FEATURE:
Inspired By…
IN THIS PHOTO: Grace Jones, blue-black in black on brown, New York, 1981/PHOTO CREDIT: Jean-Paul Goude
Part Two: Grace Jones
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THIS feature combines songs…
PHOTO CREDIT: Kate Simon
from artists who have either been inspired by a legendary musician sonically or some aspect of their career has been impactful. I started this feature last week with Prince. I united into the playlist artists who have either been influenced by Prince’s sound, fashion or his experimental nature. In this week’s Inspired By… is Grace Jones. Musically, there are plenty of artists who have been inspired by her, but there are many who have incorporated aspects of her aesthetic, pioneering nature or something else. Last year, Jones was to curate the annual Meltdown Festival – the pandemic put that on hold. The BBC ran a feature about the iconic Jones around the time:
“It’s difficult to describe Grace Jones without using words that have been dulled into cliché, but the revered Jamaican performer really is iconic, unique and visionary. It’s equally tricky to sum up succinctly what she does: since she began flexing her creative muscles in the late 1960s, Jones has been a stage actress, high-fashion model, disco singer, photographer’s muse, new wave musician, film star and perennial trend-setter. Clearly, Jones’s chameleon-like qualities are a key part of her appeal. “She takes you to higher vibrations through her presence alone – she frees you completely because she is free herself,” says Honey Dijon, an internationally renowned DJ-producer who counts Jones as a major inspiration.
At the same time, Jones’s incredible creative fluidity means her achievements in certain fields – especially music – are easy to underestimate. The dazzling, androgynous looks she’s created for photo shoots and album covers are rightly acclaimed – Vogue calls her “the ultimate fashion muse”, while Dazed has hailed her “revolutionary style moments” – but at the expense, perhaps, of her musical legacy. Warm Leatherette, the album that introduced Jones’s distinctive, reggae-flecked take on new wave, has just turned 40 years old, so it’s an apt time to reassess her contribution as a singer, songwriter and genre-blending innovator. Featuring punky covers of songs by artists as varied as Tom Petty, Smokey Robinson and Roxy Music, all sung in Jones’s majestically detached style, it’s a record as fearless and singular as Jones herself. And also like Jones, it’s strangely ageless, sounding almost as fresh today as it did in 1980.
Even with her Meltdown festival on hold, June 2020 is something of a milestone month for Jones because it marks the 40th anniversary of her first British hit. On 27 June 1980, around six weeks after Warm Leatherette was released, Jones dropped its third single: a thrillingly minimal cover of The Pretenders’ Private Life which cracked the UK top 20 and introduced her to a wider audience when she performed it, magnificently, on Top of the Pops. Zebra Katz says it’s his favourite song on Warm Leatherette – “Grace’s voice has such a relaxed and controlled attitude and the track itself is just so incredibly lush” – and The Pretenders’ Chrissie Hynde is also a big fan. “When I first heard Grace’s version I thought ‘Now that’s how it’s supposed to sound!’” she wrote in the liner notes for Jones’s 1998 compilation Private Life: The Compass Point Sessions”.
To celebrate the impact Grace Jones has had on other artists, I am ending with a playlist of tracks from those who have cited her as being important – whether her music has inspired them or the full force of her being has moved them. Enjoy tracks from artists who hold Grace Jones as...
INSPIRING to them.