Songwriter Spotlight: Jasmine Knight “Every artist, no matter what level or calibre they are, inspires me.”
Songwriter Spotlight: Jasmine Knight
Jasmine Knight is a singer-songwriter, an advocate for authenticity, and a genuine voice for UK underground dance music in the UK. Ed caught up with her to get insights into her songwriting process, talk about her love for drum and bass, and the importance of authenticity and rawness in underground music.
How did the environment you grew up in influence you to make music?
So, I grew up in Lewisham in Southeast London. I didn’t hang around with the best people, so I got myself into a lot of trouble, like some young teens I guess. That just kind of influenced me to just be better, want more, and just realise my worth. A lot of the people that I was around, they didn’t really have much inspiration, and they weren’t really inspired to do much. I always knew deep down that I wanted to be somebody, I wanted to make something of my life, and I just had this burning desire in me to do music and that became like a way of expressing myself. I did music production as well, which was a way of expressing myself, but then the top line writing, that was the main thing. So even though the upbringing around there wasn’t that great, it inspired a lot of music and passion inside of me.
Can you talk us through the particular moment in your life that led you to start creating music?
I’ve always known that I’ve been creative from a very young age. I was doing poetry, I think I was eight years old and I got one of my poems published in a book. So, I’ve always known I was creative and then I always knew that I wanted to be a singer, but at the time because when I was so young I didn’t have the confidence to be a singer. So I thought “okay, maybe I could do something in the background”, which is where the music production came in. At that time I was still quite young, I got kicked out of school when I was 13, and I just never got on with all that academic stuff, it just wasn’t me. At the time everyone was like, “don’t do music, that’s not going to get you anywhere…you don’t look like a singer, you’re never going to make it.” But I just didn’t care about what people said, I just couldn’t focus on all these classes and my mom and dad pushing me with GCSEs and everything. And one day I was just like, “I’m sorry, but I’m not doing that!”
Who are your biggest influences? And what inspires your music most?
I don’t really have a specific person who massively influences me. Every artist, in a way, no matter what level or calibre they are, inspires me. Just seeing people be themselves. I don’t have this one person that I look up to, my mind’s not like that.
What inspires my music most is just life experience, everything that I’ve been through, and just finding a way to work through all of that emotion and trying to understand life, why it’s happened, what I’m doing here, all that good stuff.
Generally just seeing other people be creative in their own way or it could be maybe I’ve seen someone do something and I’m like, “oh, I like that, they’ve inspired me to do something similar or in my own way” Yeah, just artists in general, just people being who they really are. I mean, the genuine ones…there are some that just kind of follow the hype and just do things to get more views and all that kind of stuff, but when I see someone who’s authentic, then they inspire me just by being them. You can really tell as well, you can really tell who’s just following someone else or just copying. They always say, “Be Inspired, but never copy.”
What’s your favourite thing about drum and bass music, and being a part of the scene?
DnB is like my first love. It’s just the feeling that it gives me, it just connects to me in a way that I just can’t describe. Also, the culture of drum and bass. I mean, when I first went to a drum and bass rave, everyone was just in their tracksuits, everyone was just so happy and friendly, they didn’t give a f**k, you know? ‘Cause normally when I was growing up, I would go to a UK garage rave or an R&B night, and everyone was a bit snooty and had to be dressed to impress. Then I went to a drum and bass rave, and I was just like, “wow, I feel I can just be free.”
It’s just in my blood, it’s just meant for me. Everyone’s there to have a good time, no one’s judging, everyone just wants to enjoy the vibes and the energy.
What’s been the biggest challenge in your music career so far?
Oh, that’s a good question. The biggest challenge…to be honest, the biggest challenge I would say would be, kind of like how the industry is now, where you have to wear so many different hats. You gotta be a social media manager, content creator, your own manager, booking agent, negotiator etc. ‘Cause when I was getting into music, it was like, the record label, the manager would do everything for you.
But now, you don’t necessarily need labels, and there’s so many opportunities for artists to do everything themselves. The biggest challenge would be the whole social media thing and really using that to my advantage. Because I would just be like, “oh I don’t want to go on social media, I just want to go on it when I feel like it, I don’t want to have to post content.” And I always thought it was a bit cringy and I was like, “oh my God, if I post, I feel like I’m seeking validation, why am I posting a selfie, this is stupid.” But once I started to see it as a business, it’s part of me now, it’s part of me as a business, then I started to think, “oh right, what are the other ways that I can create content instead of just doing silly dances and looking stupid and pretending I’m singing live when it’s really a recorded backing track.”
