melodylane

MELODY LANE: Just to start, we know that your album NO SWEET ILLUSIONS will be released in the near future. We know that ‘to define is to limit’…but how would you like to define the sound of your album…Is it Hard Rock? Is it Street rock?...Or Sleaze/Glam?...Or  what? …
JANINA JADE: Well i would say its hard rock/classic rock. I’m heavily influenced by the rock and hard-rock scene of the 70s and 80s and bands like: the Rolling Stones, Guns N Roses, Kiss, Alice Cooper, Judas Priest, AC/DC, Ozzy Osbourne. 

MELODY LANE: Talking about your band, are you going to have permanent musicians in your solo band? Have you already built your permanent line-up? (If so…Can you tell us the name of the musicians, their instruments,  and which bands/where…do  they come from?)
JANINA JADE: I am currently talking to some of my musician friends and putting together a backing band. On drums I will take in Tobhias Ljung (Whyte Ash/Leap/The Bereaved) and i will see if the other guys in Whyte Ash wants to join too. I have a few other guitar players in mind as well but nothing is finalized yet. The future will tell if it will be a permanent line up or if i take in different guys as we go along.The most important thing is that the guys in my backing band are professional, hard working, easy going and have a lot of stage experience. 

MELODY LANE: We read that for your album, you collaborated with producer Tommy Denander. Could you tell us how this collaboration’s born, how did you get in touch with him?
JANINA JADE: This is a really cool story. I first met Tommy on the Facebook group The Swedish Alice Cooper Fanclub. And we started talking getting to know each other and then i sent him some of my demos and I hired him to produce and play on my album. We hit it off instantly both as friends and as a musical partnership. Tommy has done a truly amazing job on my album and I’m very happy and grateful to have recorded my album together with him and to have him in my inner circle of friends. Tommy is such an amazing musician and producer and he is one of the nicest persons i have ever known. 

MELODY LANE: Tell us something about the creative process of NO SWEET ILLUSIONS…Could you tell us something about the working method that you had…Are you the main composer? Do you write all the lyrics and all the vocal melodies…or we can talk about a team work?
JANINA JADE: I have written all music and lyrics on every song on the album. My creative process, i never sit down and plan what I’m going to write a song about or a certain lyrical subject or if it is going to be an up tempo song or a slower song.I get this really strong feeling inside that something has to come out, so i grab one of my guitars and usually within 10minutes i have the basic arrangement, the riffs/chord progressions, the lyrics, the vocal melody. When i write/create it is almost on a totally subconscious level. Then when i have captured the song so to say, i start working on it, fine tuning details until it feels 100% ”right”.

MELODY LANE: Talking about  singers and songwriters…Which are your main influences? And which are the artists that provided you with inspiration during the writing process of NO SWEET ILLUSIONS?
JANINA JADE: I have to say without a doubt that Mick Jagger/Keith Richards are THE songwriters that have had the biggest impact on me. And when it comes to singers well  Mick Jagger, Axl Rose, Rob Halford, Paul Stanley - these are the guys I’ve been singing along to most over the years, yet I have never tried to sound like anybody else than myself, but like everyone else I get influenced by the music I listen to. Oh honestly I never listen to certain artists/bands or albums when I write, as I said earlier it just comes out of me. However when i started recording together with Tommy i said i wanted a Rolling Stones  early 70s kind of sound to the guitars and the production in general, you know the way music used to breathe and live back then before everything got cold, stiff, overproduced.When i recorded my vocals for the album Ii did it very old school, no cutting and pasting, I sang each song from the beginning to the end in one single take in the studio. That’s the way i have to work, I need to feel the song to be inside it and be in the moment right there and then.  

MELODY LANE: If you should choose…please list 3 songs, your favorites, only 3…from NO SWEET ILLUSIONS, that can define the sound of your project at the best … 3 songs that can help our readers to know NO SWEET ILLUSIONS and the vision of your solo-project at the best …Which ones would you choose? And why?
JANINA JADE: Oh this is s tough one. Each of the 12 songs on the album are very personal and important to me. But ok here goes:

Tattooed Fire Woman - its the first single from the album (and i have to tell you this, it went to #1 on the swedish Iitunes rock chart just 4days after it was released, that kind of blew my mind) the song is kind of an anthem, the lyrics are deeply personal, its about standing up for who i am, what i believe, never giving in or giving up, never compromising or conforming to what others want, or what society expects, you know its about being proud of who you are and keeping faith in yourself no matter what. And just listen to the guitars on this one, i get goosebumps every time, Tommy did some truly amazing stuff here. 

Nothing New - i absolutely love this song, its a really cool hard-rock song and the feel of it is pretty different the way it starts out then twists and sneaks up on you with this cool slightly sinister vibe. The lyrics are again deeply personal and quite dark, dealing with my inner demons and darkness of the soul, but its at the same time a positive strong song, it lifts you up, you know no matter how many times you fall deep down into the dark you always rise up and you return stronger than you were before. The darkness eventually becomes a familiar place and you know how to navigate your way out.

