Grammys’ surprise album of the year nominated (again)

When he was with 2021 Grammys and “Djesse Vol. 3, “Jacob Collier is again up to this year’s album, this time with permission from his pointed, soulful” Djesse Vol. 4. “While his first Aoty Nom found Wunderkind One-Man-band against a mixed bag of female and male greatness (Taylor Swifts” Folklore “won that year), for 2025, is collier surrounded Of women (Swift Again, Billie Eilish, Beyoncé, Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan and Charli XCX), plus a flute player in André 3000.

To state that the 30-year-old Londoner (who has six Grammy victories for his name) is a fan of his colleagues in 2025 cannot say enough about his devotion to music from all stripes. Playing virtuoso levels jazz piano and song opera since 10 (his mother is famous violinist-leading Suzie Collier), Collier made a YouTube splash in 2011 with complex vocal (and videoanel) worry about one thing. “The latter Stevie Wonder Cover caught the attention of Quincy Jones, who began to mentoring and managing Jacob shortly after. In Collier, Jones certainly saw a young man whose technical wizard, instrumental expertise, vocal skill and coping of jazz, R&B and above are reminiscent of his own chops.

“Djesse Vol. 4 ”-The last in a planned series of collapse-heavy albums, another animal hero, a record with Collier’s usual layers of virgin genres and voices tightened to an elegant beaten point of“ over 100,000 votes of the audience from around the world, ”bringing a Air of (literally) good cheer for the case. With “Djesse Vol. 4, ”Jacob Collier is not just a musical marker; He is a sniper.

Collier talked to Black From LA a few days before the Grammys ceremony.

Based on the fact that you are up against a wall of female superstars and that an surrounding flute plate is likely to prove victorious, you want “Djesse Vol. 4 ”could sneak in and win this year’s album?

The concept of “Album of the Year” is fun. It is not objectively true in any scenario. What we have here is a system created by Grammys over the years of albums performed to represent along with each other. I am continuously bowled over believing that my album has been placed next to these amazing artists … especially considering that it is an important, central moment for women in music. I’ve been cheering over this bandwagon for some time. It’s curious to wonder what my album represents with these others … just what it stands for.

For me, this album is the end of a four-album series designed to be a celebration of collaboration with many of my musical heroes, artists of different generations across genres and audiences across the globe. I have been obsessed with the sound of the audience, radically including everyone. So it’s hard to predict how voters will behave … that I’ve never had an album of me in the charts. The metric for how an album finds its people – the goal post is moving all the time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lsqcda2yai

You have an armful of grammys to arrange vocals and instrumentation. With more talents and Victories in these specific skills – shared by influencers like Jon Hendricks and Quincy Jones that were crucial to your career – do you feel like you’re already ahead of the game? Many artists have catchy songs or big voices, but how many can orchestrate?

The idea of ​​an “arranging” Grammy is mysterious, a little undefined. I am an artist who does not fit into single-genre-based categories-not jazz, R&B, pop-so this seems to be a safe space for those creative with their materials. Especially the first arranging Grammy was crazy because I made music in my bedroom in London by myself.

Quincy was a mentor and manager for you. Before he died last year, was there something that he said or gave you that you led into each project?

The biggest thing Quincy gave me was unconditional love and support. Sounds simple, though to Is what we need as human beings and artists: “You go, express the world as you see it, and be honest.” He always pushed the idea of ​​honesty … It was his career – to be honest and bold, even though all decades of his work. He made you want to tell your honest story. He saw something in me at. 18, 19, which I couldn’t see in myself – maybe a way to be expansive and experimental. And we connected early with regard to the idea of ​​being “warm.” Quincy lived and worked through generations of sound, different kinds of events, and what was hip at each time, and what he remained true to was the warmth of his spirit. “Don’t try to be cool. Be hot. “I never forget him and say it.

It must have been a excitement for you to perform on 2024 grammys and play “both sides now” with Joni Mitchell and one of your “vol. 4” partners, Brandi Carlile.

It was incredible. I first met Joni in 2021 when Brandi – one of my favorite people on the planet – began this process of reviving Joni’s musical energy after she was done immobile and speechless in a time because of her brain -aneurism. Brandi’s idea was to get musician friends inspiring and being inspired by Joni. This exchange of energies worked. Shill forward for a few years, and Joni went from strength to strength, from whispers to strong reproductions of her songs. For me is “both sides now” one of the Ultimate songs over time, and accompanying her on piano was surreal. For her core, Joni is a brave improviser. As a person who loves to improvise, I identify with her willingness to change expectations just with small phrasing of melody to suggest something else and always look for the edge. Witnessing that first-hand on the Grammy stage was nothing short of amazing.

Your bend went up by the mention of “improvisation.” Is that what sets you Over the edge – driven to invent with a moment?