I just thought I’d be myself and show more of my personality, because there were a lot of pictures that were very pouty and this was not showing my personality at all. So that’s been a big challenge in music, to be honest.
When I was getting into music, people would always tell me there are so many bad people in this industry…it’s going to be terrible, watch out! But I’ve never really had any bad experiences like that. I’ve mostly met really good and nice people. So, I was expecting to have more challenges because of what everyone else told me, but thankfully, I just didn’t listen and I just didn’t believe that I was going to meet horrible people all the time.
I think from what I’ve experienced, artists that just want to be in it for fame or money because it looks good and they think it’s easy, those are the ones who have more trouble. Whereas when it’s more of a really deep deep passion for artists who just want to make good music and work with great people, they seem to have more of a genuine karma ride because they’re trusting in the process, they don’t care how long things take, they just want to make good music and and meet good people.
What are the main benefits of being an independent artist?
I can work with whoever I want. Sometimes there’s rivalry with labels and they might want to keep you just to their people or who they think are popular. So yeah, I can work with whoever I want. Because I notice a lot of these big labels try and get their writers to work with all the popular people, and for me it doesn’t always feel genuine. I feel like you are seen as more authentic because sometimes I see some people are just pushed with other people, and it just doesn’t feel organic. So, I’m able to genuinely build authentic relationships with other people and because we actually want to work with each other and it’s not like a transaction.
Let’s say you’ve got something signed to a major label, how do you think that would change the way you actually wrote the lyrics to that song?
They don’t like things that are different, they want things to sound exactly the same as what’s already popular. So, instead of viewing the song and being like, “Oh, that’s really nice, they’re really cool lyrics, that really goes etc” It would be like a comparison with what’s in the charts right now, does that fit, does that work, does that sound like that person? Can you write a bit more like this, can you change this word to that? I guess a label’s goal is to be popular and especially the majors.
I remember when Rihanna started getting popular, then all these singers that sounded like Rihanna started coming out and then, you know, like Little Mix or whatever. And then they tried to piece all these other bands together. I’ve had that with a lot of quite big house producers; when they send me tracks, they always send me references of all these other tracks that are popular at the time. And they’re like, “Make it sound exactly like that, sound exactly like this person,” and I’m like, “yeah, firstly we got different tones in our voices, so that’s not going to happen. And secondly, I feel too limited.” I can’t, I have to go with how I feel, I have to write how I feel and then maybe we can, you know, change a few things around or melodies or whatever, but I can’t not write how I feel.
What does your songwriting process look like and can you talk us through how you wrote the lyrics to your latest single ‘Together’?
So with ‘Together’, me, Dope Ammo, and DJ Rap actually got into the studio together and we started writing together. DJ Rap actually had the hook down, and then I took it away, because I work best when I’m by myself. Then I kind of finished it off, or not finished it off, but just added a few extra things.
Usually I like to be locked away in my room and I just put the music on and I just shut my eyes, and I just listen to the music and see which direction and which emotion the music is bringing up. I just tune into the music and say, “Okay, how am I feeling? Oh, I’m feeling strong, I’m feeling powerful etc.” Then I start humming out melodies, and seeing if that melody feels right or could it be better. I start playing around with melodies and then I can start writing words but sometimes words just come straight away.
Can you tell us some lyrics from a recent or previous release that mean a lot to you?
They’re all really meaningful for me, I’m just trying to think if I got any really clever lines. The one that keeps coming to mind is…
“Who do you think you are?”
I know that’s the name of the Spice Girls track, but I didn’t realise that at the time, yeah, is it “Who do you think you are?” was just me taking a stand and standing up for myself. We have friendships or relationships, you know, where people might take the piss and not respect us, or not realise how good we are being to them. When I heard the track, I was just lost in a big whirlwind of people in my life that I was just fed up with. People from the past, and people in the future who I just thought, “Oh my God, they don’t deserve to be in my life.”
What are you dropping this year, and what are your plans for the future?
I’m thinking me and Dope Ammo are going to be doing something special together. I don’t know if I can say exactly what, but we’ll be working even more together this year. People seem to love us working together, I don’t know why. Actually, I do know why, we work really well together.
I’ve started a podcast, it’s not out yet but I’m incorporating music into that. I wanted to talk about things in life in general, but then also have a more music-focused one. I get asked a lot of questions all the time, so I thought maybe it would just be better if I started a podcast.
When can we expect that to be coming out?
Oh, this year [2024]. I’m going to see how it goes and if it goes well, then I’ll start properly branding it and inviting lots of good people on. So that’s exciting.
