Q&A: Jess Young Talks “Butterflies,” Authenticity & More
“I THINK SO MUCH,” LONDON-BORN AND -BASED ARTIST AND DJ — Jess Young says. “I have always been a very emotional person.” Young exemplifies music as a means for thought, and, further, the externalization of such thought. For her, music is a construction of self, an affirming force that strings the unspoken with its expression.
“Music is a way for me to vent and also make sense of life through sound.” Young crafts stories, each injected with a plethora of the reflections and moments that inform her personhood: her coming of age, her encounters with love and loss, solitude, nostalgia, hope, and her realizations of self. In rendering these personal observations, she captures contradiction and nuance in a manner that shines true to her entire artistry, as someone who uses music and art for understanding and connection. All the while, she does so in a manner that is authentic and reaches out to listeners with a tender invitation to her inner landscape.
From her childhood, Young’s world was music. She would sing Vietnamese karaoke with her mother and her mother’s friends, strum a pink guitar as her mother ran the Chinese takeaway restaurant down the road. On the stirring streets of Camden, she would strum her guitar as the city bustled around her. Naturally, with a resoluteness that was brave and passionate, Young learned of her affinity for sound, music, and expression.
Throughout the years, she has developed an admirable career across multiple creative fields, playing for the likes of COACH, The Offspring, Notion, Voices Radio, Spotify, and Reprezent Radio and has explored nail art through her platform Boys In Polish, working with names such as i-D, Dazed Beauty, and Highsnobiety, among others.
In championing intuition and freedom in expression, Young’s musicianship is one characterized by spontaneity and instinct. From writing to recording, producing, and releasing her music, Young is attentive to the details that assure her work is timeless, straying from a process defined by formula or tradition. Melding vulnerable R&B tendencies with dreamy instrumentation, she conveys a vulnerability that is faithful to her truth and doesn’t waver from her value of authenticity in the act of creating. She seeks out deeper pockets of nostalgia, introspection, romance, and melancholy with murmuring vocals fleshed out upon masterful production.
Though there is experimentation as she constructs her ideas, in which she boundlessly explores the extent of her thought and ability in execution, there is an ultimate attentiveness in the final choices of her tracks, and she balances an impressive capacity to convey both a breadth and depth of emotion with an energy that is purposeful and honest.
With the release of her latest single, “Butterflies,” a track that treads between wistfulness and sensuality, Young fuses glimmers of the past few decades of sound, wavering through a soulful R&B sonic world with glimmers of jazz folk and a subtle weaving of electronic lo-fi. She recollects a past love, and in doing so tethers a relationship with her listeners, grasping their hands as they revisit their own memories.
In celebration of AAPI month, Young shares moments of vulnerability and offers us a glimpse into her mind and artistry. Read on below as Young discusses her journey and the significance of championing individual experience.
LUNA: Before we start, I want to mention that it is a pleasure to meet you. My introduction to your music was a very acute thing, actually. It becomes easy to forget how significant music is as an agent of connection and as cultural memorabilia. I think, as talk of diversity becomes more of an imposed obligation, it can feel insincere, but you re-reminded me that representation in music is something that can never be fully exercised — it has no capacity. So thank you, and in lieu of that, a very happy AAPI month to you.
YOUNG: Thank you so much, Nicole, and for those kind words too. Happy AAPI month to you too.
LUNA: Did you grow up with an idea of your own musicianship?
YOUNG: It goes without saying, really, but I have loved singing since I was a child. Apparently when I was younger I was really good at Vietnamese karaoke and would sing with my mom and her friends, but now I could not tell you a word of it.
LUNA: Oh yes, Vietnamese culture is very intertwined with music. It finds its way to fix itself into you — you become really attune to understanding things through music, as a sort of lens.
YOUNG: Yes exactly, and especially when growing up.
LUNA: How did your love of music come about?
YOUNG: The most prolific part of my musical journey has to be when I studied it at school. I learned basic music production [and] was able to sing and perform at school concerts. I loved it. I also picked up DJing as an extracurricular activity because I really wanted to DJ for my school prom. I stopped doing music during college and art foundation, as my studies became intense and dug a deep hole into uni, doing a degree in something I wasn’t interested in. Fortunately, I pulled myself together and dropped out of uni after a year, which was when I really questioned what I wanted to do in life, and one of the answers was music.
LUNA: When was this realization?
YOUNG: This all happened about five years ago now. And in the midst of COVID-19 I decided to do a music production diploma, which has given me the tools and skills that I need to release my own music.
LUNA: The pause that came with COVID-19 was quite aligning for many. Would you say this period was pivotal for you?
