Toronto Electropop R&B artist, Jordana of Earth has released her newest single, “Motions”.
“I wrote ‘Motions’ when I felt like I was falling for someone,” Jordana of Earth reveals of the track’s inspiration and seeming muse. “I wasn’t sure, though, if I was feeling true feelings of love, or just getting caught up in the excitement of a new person and convincing myself that it was something real.”
‘hold on, wait, in a way I feel like I’m just moving through all of the motions, and that this ain’t true’
“That line is meant to really illustrate a moment where I catch myself before I get too carried away,” she continues. “The song is, in this way, very self-aware, and I paint this picture that my self-awareness and doubt is some sort of gate, wall, or barrier.
“There’s talk about past loves, having been played and fooled by past lovers, and feelings of reluctance to get close to someone just to have that happen again. It’s about that tension that exists between a want for connection and that protective wall that keeps me from intimacy.”
The video’s concept was created from this line of creative processing, and the footage was something Jordana of Earth had a friend shoot on her old 90s camcorder.
“This was all during a photoshoot, and I spotted this sort of broken-down tennis court; it drew me in by how vacant and abandoned it looked.
“Before I knew it, I just sort of started dancing and it turned into this whole vibe. In the original audio of the video, you can even hear her laugh and say, ‘are we accidentally shooting a music video?’
“Lol. Yes. Yes, we are.
“But it worked. When I started to see the two pieces — the video and the song — as two halves of the same project, I began to see the fence as a symbol for that barrier of doubt between myself and true intimacy. The location, in being nondescript, displays itself only as being on the edge of something.
“On an emotional level, that’s exactly what ‘Motions’ is about.”
It’s within elements and interpretations of exactly this kind that Jordana of Earth occupies.
“My vibe is altogether spacey and, at times, quite dark,” she offers of her intricate aesthetic that weaves elements of fantasy, science fiction, and art history into one multi-sensory experience. “There’s a hushed intensity.”
Check out the video for “Motions” below and find out more about Jordana of Earth via our Five Questions With segment.
Care to introduce yourself to our readers?
Jordana of Earth is an electropop R&B solo project, headed by myself, singer-songwriter Jordana Magwood. A multidisciplinary art project that spans past music into a broader practice of photography, video, incorporating aspects of costume, sculpture, and installation practices.
Growing up in downtown Toronto, my exposure to the arts has been lifelong. After high school at Etobicoke School of the Arts, I went on to study in Montreal at Concordia University, working as a multi-disciplinary artist in drawing, sculpture, photography, video, and installation. I began experimenting with music as a way to enhance my other work.
Initially, the music was more like ‘sound art’ — not really structured songs, just like these really spacey, ambient electronic loops I would make in GarageBand on my iPhone. I was layering electronic instruments with samples taken mostly from sounds of the city I was living in — anything I heard that I thought would be a cool texture. I would then cut those up and make rhythms and melodies out of them. Then I started recording my voice… just melodies, not lyrics or full songs or anything.
Fast forward some years later, music is now my primary practice. And in some ways, this is still my process (lol). Each song starts with something I hear. I freestyle melodies over whatever music I’m working with or inspired by, and from that, I can build a song.
All my songs are written in moments when I’m trying to be honest with myself. It could be playful, sexy, sad — whatever it is, it comes from a moment when I’m really allowing myself to dive into the feel of whatever the song is about, and how that relates to my real life and experiences. It’s often quite introspective.
Consistent with my lo-fi electronic roots, most of my music is electronic with some acoustic elements.
I think that being from Toronto really helps to influence fluidity in my style. There’s so much great music and art that comes from this city. We’re culturally and creatively so diverse that I’ve never really felt the pressure to stay locked into one specific creative style. I don’t let that kind of pressure get to me. It all kind of just flows. Jordana of Earth is the vibe. It seems like most things I create are altogether spacey, and at times quite dark. There’s a hushed intensity. These qualities to my sound are really the consistent, defining feature of my style. So I think that maintaining this freedom to flex between genres is, also, one of my defining traits as an artist.
I’ve been building my sound, brand, and aesthetic to suit the multiple facets of my work. Aesthetically blending urban grunge with aspects of fantasy, science fiction, and art history, I aim to construct a dreamy world that is playfully juxtaposed with contemporary sounds and images. I collaborate with other instrumentalists and producers to bring my music to life. I have a team, but I’m solo. I’ve been blessed with a solid crew of musicians, photographers, and various other collaborators that help to drive this project forward, but in many ways I’m very independent. I write my songs, I edit my own videos, I style my own shoots. I love it. It brings together everything that I already love to do into one project.
This year especially has been really great for me creatively. I’ve been steadily dropping music since my February 2020 debut ‘Leave the Light On’, produced by Jeff Crake (DVSN). The song hit over 20,000+ streams and quickly gained momentum on CBC Radio One, alongside my June release, ‘Do U’. My latest release, ‘Motions’, dropped on October 23rd, with more to follow.
Tell us a bit about your music and writing style.
If I were to try and define a genre, I would say it’s Electropop R&B. But the fluidity in my music style allows me to take this to a number of places. Sometime within the next year I will be dropping some stuff that delves into an area of R&B with a moody 80’s metal vibe. Lol, so stay tuned for that.
How are you keeping creative without shows? What are you spending your time on?
I’ve been writing a lot. I’ve been so lucky to be able to still work and collaborate with people remotely from my home studio and it’s been really great because of that. Writing new material and planning my next releases are my main focus right now. On the visual side of things, I’ve been spending some time planning photo and video shoots, and am looking forward to where this side of the project is going to move in conjunction with my upcoming releases.
If you were asked to suggest only one of your songs for someone to hear, which would it be?
My latest single, ‘Motions’. Be sure to catch the video, too. 🙂
Canadian Beats is all about Canadian music, so who are your current favourite Canadian bands/ artists?
Some of my favourite artists out of Canada right now are DVSN, Majid Jordan, and Kaytranada.