Freaks Of The Earth - this is a full out hard-rock song and i really like the kick, the boost, the energy you get from it. Again the lyrics are deeply personal telling another story from my life. The song is kind of a celebration to a life lived on your own terms, a celebration to all the outcasts, the freaks, the different ones the ones who live life on the dark side of society and are proud of being who we are. United we stand so to say, and as the chorus lyrics says: junkies drunks and prostitutes flying high without parachutes, they all know they know me by name i guess inside we’re all the same, in the gutter in the dirt we’re the freaks of the earth.

MELODY LANE: Thinking about your solo album, thinking about touring…Could  you tell us two bands, from the world stage,  you’d like tour with…Two bands that would be a perfect LIne-up for your project on a tour… and why these bands? 
JANINA JADE: Well I would absolutely love to go on tour and open for the Rolling Stones or Guns N Roses or Kiss or Metallica but that is not very likely to happen. That said well, i think that I can tour with just about everyone from Judas Priest to Alice Cooper to Whitesnake to Megadeth, you know from harder metal to bluesy classic rock to hard-rock. This is my kind of music and my kind of crowd this is where I belong, on the hard-rock scene, and these are my people and I’m one of them.  

MELODY LANE: As a musician, singer and songwriter… What has been your biggest achievement to date and what do you want to achieve in the near future? Can you tell us any news about your past experiences in the music biz...or is this your first project?
JANINA JADE: Recording this album together with Tommy Denander  then landing a record deal with Sliptrick Records (thank you Carlo Muselli for believing in me and my music), getting a #1 single on itunes for Tattooed Fire Woman, getting to do interviews with many major rock magazines and websites – that’s my biggest achievement so far. And I have been working really hard to get this far all my life. But this is just the beginning i mean who knows what might happen when the album is released, i have a very positive feeling about all this and with a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck anything is possible. In the near future I’m shooting an official video to be released at the same time the album is released. I’m also already writing new material for the follow up album, planning a release event and working really hard with promoting and networking. I want to get my music out there to as many people as possible, to go on tour, record more albums and reach out and touch people with my music, i want to give the fans the same strength i get from my music. And the same strengtht I’ve gotten from my favorite bands you know. I have been playing guitar for 30yrs now, started out as a lead guitar player in heavy metal and hard-rock and thrash metal bands, studied at the Musicians Institute in London, won best new guitarist award in Sweden, performed at the Roskilde Festival in Denmark (2gigs one on the Blue Stage and one on the Orange Stage/main stage), I started writing songs by myself (music and lyrics and vocal melodies) and singing about 25 years ago and have written over 350 songs since i started counting them around 20yrs ago, I’ve recorded numerous demos over the years and in the 00s i recorded 3 albums and one EP where i did everything in the studio myself all instruments and vocals and as always wrote all the music and lyrics, none of these are released Ii have the master cds in a box in my music work room. So this is far from my first project but this album ”No Sweet Illusions” contains my best work so far and I’m very proud of it (the songs on the album are not any old stuff from my vaults it’s all brand new).

MELODY LANE: Tour plans? Scheduled dates?
JANINA JADE: At this moment i have no tour dates booked. But I’m working on that. The plan is to book a tour starting early next year in January or February and to book gigs at the summer festivals like Sweden Rock Festival. And if you’re a promoter reading this and want to book me and my band to go on tour or play on your festival don’t hesitate to contact me.  

MELODY LANE: Something about your life: who is Janina Jade when she’ not playing and writing music? Have you got also a “regular” job and different hobbies other than music, or music is 100% of your life
JANINA JADE: I don’t have a regular job I really never had one (except for working short periods of time in record shops and musical instrument shops when I was really young). Music is my life and it has always been my life. It’s not just something that I do, it is something that i have to do. It’s as important as breathing to me. Without creating/writing, singing, playing guitar I just don’t function as a human being at all. It’s a basic need I have and I need to do it to survive you know.  Actually my very first memory that I have is from when I was 3-4yrs old and I’m trying to play on a tiny plastic toy piano and trying to sing along to Abba (growing up in Sweden in the 70s Abba was everywhere on tv, on radio and every household had their tapes or records). So looking back music has been in my life for as long as I can remember. When I’m not working with my own music,I love listening to records, going to concerts, reading music magazines, watching music documentaries. I’m also into guitars, but not as nerdy as i used to be, however i still read guitar magazines and check out new gear. But outside of music related interests well I am a huge movie fan i love watching movies on dvd (my all time faves are: Terminator2, Alien, The Matrix, The Shining, Rocky) and I’m also  into watching documentaries about wildlife and nature, space, mythology and history. And I’m a cat person i love spending time with my cats. And when i want to kick back and really relax between all music work there’s nothing better than listening to hardrock/classic rock/heavy metal albums and drinking beer and whiskey with my closest friends. 

MELODY LANE: And in the end a message to all Melody Lane readers and followers...
JANINA JADE:First of all, a big thank you for doing this interview with me. I appreciate it. And to all of you Melody Lane readers and followers I would like to say: thank you for reading my interview, and if you like the album buy the cd and spread the word to your friends, I truly appreciate your support. And hope to see you on tour.