YOUNG: It was a very important part of the journey so far, definitely.
LUNA: Prior to that, what sounds shaped you? Besides the glory of Vietnamese karaoke, of course (laughs).
YOUNG: I grew up listening to a lot of R&B and 2000s music, so I guess that has heavily influenced my sound. Still to this day I love listening to old-school R&B because it makes me feel nostalgic and at home. I also started playing guitar when I was about 13, so I love tracks with guitars in them. I even have a Spotify playlist which is a collection of my favorite songs that consist mainly of guitar.
LUNA: There are strong remnants of these sounds in your music, for sure. What records are on your mind at the moment?
YOUNG: Right now and recently, I have been listening to a lot of Dijon, Noah Cyrus, and Victoria Monét.
LUNA: From these earlier days, how was the journey in finding what sound you wanted to create and then share? Actually, I will reword that. Sound is not fixed, artistry is not fixed — both evolve — so how do you continue to play around with what sound you feel aligns with you?
YOUNG: To be totally honest, I find it difficult to work on my music consistently. I am a nail artist and do other creative bits so usually that takes up most of my time, as it is what I mainly monetize from. This probably means it will take longer for me to find a “sound,” but I can definitely feel the essence of me in everything I create, and that’s what keeps me going.
LUNA: Would you say your process has been, and is, experimental?
YOUNG: Well, I usually begin by recording voice memos of song ideas with my vocals and guitar, then put them through production after. During my music production diploma I definitely was more experimental, as you naturally are when you learn new things, but the experimental side of me probably comes out more when I am writing songs and recording voice memos, as there is no real commitment yet. I’m not the kind of person to be working on multiple productions at the same time, as I find it overwhelming, so instead of having hundreds of unfinished projects, I have hundreds of unfinished songs.
LUNA: We talked briefly on the sounds that shaped your upbringing, but I’d say your music is genre-bending, and the way you dissolve these boundaries is very natural, also with attention to detail. On your side, though, would you classify yourself through genre, or perhaps multiple genres?
YOUNG: This is so lovely, Nicole, thank you again. I’ve never really been one to adhere to genres — instead I just create what sounds and feels good to me and people will genre you anyways, and I think that is a more liberating way to create rather than obsessing over copying that exact kick and exact snare and exact beat from your favorite R&B song.
LUNA: I mean, what Nadia Boulanger said: to create music, we must break the rules we created in studying it. Or something like that.
YOUNG: Exactly. And a lot of times I have seen new and upcoming artists try to copy the sounds of what is “trending” so they can be relevant. It may work well from a marketing perspective but I think we need to trust ourselves and our uniqueness a bit more.
LUNA: I agree. Authenticity propels craft — upholds the entire purpose of it, I think. Your music also lends way to vulnerability, and inherently that tends to disband strict constraint anyway. In approaching your music intuitively, have you found that your sound has developed over time?
YOUNG: My voice has become stronger and more earthy. I guess that is proof of the resilience I have built through life’s growing pains, and it’s nice to hear, actually. Doing my music production course evolved my sound massively — it was like finding a missing piece of myself. My melodies have started to make more sense the more I have opened up to different kinds of music.
LUNA: What has shifted the most?
YOUNG: You know, for some reason I used to be against using major and minor chords, as I thought they were too “pop” and not “cool,” but I would like to say I have put my ego down and opened my mind up, as I love pop music and always have, to be honest.
LUNA: You’ve mentioned your hundreds of unfinished tracks. If you were to take all of these and the music you’ve completed, released or unreleased, and form a sort of tapestry, a world of what your music is, what would that be like?
YOUNG: Every producer has their own world, and it has been such a wonderful experience to travel to the worlds of others. It is like the screen becomes their escape and sanctuary that they can teleport to when the real world gets too much, like a warm blanket that feels like home. That’s how I feel when I listen to my library of voice memos at night, under a literal warm blanket (laughs).
LUNA: How would you describe the feeling?
YOUNG: If I described it, it would be sensual, emotional, and nostalgic. Making music really connects me to my inner child, I have realized.
LUNA: In a healing way?
YOUNG: Most definitely.
LUNA: In a good way?
YOUNG: You know what, I would like to say music is my therapy and it most definitely has been, but I’ve learned through the process of making music during painful times [that] it can be like scratching a scab off a fresh wound, so I need to be softer with myself sometimes and just take a moment to breathe.
LUNA: I guess at times, the act of revision — of a moment or time — can come with an expectation of rectifying something. So it can be both light and heavy. How do you balance or recalibrate when you feel like you need that moment to breathe?
