Jazzy is putting Dublin on the map for dance music as she releases her debut album.
The Music Week cover star dropped her debut album, Peace & Patience, this Friday (October 23) via Chaos/Polydor Label Group (PLG). It landed the day before a homecoming show at Dublin’s 13,000-capacity 3Arena.
She previewed her new LP in our October edition, as we sit down with the singer, songwriter and DJ alongside PLG’s Jack Duckworth, Chaos Records’ Silas Howison-Waughray, Attention Management’s Jo Eales and Jazzy’s close collaborator Mark Ralph.
Jazzy said that she is “curious” to hear what people think about her debut, which has been in the works for the past two years.
The collection of house tunes, which sometimes traverses UKG and amapiano territory, are studded by Jazzy’s husky vocals and themes of home, identity, positivity, and more.
Last year, Jazzy was the most-streamed female DJ globally on SoundCloud, while her top singles on Spotify – Giving Me and Somedays – have more than 265 million plays each and she has more than 11m monthly listeners.
She boasts three million-selling singles in the aforementioned Giving Me (which topped the charts in Ireland and hit No.3 in the UK, where it has 1,236,608 sales, according to the Official Charts Company), Sonny Fodera & DOD collab Somedays (1,314,964), and Belters Only hook-up Make Me Feel Good (1,469,148), which also hit No.1 on the Irish charts.
I don’t like AI at all – it’s cheating and it’s lazy
Jazzy
A racing green holdall placed at Jazzy’s feet on the cover of her new album provides a fitting metaphor for a life lived mostly on the road in recent years.
“I bring that iconic bag with me as I travel the world, and it represents all that stuff,” she explained. “The album is a big ‘thank you’ to the people who’ve built me, made me the way I am, kept my feet on the ground. I’m glad I’m not getting too big for my boots!”
Chaos honouring Jazzy’s roots was important. The artist was heavily involved in Dublin’s club and hip-hop scene, having formerly fronted the rap collective, Powerful Creative Minds.
It has been a strategy spun out of Jazzy’s ethos – which has been “Dublin to the world” from the start – shared Chaos GM and director of dance marketing, Silas Howison-Waughray.
Putting Dublin on the map has taken “a lot of graft and continues to do so,” he added, but she is “well on her way to making it a reality”.
Howison-Waughray puts that down to the fact that Jazzy is a “unique” artist.
“Being an Irish singer-songwriter and touring DJ, with all original vocals on her own records and a strong creative vision, puts her in a totally different space to a lot of acts in dance music,” he explained. “She’s able to put herself both visually and sonically at the forefront of every aspect of the campaign, which removes the limits of success in our minds.”
Jack Duckworth, A&R director at Polydor and head of A&R at Chaos, signed Jazzy after a lunch in Dublin four years ago. He knew from the off that it was imperative to recognise her background as a singer, songwriter, DJ and raver.
“It’s always been about making sure she’s had one foot in the underground and the other in the crossover world,” explained Duckworth. “We wanted people to know Jazzy was coming from the culture. When we signed her to Chaos, she was well rooted in the D12 [postcode] Dublin house scene, which was popping off. She’d just come off the back of Make Me Feel Good. We knew we needed to be fluid and nimble.”
A common move in electronic music is to roll out a steady stream of releases. Fans expect it, too.
“We set out a regular flow,” continued Duckworth. “Some tracks would cater to Jazzy’s club audience and others to her crossover one.”
Those crossover tunes include No Bad Vibes, her 2024 collaboration with Zambian-British DJ Kilimanjaro, which takes its cues from the slow, protracted beats of amapiano as well as Afro house.
Securing the “right” collaborations, including High On Me, a No.18 single released last year with Rossi, has been key to “really super-charging the project”, Duckworth added. “To quote Paddy McLean,” he said, nodding to the Chaos co-GM, “we wanted ‘to be everywhere, anywhere, all at once’.”
Howison-Waughray echoed those sentiments. “The primary goal for both the label and Jazzy from the outset was long-term artist development,” he said. “This album is the biggest moment in her journey and we have high expectations in the UK, Ireland and globally, but it’s another milestone in a long career that will stand the test of time and continue to evolve.”
This album is the biggest moment in her journey and we have high expectations
Silas Howison-Waughray
Elsewhere in the interview, Jazzy spoke about her continued passion for club culture, and just how vital it is to keep that part of the music industry’s economy healthy.
“Right now, there are probably only two clubs in Dublin that are credible – Index and Block – and they’re basically running the whole club scene,” Jazzy said.
She called for “solutions and support” from the authorities, and welcomed a similar scheme in her home country as the £1 grassroots levy in the UK.
“With the club scene in Dublin, there’s literally so much talent, but they don’t have anywhere to play,” she added.
Among other topics, Music Week broached AI and music making with the dance sensation. Would she ever consider using generative AI in her own music?
“I don’t like it at all,” Jazzy answered. “It’s cheating; it’s lazy. If you want to be an artist and you want to make music, why are you letting a computer do it for you? It should come from the heart.”
Subscribers can read the full interview with Jazzy and her team here.
PHOTO: Seb Luke-Virgo
