Music
“We’re not married, it’s just our child”, says Baltimore-born DJ and producer, J.Robb. He is one half of JEMS!, the other half being Oakland-born Elujay, singer, songwriter and producer. Both are the product of peak SoundCloud era R&B, and were fans of each other’s work before meeting seven years ago. Having released their first joint album, ‘GEMS IN THE CORNERSTORE’ in 2020 after virtual pandemic sessions, September 20th sees the release of the sequel, ‘GEMS IN THE CORNERSTORE II’. Solidifying their partnership under the group name JEMS! was an important step forward with this album, “It’s just ways to syphon off certain sides of yourself that you wouldn’t put on your solo stuff.”
Since the first project, both artists have travelled the world, exposed themselves to new genres (with a special UK interest) and most notably, they recorded this album in person. The outcome is a project that holds the richness and references that can only come from looking beyond one’s comfort zone, bringing it back to the studio and putting a fresh spin on it.
Speaking on Zoom between LA and Thailand, the gap in time and space doesn’t stop J.Robb and Elujay from literally finishing each other’s sentences. The mutual respect is palpable as we discussed their natural chemistry, sources of inspiration, and just how important trips to London have been.
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There’s a pattern of artist groups existing alongside their respective solo work. How did JEMS! come about?
Elujay: Originally it was gonna be a collective, we were going to put out a compilation album.
J.Robb: I had always wanted to produce a full project for somebody…You make it onto albums, but it’s really disconnected because you don’t even know when a song is coming out until you get the email from somebody’s lawyer…It definitely was an eye-opening experience in how to finish a song versus start an idea.
What do you think makes this partnership so unique and fruitful?
J.Robb: With the typical artist/producer duos, you’ll have the producer craft the soundscape, and then the artist tries to fit themselves into it, or vice versa. Whereas we’re able to go through each process for every step of the way through the song…Just having an artist who also has the ear to make the song, not just write and sing, definitely makes the process a lot easier. Especially when they have the musical know-how on how to articulate what they want.
Elujay: It’s kind of a telepathic language which you develop by working with somebody that you have tenure with. It’s very intuitive, and that just makes the relationship fruitful. I don’t like explaining myself, it’s one of my biggest flaws…We don’t always see eye-to-eye, but we usually find a middle ground.
J.Robb: The beauty of partnership.
Did you feel like there was always going to be a sequel when you made the first album?
Elujay: I think the people pushed us to do it, it was definitely the feedback. Me and J just started to not really like the album as much, ‘we could have done this better, we could have done that better.’…We just had a little more wind in us…Let’s make the production more musical and add experimentation.
J.Robb: It’s funny, we both ended up just going to London a lot during that off time between the projects. So when we linked back up, he was showing me shit, I’m like, “Oh, I kind of heard something like that,” it was easier to come back and meet in the middle still…Long story short, I feel like this album is just the grown up version of the last one.
Elujay: I think the most important thing me and J did is that we just listened a lot…We were looking at the past and trying to meld our influences and make it more contemporary…J has more of a 2000s/90s palette, and mine was 70s and 80s. We definitely have different tastes in certain things, but there’s a Venn diagram.
J.Robb: One thing about Elu I love is that I may not get it at the time, but he’s definitely always got a vision in mind.
Speaking of the London influence, you worked with British producer Budgie on ‘FLIGHTS’ and Louis Culture features on ‘BMW’. What is it about the UK sound that draws you in, and who are some of your favourite artists?
Elujay: I’ve always looked at people from the UK as pioneers of music, whether you start with Aphex Twin to Amy Winehouse, Omar, Jamiroquai, Blood Orange, King Krule, there’s just infinite sauce there.
When I was younger, I was really intrigued by it. I would go a lot to visit fam…I did a really big deep dive when I was in college into UK garage, I was listening to a lot of Sunship…After that I did a very massive lovers rock deep dive…My family were part of the Windrush era and that music just resonated in a really, really good way. From there I started discovering street soul.
I was a nerd about this stuff, I would listen to hours and hours of mixtapes and then I would send it to J and be like, “Listen to this shit, it’s crazy”. We both just nerded out and I think that’s the most important thing.
J.Robb: The first song I heard from the UK I didn’t know who it was, that Daniel Bedingfield song, ‘Gotta Get Thru This’…Throughout my life there’s always been songs that have stuck out to me, and I’ve come to find it’s a UK group. So going to the UK for the first time and going to Brixton, going out to a club, the shit you guys play is just crazy. Garage or drum and bass or jungle, just that whole vibe. Discovering that fully made me super open and receptive to the sounds you guys produce over there. It’s just divine timing when I discovered it.
Elujay: The UK always has done it the best. It’s so obvious, look at the influence of music nowadays…It speaks to the Black diaspora and how interconnected certain things are.
Lyrically this album displays more maturity. Did you find it difficult to tap into those deeper emotions and lay them out in such a vulnerable way?
Elujay: If you really pay attention to the lyrics, it’s just on some conversational kind of shit. ‘FLIGHTS’ is supposed to be a funny song, like damn this person really made me waste my time and I missed my flight.
‘45’ is a discourse on how social media is in this generation, we lose the plot and you end up not being aware of your surroundings.
‘CREEPIN’, the lyrics are cute because it’s kind of on some, ‘I’ve been watching your AOL page’, early 2000s/late 90s…I tend to talk about a lot of serious stuff in my own work, but I wanted it to be more tongue and cheek and get my fun side out.
J, would you say you’re the lead producer although Elu also produces?
J.Robb: I guess lead producer would be the correct term…I’m sort of like the input machine, everyone gives me shit, give me a few hours and then we’ll have a song. The word I’ve used for this entire process is, “We can try it.” I’ll never say no to an idea because it may end up being something really cool that we’ll keep. Sometimes Elu will be like, “Maybe it’s too weird”, but we can always find a way to make something work.
And can we expect more work in the future?
J.Robb: Definitely, it’ll happen. When the time comes, things just fall into place, and we’ll knock it out.
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Pre-save GEMS IN THE CORNERSTORE II, out tomorrow; and if you’re in NYC, you can head down to the release party tomorrow.
Words: Nicola Davies
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