YOUNG: Journaling is a lighter outlet for me during those times. The way I see it is like prayer. When I journal, I write to the universe, and when I make music, I talk to the universe.
LUNA: I can imagine that would naturally intertwine itself with your musical process as well. Does your process tend to be more of a routine?
YOUNG: Well, a routine that I am definitely trying to break out of, I would say.
LUNA: What is your process?
YOUNG: I’m very comfortable with meandering with my guitar and singing into my voice memos app to get ideas out. I basically have a massive voice memo archive that I revisit every now and then, and when I do feel like starting a new project I will run those ideas through my DAW and produce them properly. I try to keep a balance between doing that and then just going free reign and starting ideas from scratch straight into my DAW and producing it from the get-go. I am in a place where I am enjoying collaborations and jamming with music friends, which is another fun way to get the juices flowing.
LUNA: You released “Fathers” in 2021, which outlined these very entrenched, personal experiences in your relationships. Inexplicitly, you also explore its linkage to culture. Listening to this as someone who has observed these experiences in both my own life and others amplified its power. How did you start the track?
YOUNG: Thank you again, Nicole. It means a lot to me when my music helps to translate other people’s experiences. The making of this track was very spontaneous. It didn’t exist as a voice memo idea like my others. I just laid down a sample straight into Logic Pro and went from there.
LUNA: How did you translate your personal experience into the song, lyrically and sonically?
YOUNG: Well, I started singing The Internet’s “Penthouse Cloud” on top of the beat and the lyric “Father, oh lord in Heaven.” Listening to the moody, melancholy beat, I thought, “Oh, I can sing about my own father and do a kind of call and response thing.”
LUNA: I love that song — what a great lyric, too. Are there any lyrics in this track that are particularly important to you?
YOUNG: The most important lyric for me is the hook “Money don’t buy you my love.” I just feel it so powerfully. My dad was so absent in my life and still is. He thought that giving me money and buying me things would be enough to make me feel loved.
LUNA: Did the creation of the song help you reflect on this?
YOUNG: Yes, definitely. As a kid that’s the best thing ever, having money to buy toys and sweets and all that, but getting older I saw how the absence of all the other love languages made me reach for emotionally unavailable men in my romantic encounters and not [know] how to be comfortable with intimacy towards men.
LUNA: Thank you for sharing those experiences — it’s cool that you display such vulnerability. Similarly, your newest single, “Butterflies,” explores your experiences quite deeply too. It’s a super cinematic, dreamy track, but there is an underlying darkness to it. It lingers beneath. Could you walk me through how this track came about?
YOUNG: “Butterflies” was written during the first time I fell in love, and about it too. This one was written in voice memo form and then I developed it afterwards. It actually was released as an acoustic demo in 2018, then I took it down shortly after as I wanted to do it more justice. So that was when I did a music production diploma in 2020, which gave me the tools to amplify and rework it to what it sounds like today. I am so proud of it, and it has been on such a journey of growth alongside me.
LUNA: Do you find that you often write music and rediscover it later? If your process begins more with intuition than structure, do you find that you have to resist the urge to constantly put out everything you create? It must be hard — I’m sure you’re writing a lot.
YOUNG: I love rediscovering old songs that I have written. I tend to not put my song ideas through production on impulse. If I listen back to a song idea I had written in a few months time and it still hits me, then I know that it is real and timeless. I want my music to be timeless.
LUNA: What about the sonic choices in “Butterflies”? Continuing what I said before about the track having an aura, which combines these two conflicting but cohesive energies — light and dark — did you know what you wanted its soul to have? I always say the soul of a song — I mean its essence, its energy. Or was this something that developed?
YOUNG: The sonics of “Butterflies” were all just part of the process, to be honest. I knew what essence I wanted it to have, but I didn’t plan the exact instrumentation of it. It all just felt very intuitive and a lot of “Ah, that sounds good, let me use that sound and that melody.” It’s definitely a more fun and gentle way for me to create. I never want making music to feel mundane and stressful, which is why I take my time.
LUNA: You create a world in this song, one that is quite romantic and sensual. What themes do you tend to explore, even in your unreleased work?
YOUNG: I love this question, and I love that the world of “Butterflies” feels romantic and sensual for you. Around the time “Butterflies” was written, I was having a real Adele moment where all I could write about was heartbreak. Then I got to a point where I became frustrated because I didn’t know how to write about anything else.
LUNA: Was this cathartic?
YOUNG: Definitely. I realized those moments of frustration are where you break open. So then I went through a phase where I wrote about my solitude and self-love, which was cute. I recently wrote a song about confronting my demons and missing home, and also one about being hopeful for the future in times when you’re having a really shitty time. If I could talk to the Jess who thought she was only ever going to write about her broken heart, I would tell her, “Buckle up girl, you're in for a ride!”
LUNA: It certainly is interesting to learn the details of your own identity with time. You look back one day and you have been an entirely different facet of yourself. I think this links closely with broader cultural shifts, too. I said it before but I’ll say it again. Happy AAPI month! I think the interrelation of heritage with art, music, and public identity has become almost an extension of genre itself, ways to define an artistry. Significant steps though, but I could imagine it may feel draining as someone who simply wants to create. In what ways did your culture and roots play a role in your music?
YOUNG: My ethnicity is Chinese-Vietnamese but I have been in London my whole life, so my roots are London. My experience is being an East Asian woman living in London. If I was living in Asia, for example, my experience would be very different. I didn’t grow up with my mother playing the guzheng. I grew up listening to The Ting Tings and playing my pink guitar whilst my mother was working our family Chinese takeaway down the road.
LUNA: Thank you for that. Sometimes I recognize how automatic it can be to unintentionally group such distinct experiences together — it negates the simple fact that culture isn’t defining but rather breeds nuanced, complex stories. Instead then, I’ll ask, how do you connect to the way your culture naturally shaped you, the experiences it brought, and the qualities or memories it created?
YOUNG: Whenever I feel nervous, lost, or disconnected I like to take myself to this memory of my teenage self busking in Camden with my pink guitar peaches and my friend at the time. We sang a bunch of 2000s tunes and made seven quid. I never did it again but it was definitely one of the bravest things I have done, and I will always be proud of that girl. Her courage and spirit got me this far, and she is the home in my heart.
LUNA: In terms of feeling disconnected, what do you mean? Do you feel as though music has become misaligned with realness?
YOUNG: I was having a conversation with some friends about our obsession with authenticity. To the point where it’s become a trend to put on a spiritual “peace and love” act. Perhaps there is good intention behind it, but it cringes me out so much. Can we all just relax and do what feels right, as opposed to what we think we are supposed to be doing? Unpopular opinion, but this obsession we have — probably as a result of social media — to constantly be better and good and perfect is just toxic. We are rejecting the truth that we are enough as we are.
LUNA: Yeah, social media has leaked its way into our understanding of fulfillment and self-concept. Removing that facet from the music — which is hard because it has become so interlinked — let’s talk about your audience. What do you hope your music does for your listeners, the music purely as its own thing?
YOUNG: I’m very emotional when it comes to making my music, so I just hope that my music can evoke feelings and put people’s experiences into words.
LUNA: You’re also a DJ and have worked with some really great names. Is this similar? The feeling of creating experiences for others?
YOUNG: I’m at a place where I am fairly comfortable DJing live, but performing live is a much more visceral experience for me, as I’m not hiding behind other people’s music anymore. I’m playing my own music and everything is in my control. I do enjoy it, but it takes a lot more preparation, physically and mentally.
LUNA: Do you find that the processes of DJing and also making your own music draw from each other?
YOUNG: I feel like DJing used to feel a lot more separate from making my own music as I used to play mostly house when I started out, but now I’m beginning to get comfortable with slower tempos and can see how the bridge between my DJing and my own music is starting to feel connected. Doing my music production course definitely increased my confidence in DJing as I knew what the buttons and effects actually did in more depth! So yes, it does cross over. I’m also working with some dance producers and experimenting with my vocals in that way.
LUNA: As well as this, you founded Boys In Polish. I read that you aim to eradicate ideas of toxic masculinity through nail art. Art can be such a powerful way to dismantle these broader structures. Is it important to your work that you are able to interweave and marry the two ideas, personal expression and these larger, societal narratives?
YOUNG: You know what, I didn’t intend to really, but at the end of the day that is what being an artist is, right? I’m glad that I have finally found healthier outlets for my sensitivity and a way to use that as my power. I just love digging deep into things, and I think so much.
LUNA: Yeah, I guess in the same way as we discussed culture and the pressures and presentation of it all, the most impactful projects arise by just being real, genuinely caring about people and stories.
YOUNG: Exactly. What is important to me is understanding people, which in turn helps us to understand ourselves. It all comes down to that.
LUNA: You certainly have. Looking forward, is there anything planned for the rest of the year?
YOUNG: I actually just want to keep going with the flow and stay open to the good things that are coming my way, so we shall see what happens.
LUNA: We are excited for you.
YOUNG: Thank you so much.
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