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MUSIC FEATURE

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deliberate effort to become, again, a music fan. ”When you’re younger it’s very uncomplicated – or, it felt very uncomplicated,” she says. ”Then it kind of gets very complicated around 14, and then it gets even more complicated when you start [making music] yourself. I think I was trying to connect more with my eight-year old self… before you were concerned about what was cool, or before you felt like your musical taste defined who you were as a person.

Julia Jacklin on the set of the IWas Neon clip, photographed by Nic McKinlay

”I [started] reconnecting with Celine Dion, and those big balladeers that definitely were my first introductions to music. But I was also listening to music that really spoke to me when I was an early teenager – like Silverchair, especially. I listened to a lot of Silverchair while I was making this record, which was kind of nice because I made it overseas, and it felt very homely.” On single Love, Try Not to Let Go , we’re reminded of the thing about Jacklin’s songwriting which we love the most: the unhurried way her voice never competes with the instrumentation. It’s like a dolphin in the slipstream of a boat, or birds flying in a V. Jacklin says she’s been trying to ”unlearn” aspects of her classical training for most of her music career, but still enjoys the comparison. ”I feel like people come to my shows and are surprised about how good my voice is,” she says a little hesitantly. ”When I’m recording I’m not necessarily thinking about, ’How can I show off my voice?’, it’s more about what’s going to work the best for the song.When I play shows, that’s where I have a bit more fun with my voice. Every record [I make], I want to express myself more vocally, but there’s also just self consciousness...”

INTERVIEW

On her third album, Julia Jacklin's songwriting instincts string trembling nanothreads around your heart until you're utterly swaddled in her spell. We spoke to the artist about the magnificent PRE PLEASURE . Words Zoë Radas JULIA JACKLIN

”A m I gonna lose myself again? I quite like the person that I am,” Julia Jacklin sings as she sashays around a modest mid-century loungeroom, the browns and beiges of its walls and carpet recalling the same décor of her debut album cover Don’t Let the Kids Win . Colour appears in one particular hue most noticeable on Julia’s person: neon green. It’s there in her eyeshadow, her elbow-length gloves, and the ribbon of her hat (in the pastoral scenes). It’s totally

evocative of the artist’s second album, 2019’s Crushing , which used the colour in all its visuals. ”I think I’m very self-referential in my aesthetics,” Jacklin tells STACK with a smile, going on to praise her constant collaborator Nick McKinlay – with whom she went to school in the Blue Mountains, and shares a love of spontaneity and ”the same reference points for home, style and colour.”

PRE PLEASURE by Julia Jacklin is out Aug 26, including on JB-exclusive red vinyl, via Liberation.

Continue reading the full interview online at stack.com.au

During the writing of PRE PLEASURE , Jacklin made a

ARLO PARKS Collapsed in Sunbeams

NT: AUG 7 | VIC: AUG 9 &10 QLD: AUG 11 | NSW: AUG 13 | TAS: AUG 14

TOUR DATES:

Aug 7 - 14, 2022

Album available at

XX XXXXX 2020

jbhifi.com.au