The Second Wave of Jamie xx
In lockdown, while the rest of us got to grips with 1,000-piece puzzles or sourdough starters, Jamie xx discovered an equally thrilling hobby: a regular routine. The DJ and producer, whose real name is Jamie Smith, woke up, did yoga with his friend who lived upstairs, sat in the garden, then made music until late. Sometimes he’d go for a walk around east London in the evenings. “I’ve been on tour for so much of my life,” the 35-year-old says, “and that chance to stop and reflect on it all really lent itself well to being able to make this record.”
That album, In Waves, is due out later this month. It’s the second solo effort from Smith, following 2015’s Grammy-nominated In Colour, an eclectic dance record that dipped into electronica and rave, and sampled Top Boy. He has, of course, made three records with The xx, the band he co-founded with his London schoolmates Romy Madley Croft and Oliver Sim, beginning with 2009’s sleeper hit xx, which won the Mercury Prize. Smith’s subsequent solo work has rivalled his success with the three-piece, winning acclaim for We’re New Here, a remix album of Gil Scott-Heron covers and “Take Care”, the sublime single he produced for Drake and Rihanna. It’s a long way since his 10th birthday, when his uncles — both DJs, one based in New York, the other in Sheffield — teamed up to give him a pair of decks and a few choice records.
At the centre of In Waves lies “Dafodil”, a joyous, frenetic anthem featuring Kelsey Lu, Panda Bear and John Glacier. “It was the first bit of music that made me feel like I could make an album again,” Smith says about the song, which he made at the start of lockdown. “It just sounded fresh to me and like something I hadn’t made before.” The song sets a few themes for In Waves: an upbeat, late-summer vibe and liberal use of — stay with me here — spoken word.
Take the album’s final track “Falling Together”, in which dancer Oona Doherty intones over a persistent drumbeat: “There’s a whole world in that dancer, a microcosm of everyone you love, everyone you know, every human being who ever was.” It is a startling mix of sounds, primed for 2am in a club, when you’re in the embrace of a dancefloor or swaying alone in the corner. “I had the backing music, but I could never work out why it didn’t feel whole,” Smith says. He added Doherty’s vocals — they had previously collaborated on a dance piece — and fittingly, it fell together. “I remember sitting in my studio in London, which is quite high up, looking out the window and just listening to it on repeat. And it felt really good.”
Smith talks about the whole record, which also boasts the Swedish pop star Robyn and, as with In Colour, many a nostalgic sample, with a similar air of serendipity. On “Waited All Night”, he re-teams with Madley Croft and Sim on a woozy ode to a night out. “There’s just some chemistry that works between the three of us,” he says, though they face the same challenges any group of friends in their thirties might face (packed schedules, for starters: all three members now have solo careers). “I’ve worked with lots of other people, but there’s something about the three of us: when it works, it works, and each of us comes up with something that we wouldn’t have come up with on our own. We can’t really explain it.” They have been, fans of The xx will be pleased to know, meeting once a month to work on new music.
When we speak on the phone in late July, Smith is jet-lagged: he arrived in New York a few days ago. After our interview he will be preparing for the first night of his sold-out residency The Floor, in New York and LA. In London, he performed to 3,500 people across 10 nights at Bermondsey’s Venue MOT. From Instagram, it looked like a sweaty, euphoric affair, with a guest appearance from pop star of the moment Charli xcx. Smith, in his own muted way, sounds pleased with how it’s going. As he tells it, he likes the big stages (he recently played a triumphant set at Glastonbury), but he especially likes the small ones: “You can go to more places and take everyone on a journey and make more mistakes.” In the autumn, he will take In Waves on tour in London and Mexico City.
“I’m trying to maintain some calmness in my life, which I didn’t have before lockdown,” he says of the upcoming period. How does he do that? Working less, devoting time to himself, enjoying the silence. He likes to surf, too: 10 years ago, on a stopover in Hawaii, he picked up a board and “fell in love instantly”. On weekends off when he’s based in London, he will go to Biarritz for the waves. And after New York, he’s heading to his place in Los Angeles, where he spent time while making In Waves. “It’s very isolating, you can really be on your own in your house, up a hill,” Smith says, clearly excited about the prospect of good beaches and time alone. “It’s ideal for me.” ○
‘In Waves’ is out on 20 September via Young
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