people, songs, flavours, landscapes in order to capture a certain sound?
I'd like to think so. Recently with the new material that I've been working on it was a different process, because I was really limited in my movements with the lockdown in Victoria. Going back to the single again, ‘In Love With This Place’, I took up the opportunity to go and spend some time out in nature and write some songs, and inevitably, that really did impact what I was writing about.
You've got the gorgeous Wanderer festival coming up and you also have an album coming up at some point next year. What are looking forward to for the rest of the year?
I'm looking forward to playing live again, and I'm looking forward to working on the release of the next album. That's enough to focus on for now, as well as recording new songs. We really are looking forward to coming to coastal New South Wales for Wanderer. I can't believe how excited everyone in the band is because it's been such a long time.We're really looking forward to getting out of a miserable winter here in Melbourne. We want some sunshine and some ocean. What am I looking forward to for the rest of the year? I guess it's good weather and some really nice time at the beach, wherever that may be!
That’s a really good goal for everyone, some nice summer memories. You gotta create your Beach Boys album next!
Well, you know, I've got a song called ‘Summer of Love’ that’s going to be on the new album, so we'll see!
‘In Love With This Place’ is out now. You can download and stream here.
Wanderer Festival is on September 23-25. You can get more info and buy tickets here.
To keep up with all things Jess Ribeiro, you can follow her on Instagram and Facebook.
