Jessie Ware: Coming out of her shell

Jessie Ware continues on the road to fame with a headline slot at MTV Crashes Cork, writes Ed Power.

Tue, 25 Nov, 2014 - 00:00

Ed Power

AN Jessie Ware become a pop star? Her record label seems pretty confident: for her second album, Tough Love, the Londoner was paired with hit-makers such as Ed Sheeran and Benny Blanco, artists who could pen chart-toppers in their sleep. She wasn’t told to write a smash, exactly — but the implication was there. After a critically lauded 2012 debut, there is a sense that this is her moment: Ware has entranced the critics, now it’s time to win over the music-downloading masses.

You can see why the moguls would have their hopes up. Ware, 30, is photogenic, stylish and articulate — with a swoonful voice and a musical sensibility that moves comfortably between pop and soul. She is equally at home performing in a church in north London — where the new LP was launched — and headlining an MTV event, as she will do in Cork on Thursday.

The only sticking point is that Ware herself seems ambivalent as to whether she is truly cut out for fame. By her own admission she has never been the most confident (her early gigs were attended by stage fright). When she went into the studio with Sheeran last year she was struck by his self-possession: she was mumbly and awkward, he whipped his guitar out and started to work through some ideas he’d had in his back pocket. “Wow,” she thought. “Imagine having that kind of self belief.”

Still, Ware is a good sport and doing her best to live up to expectations. Released over the summer, Tough Love is unquestionably one of the year’s most singular pop albums: catchy, with the sort of bright production radio loves, but also containing an undertow of genuine emotion.

“You can’t ignore the commercial side can you?” she says. “If you have a record label… well, they are going to want you to sell as many records as possible. I was ready to do more direct songs second time out. I don’t think I compromised. Some of the new stuff is definitely accessible —‘mainstream’, I suppose. It was definitely not a conscious thing: I remember pushing back in the studio. I’d say ‘Oh, this is too pop’. There were moments I had to put my hands up.”

Ware is upfront about not being the most self-possessed artist around. The daughter of BBC Panorama journalist John Ware, and a former trainee reporter on London’s Jewish Chronicle, she’s spent enough time in the real world to understand that talent and determination do not guarantee success. You need luck and you have to know how to sell yourself. Though there’s not much she can do about the former, she’s working hard on the latter.

“I’m not the most confident in the studio,” she says. “I mean, you look at someone like Ed Sheeran, his confidence is inspiring. That was really good for me to see. I don’t play any instruments — whereas his guitar was stuck to him the whole time. It was amazing to see.”

There are several misconceptions she is anxious to address. First, she does not regard her Mercury Music Prize-nominated 2012 debut Devotion was, in any way, a flop. Granted, it may have not moved units by the shedload. However, contrary to media reports, there was never an anticipation that it would.

“I was really new on the scene,” she says. “I felt it did well. For me, given where I was starting from, I felt it sold shitloads.”

Second, she wishes to make it clear that the title of the new album does not refer directly to the condition of her love life. She married her long-term boyfriend — a teacher in London — at the start of the year. Many have wondered how she could sing so keeningly about heartache, as she apparently does on Tough Love, in a happy, committed relationship.

“‘Tough Love’ refers to the tension of loving your job and being away from the people that are important to you,” she says. “Love is always more important than work — of course it is. If you adore both, it can be intense: for me that’s what the song and,indeed, the entire record, is about.”

Ware’s accent is standard issue estuary English: the sort you’ll hear in the chattering class hot-zones of north and west London. While not exactly posh the singer is certainly from a privileged background, having attended Alleyn’s, the £15,000 a year private school that counts Lily Allen and Florence Welch as past pupils.

“Florence Welch was a few years behind me,” she said. “It’s funny, I always remember her being very quiet. Then, when I was 19, I saw her perform at a squat party and she definitely wasn’t shy. She was a person whose voice you wanted to hear. She had something about her. She sounded like a star.”

However, it was her friend Jack Penate — a minor pop star currently missing in action — who convinced her she could make it in music.

“Growing up I didn’t know any singers,” she said. “As for the music business — well how were you supposed to get into it? It seemed an impossible dream. Then Jack got signed and it was like, wow,this can actually happen to people you know.”

Ware is looking forward to performing in Cork (where her grandfather lived for some time). She has warm memories of Ireland in general. As a child, she would often travel to Belfast, when her father was reporting on the Troubles. Her recollections of the North are hazy but pleasant and she has always enjoyed playing here: she takes satisfaction from the fact that the first date on her Devotion tour was at Dublin’s Sugar Club.

For now, her focus is on getting word out about the new LP. “Making the album was definitely the most fun I’ve had. I’ve got all these new experiences to put into the record. I toured and got to travel a lot. In parts, it was definitely very glamorous. Right now, I’m a bit tired. At the same time, I’m excited the music is out there for everyone to discover.”