I feel most myself when I am a megaphone to other voices, but I combine these voices with deep curiosity and adventure. Whether it means working with my own voice, the voices of the partners or my audience, there is something I feel when I use this palette where the whole world becomes a musical instrument. I can see interesting combinations and collisions based on these materials. Much of it comes from curiosity. … Quincy mastered that thing about being a megaphone for others and doing it in a great way. I am also obsessed with the unusual, the undermining, the irreverent. As a listener, I am drawn to artists who are not afraid to try something else. Joni or Bjork, Stevie Wonder, Freddie Mercury or Igor Stravinsky – people who go there.

Your musical talents are plentiful. Your willingness to experiment with form is clear. However, your increase to prominent character came with courtesy of your colorful YouTube videos. When you go back 11 years, how do you see that rush of fame beyond music?

No one knew what it was all, yet. It made it magical. There were no algorithms to talk about. As a creative person, it’s a cool place to be. So YouTube was a mystery but it was a safe space to experiment – so I did in every way possible to get my fascinations out to the world. And it was multimodal. Not just about the music, but to film all my faces, hair styles, color coordination of my clothes and edit it all together…. At the age of 16, you are full of ideas and ravenous for a marketing market, so I went down so many rabbit holes to suit my fascinations. I still do. You just have to dodge the algorithms.

The “Djesse” series started in 2018, announcing it would exist in four volumes. Listening to the arch of the series is “Vol. 4 “What you thought it would be when you created“ Vol. 1 ”?

I deliberately did not plan “Vol. 4 ”too much … Although I initially planned for all four albums to come out in a year (laugh) in a typical Jacobian way. I knew the first one would be an orchestra, that the second would be folk and acoustic-based, and that “Vol. 3 ”would be mysterious and digital – like coming out as it did around Covid made sense. For a while ”Vol. 4 ”was an unmatched album; Its limitations were too broad and difficult to implement … When I started playing again after the pandemic, I found that I was in love with the audience and realized that this next volume would include their voices as part of my collaborations. “Vol. 4 ”was about the human voice – still euphoric, unifying collide genres and languages, as there are 23 languages ​​on this new album. Works with Brandi Carlile, Kirk Franklin, Anoushka Shankar and Chris Martin – all amazing. Everything I had planned in 2018 went as far as it could go. I would feel euphoric, feel funny and create an epic final – end up with this collision of worlds.

And yet rather than close to something as magnificent complex as the first three volumes, “Djesse Vol. 4, ”is not so much simpler, but rather blunt and punkic. All your usual, dynamic realms, layer-bright layers, all your obvious knowledge of close harmony, micro-tonality and dissonance are at “Vol. 4, ”compressed, more direct and more densely melodic.

I could see it coming when I got to the second volume using what was exciting me. As a writer, producer and singer, I wanted to increase its intensity. One way to do it is to use a lot of materials and pure width. You could do this too by raising it quietly. It’s grounding and pulling you in. You can make everything brighter. My own voice grew with it and I fell in love with the idea of ​​a voice that grew, natural and with intensity. It took me 10 years to learn to sing like that. When I acknowledged, my job was to let the natural intensity of that brilliance and be clear. My skills and interests focused on the different kind of intensity …

You used the words “punk” and “direct.” There is something about “Vol. 4 “That it seeks to give more obstacles – seek other edges – and deal with them in unusual ways. All we can do as artists is to catch the wave and ride it. To your word, yes, it’s more direct. And I can also see what you get to, with the word “blunt.” I would use “sharp” instead. This is a sharper album. Clearer. Every sound you hear has a place and an identity. When I listen to my previous albums, I can hear me finding out.

In the end, this was the first album I wrote to play shows and touring in mind. The first three albums were their own world, designed in the studio, for the studio-very colorful, multilayer’s environments. With “Vol. 4, ”I sought to discard some of these layers in favor of songs that would more easily sing themselves. It gives something more direct. In playing “Vol. 4 ”Live, these were songs that had to fill large spaces.

Without playing a psychologist, your songs may welcome the audience and use their voices expansively, but your lyrics focus on loneliness and seek night. You’ve been a one-man band for so long. Do you think you are making music to emulate the shared family sing-longs of your past with your mother and siblings? And how it comes through most at “Vol. 4 ”by including the audience now as part of your process?

I think you’re probably right. My earliest memories of being a child were toHaving a single mother with three children and our song as a big part of things. I am wholeheartedly an introvert and entered the music industry that never dreamed of playing shows – I have never seen “Jacob Collier” in neon lights. My dreams were to be an alchemist, someone in a workshop with beautiful metal and tools that sculpted things that were visceral and make sense. And it was quite a lonely process, even though it was informed by the world around me …

My first tour ever was the one-man-band thing that was done in solitude. But the need for collaboration and loves my audience did the same crowd my playmates, my bandmates. Having the audience gave me someone to vibe off. Real improvisation is to have that audience in the room with me. So I still build worlds, but – like every artist – I give a mirror, something that gives an opportunity to see itself. That’s what an artist like Joni Mitchell did for me – allowed me to see myself in his work. The mirror I hope to give others is to literally make them part of the band. You may have never met 5,000 people before, but what if it is me who just instructs you and as a team can we reflect each other?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvkuttys5ow