Q&A: Jack & Jack’s Musical Reunion and the Journey Behind Single “September’s Gone”
A WAVE OF NOSTALGIA MIGHT HIT YOU — when you’re reminded of your former favorite app, Vine. It might hit you even harder when you hear the name Jack & Jack. Omaha-based best friend duo Jack Gilinsky and Jack Johnson are back and better than ever with their new single, “September’s Gone.”
The duo met in their hometown just before kindergarten and have been inseparable ever since. Although they were always creative in their own ways, their success began when they began to create six-second videos on the former Vine app. After garnering millions of views, the two got to work and began to write music.
Flash forward, and Jack & Jack have hit tremendous heights. Their biggest hits include “Rise” featuring DJ Jonas Blue, which became one of the top 10 globally streamed songs in 2018. They’ve also collected over 1M listeners on Spotify and 15M followers across Instagram.
“September’s Gone” is the perfect pop piano ballad that touches on themes of heartbreak and long-distance relationships, exploring how as the seasons change, so do feelings and experiences.
Luna had the chance to chat with Gilinsky and Johnson about their new single, upcoming plans, and their bond as best friends. Read the interview below.
LUNA: Tell me more about how you became Jack & Jack and how you both originally met.
JOHNSON: This is one of my favorite stories to tell. It’s a testament to our friendship and why we've lasted as long as we have in this industry, and just as friends in life in general. We met way back in pre-kindergarten. We happened to have houses in the same neighborhood, and all of the families had a meet-up at one of the houses. When I first met Gilinsky there, he walked up to me, sniffed me, and asked me if I would be his friend. It was just love at first sight. We have been best friends ever since.
LUNA: I listened to “September's Gone” and it’s already on repeat and in my car playlist. I’m curious to learn more about how the song was written. What was the inspiration behind it?
GILINSKY: Johnson wrote the hook to “September's Gone” by himself.
JOHNSON: Yeah, I posted a snippet of the hook on Instagram a while back. I knew in my mind I would need [Gilinsky] to sing the hook because I would not want to belt that live. It was September of 2021, right as [the month] was ending. I don't know why but I just had this idea of a song about September ending [that was also] an analogy for a hometown relationship that you're leaving to go chase your dreams out on the West Coast. It’s relatable if you have somebody you had to break up with, or they were going to college. I think we both had a similar situation we could relate to in that.
I was channeling that and thinking, “This might be our last time seeing each other” from that perspective. It’s the feeling of dropping everything to chase your dreams, but there’s still that lingering sensation of wondering how they're doing. You’ll still talk to them from time to time in the early months after breaking up and splitting apart, try to do the long-distance thing, and it doesn't work. I was inspired by that whole scenario and wanted to make it an analogy to the seasons and how times are changing.
LUNA: What was an obstacle you had to face while writing the song, or maybe just this year with songwriting in general?
GILINSKY: Fortunately, we haven’t had too many roadblocks. We were locked out of the studio for a while during the pandemic. I feel like we got back in during the summer of 2020, and things just started to flow as we worked together. It's almost easier when you're in there with your best friend — you can read each other's minds a little bit. When I have writer's block, [Johnson’s] ideas blossom, and then it inspires me and I get out of my little funk.
LUNA: In what ways have you grown closer as a duo while working on this project?
JOHNSON: Because it's a new territory for us and [we’ve taken] a few years away, we have to grind back, and we're working hard together — not only just on the music but also on the social side. We have that same hunger that we had before we ever had any success on the internet, when we wanted to post every day and just see if we could garner some traction. I feel like we're back in that stage where we have all these followers, but it's more about re-engaging the people that we left by the wayside when we left them in the dark. They deserve us to give it our all.
GILINSKY: It does feel like the OG days of us grinding and putting out content, along with working on our first songs together. Although we've learned so much in the past eight or nine years, we're so much more well-equipped. There are people out there who probably haven't thought about Jack & Jack in years. If we can find a way to get back on their radar, I would love that. We have these people who know us, and we still have our core of supporters, but we're primed in a better situation. Now, we can come up with something fresh that feels like us and get back on those people's radars. We have an opportunity to do this the right way, the second time around. We’re so much more well-equipped to navigate the industry as a duo.
LUNA: Any big musical influences you both have as you write lyrics or instrumentals?
JOHNSON: For “September’s Gone,” I wanted to do something similar-sounding to Elton John. I love where he takes his piano skills, and he always evokes so much emotion. We're trying to make everything feel more musical, but we also want to pay attention to that pop side of us. For me, it even comes from people like Anderson .Paak, who has so many different talents.
GILINSKY: Even though we sound nothing like these people in terms of what our music comes out to, they’re still big inspirations to us. I love how The Weeknd and Ariana Grande and even people like Justin Bieber make good pop music for the radio, but it’s also pure talent. They’re not just trying to make a good hit for the radio, but they put raw and talented vocals on a catchy hook.
LUNA: Who have been some of your favorite artists to work with?
GILINSKY: We’ve had so much fun collaborating and touring with a DJ named Jonas Blue. We had a great song with him called “Rise” that felt pretty left-field for us at first. It’s more of an EDM dance song, but he's so talented when it comes to producing and DJing live. He opened up this massive opportunity for us overseas that allowed us to have this top-five radio song over there. We're going to Japan with him in April to tour that song.
JOHNSON: For this project, we didn’t have any featured artists, but my favorite collaborators have been some of our friends like Sammy Wilk, who we grew up with. We just love collaborating with our friends because we feel like it's a natural way to make good music.
GILINSKY: We did a couple of records with Timbaland, which was awesome. Brandon from Pretty Much produced one of our favorite records on this project, [which] we're currently getting mixed and mastered right now. We’ve also got our boys from Omaha, The Potash Twins. They play horns and perform live with us sometimes.
LUNA: What do you think makes you both special as a duo compared to others?
JOHNSON: Good question. A lot of people who are in duos have a true relationship. Maybe they’re brothers, siblings, sure. There’s always that connection that runs deep, and that’s what I feel like I have with Gilinsky. What always gives me confidence is that nothing can come between us. If I were to do it with anybody else, there’s the potential of that relationship dying out. But I think our rock has been that we’re best friends and always will be, and it’s something we never question.
GILINSKY: I second everything you said, Johnson. It’s very rare that a couple of people who have made a top-40 radio song grew up together — it’s what sets us apart. It’s all about the previous relationship we shared before our careers.
JOHNSON: Another thing to add is that we’re just normal dudes. We don't try to put on a front or anything flashy. We’re just two best friends from a Midwest town who followed their dreams and made it somehow.
