Vancouver’s own Jillian Lake is back with a brand new single, “Bleed Baby Bleed”, which premiered on Exclaim! and also landed on Apple Music’s “Breaking Alternative” and “New Music Daily” Playlists in Canada.
Check out the official lyric video below, and find out more about Jillian via our Five Questions With segment.
Care to introduce yourself to our readers?
Yes hi! I’m Jillian – originally from a small town outside of Edmonton, but now living in Vancouver for the past 5 years. Music has always run through me, and after tip-toeing in various forms of art, a couple of years ago I figured I couldn’t NOT do music and decided to finally dive in. I feel like I’m just at the beginning of my musical journey and so very keen to see where it takes me.
Tell us a bit about your music and writing style
Genre is so all over the place and blended now that I never know how to describe my music and usually change my mind, but definitely along the lines of indie/folk/pop. I love all forms of art and creativity, and just hope to write music that evokes feeling and inspires more forms of creativity. I started writing very naturally as more storytelling over top of the music, but now I’m challenging myself to write differently all the time as I learn and grow. I love working with other artists the most, as the blend of personalities and energies pushing against each other brings out something totally different. I feed off of that and get so excited to see what comes out.
Do you have any upcoming shows? For someone who has yet to see you live, how would you explain your live performance?
Hehe sadly not in this whacko isolated world we’re living in, cancelled/postponed for the time being. Music to me has always been about the feelings and the experience, so losing live music has been very strange. When I perform, my biggest goal is to connect with the audience, and hope that from something that I give, they feel something. Whether they relate to the lyrics or the sound makes their body vibrate, or the beat makes them want to dance, or even the ache makes them want to cry (or hey even they hate it and want to throw tomatoes at the stage, at least it’s a FEELING) When the world goes back to normal, I can’t wait to get back up there and share those moments with a room full of people. That’s what’s cool to me about live music is that it’s a one-of. One room with THOSE specific people hearing THAT specific sound. An experience that is shared just in that one moment.
If you were asked to suggest only one of your songs for someone to hear, which would it be?
OOoooOOoh probably “Oliver”. It’s the first single off my new record that’s coming out and I carefully chose it as one that represents the mood/feeling in time of the album. It’s a sad lil bop that makes you wanna dance along with a broken heart. It’s the first song we worked on in the studio and the first one that made me realize “holy shit I’m making an album”.
Canadian Beats is all about Canadian music, so who are your current favourite Canadian bands/ artists?
Oh so many. Feist is my long time favourite and muse, she is just, wow. Leif Vollebekk is top of my mind as he’s on heavy rotation during quarantine and makes me feel all kinds of things. Emily Haines, Patrick Watson, god Canada’s got some good ones… I also have so many pals in bands that I’m stoked on. The Velveteins & Jordan Klassen to name a few. <3
Connect with Jillian Lake:
Website
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram