Culture Cabinet

Let’s take a quick walk through Jordana’s discography. 

First, she emerged to the scene with 2020’s Classical Notions of Happiness, an album that brought a brilliant convergence of lo-fi pop and folk music, that Jordana self produced in her own bedroom. 

Then, that same year, she released two EPs, Something To Say To You, which offered a taste of indie rock meets singer-songwriter acoustic. 

In 2022, she released Face The Wall, an LP that felt more pop, as she was coming out of a whirlwind of collaborating with a string of impressive artists like Inner Wave, Magdalena Bay, and TV Girl. 

Enter Jordana’s yacht rock era. 

Lively Premonition, Jordana’s newest record (out now) was the result of a strike of inspiration that emerged while she was making a new home in Eagle Rock, Los Angeles. 

Only a truly skilled artist could navigate such a switch from genre to genre so seamlessly, but Jordana is a master. A self professed “chameleon,” she finds joy in the switch up, in the unexpected. 

“I just love music,” she says in an interview with Culture Cabinet when asked about her love of switching genres. “When I become really obsessed with something, I will listen to it into the ground, more than I think the normal person should.” 

Lively Premonition offers up ten tracks of dreamy goodness that feel straight out of Laurel Canyon in the 70s. “Like A Dog” has an almost Supertramp feel to it, and Jordana’s inspirations like Stevie Nicks and Carole King are ever apparent throughout. The genre switch also managed to bring a new way of creation for the artist. 

“I went through this sort of epiphany in my creative process where I tried to focus on not writing primarily from my feelings at the current time, because I was doing that with my breakup songs, and I found that I was kind of draining anything I had left to write about in them. I was getting over it, and I was like, ‘I’m going to make stuff up now. I’m going to explore this creative storytelling mode that I see everyone else doing.’ So, I kind of did that with the love songs. If I’m in love, I’ll write love songs, but I wondered what it would be like to write from the perspective of falling in love for the first time.”

“How would it feel to have a high school sweetheart or somebody that I’ve known for such a long time that I’m just absolutely entranced with? I was in a happier place, as I was approaching this era of self love that I’m still actively finding my way through, so I incorporated that into my life and my new thought processes. I just wanted to exercise that mentality in the creative process as well to make it more enjoyable, even for the live shows, or just for peace of mind, I guess. I’ve released something that’s beautiful to me.” 

While Lively Premonition came out in October, she is now wrapping up the tour for the album, with a show at New York City’s Bowery Ballroom planned for tomorrow night. 

“It’s been so great,” she says of touring. “It’s been a whole new way of doing it. It’s fun. I mean, I get to try really hard every night with the vocal things. I never really saw myself as a vocalist. I started out primarily playing in orchestra from the time I was nine, then I started playing violin, sort of classical things. I didn’t ever really use my voice until I was maybe fifteen? I didn’t think this would happen. I get to focus on melodies that I’ve written that are kind of foreign to me, as far as performing every night. It’s nice to give it my all in that way and just make sure that I sound the way that I want to. [Touring] forces me to try my best always.” 

Though, Jordana’s “best” is better than the average person’s. With a innate sense of understanding music and genre in ways that not too many artists are keen to, and an ability to adapt at the drop of the hat, it seems only natural that Jordana would be worth seeing live.

And, if for nothing else, in these bleak times, it may be worth going if for no other reason than to experience something that is meant to be joyful. 

“I just hope that [listeners] feel good when they listen to my record,” Jordana says. “It’s definitely a feel-good record. I just want to feel good now, I don’t want to feel bad. There are breakup songs on it, but I feel like as far as musicality goes, it’s sort of a step up in energy.” 

You can stream Lively Premonition below. 

You can buy tickets to Jordana on tour here.