Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to J Chambers . We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi J, thanks for joining us today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

This year I’ve been working on a project entitled ‘Homecoming’ which builds on from the theme of Identity explored in my previous work ‘Escape The Kingdom’. The creation of this project has been a really liberating process, as its enabled me to explore who and what I am at the foundational basic human level. My Jamaican heritage has been a consistent theme in my recent work and I have been intrigued at the relationship that England has with the Carribean and Commonwealth as a whole.

Being Black and British, we are consistently presented with mixed messaging about the notions of the depth surrounding our Britishness and how British we could be. I explored this within ‘Escape The Kingdom’ and concluded that the only place of peace was to in-some ways leave this notion of ‘Great Britain’ and to return home, for being there I can take off the armour I wear navigating British Society, ground recharge and create at the most basic freeing level.

This has produced an audio-visual project in the form of ‘Homecoming’ which shows the actual journey and creating of some of my most fulfilled music, collaborating with award winning producers, songwriters and artists, Recording in Tuff Gong studios.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

My music came from a place of wanting a space to decompress, process and explore. Naturally being introverted prose was always a place of comfort to explore and navigate my overstanding of situations and also of myself. I think naturally my art became more aligned the further I dug into myself and into what makes me, me. I think that the differentiation between my music and poetry two aligns with this, in a sense of my lyrics are structured, thought-out, methodic in their delivery, process and I guess in someways the sound (in terms of voice, not production). However with my poetry, that is more a stream of consciousness, I do not edit my poetic works, what you hear in those pieces is the stream of consciousness of how I felt in that moment and in that time. Whilst this is also something that is a thread throughout my music as I use poetry and rap interchangeably. I feel as though the poems are pure expression, that is why they’re often about serious issues where I can provide my perspective.

In terms of what I’m most proud of, I would say its myself this year. Navigating an evolving industry, working with my team to go to Jamaica to collaborate with artists, songwriters and producers, documenting it all and creating an A/V project which has been screened at several film festivals. I think being unapologetic and daring in the pursuit of something you believe in is important. So I guess I give thanks to the process and to myself for being brave enough to put myself through the process. I also am thankful to the team involved and I’m proud of what we’ve accomplished this year with touring, festivals and the album.

In terms of what I want people to know about my work, I guess is that its purpose orientated and that there is value and overstanding in the words, should we be in a place to hear the work. As my music isn’t for everyday rotation (or at least so I’ve been told)

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

Telling my story, leaving a body of work that I guess explores who I am. I guess it’s an audio journal in someways.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

Energies, the exchange of energy from a crowd at shows or at festivals is the reason I do this. For a brief moment in a set of music, we put aside all of our differences, ideologies, perspectives and ideas and move as a collective. There is something healing about live music, we feel invigorated and recharged both seeing it and delivering it. So yeah, I guess thats the most rewarding part.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @jaycmcr
• Facebook: jaycmcr
• Twitter: jaycmcr
• Youtube: jaycmcr

Image Credits
@seinHQ on all photos