Jenni Orlopp talks about her music and her latest single ‘maybe that’s true’
Jenni Orlopp is a 20 year old self taught singer, songwriter and music producer from the North of England. Aiming to tell stories through her music, Jenni often combines thematic lyrics with heavy baselines in a nod to her love of RnB and rap, and has recently been experimenting with influences from the UK Garage, Bossa Nova and pop rock for her upcoming releases in 2023.
With her sixth single ‘maybe that’s true’ Jenni reflects on her experiences of being part of the younger generation in the last couple of years. Produced by Jenni herself, this single marks a new era in Jenni’s musical journey.
Maria: How did you get into music? When was the day when you woke up and decided that this is what you wanna do now?
Jenni: Um, I think I was always into music as a kid, like playing instruments. But I think when I actually started to want to do my own stuff, I was probably about like 12 or 13 and have figured out you can produce things as well and, you know, you could record it and then sing over it and do it all kind of like on an iPod or something. It was a lot easier than I thought. I think that was probably it to me. I started writing songs to the instruments that I played, and then eventually, kind of it progressed. I think it was definitely around then for me.
Maria: How would you describe the genre of your music?
Jenni: It definitely changed since I started. I know like, when I first started, it was very much like the music that I was listening to at the time. And you know, I didn't really put anything out because it kind of just sounded like what I was listening to. And I think as I've gotten older, and I've had more experiences with things, it's definitely turned into more of something that I would put out rather than just what I'm listening to at the time.
I think genre wise it's definitely like pop, but I think it has a lot of different influences within it. So it's kind of like pop but some of it has an r&b influence. Some of it has more jazz stuff.
When it comes to my influences, I think for every song for me, it tends to be different. Like I'm always relying on people when someone says like, Oh, what do you listen to? I'm likea bit of everything. So it definitely varies from song to song. At the moment there is a UK artist called Jordan Stevens that I've been listening to a lot. I've been listening to a lot of Frank Ocean again recently with his Coachella performance thing. And things that are just like, happened. What I'd say overall, it's probably a lot of older music, the stuff that my parents used to listen to. So that's what I grew up with. I like Borneo and things like that anyway, and house is a big one for me.
Maria: What was your creative process like for writing your latest single «maybe that’s true» ?
Jenni: I actually wrote it while I was in France. I was visiting France to look after a family's house while they were on holiday for a couple of weeks. And I was in the French countryside by myself for three weeks and I was like, I'm gonna write something on it, make some music. And I had the backing track already. And I kind of just sat and thought about it like the last years with COVID and, you know, everything that's happened. And the song kind of just happened really from that. But it was definitely an easier process than some of the other songs.
Maria: Do you think your process of writing songs has changed in any way since you started releasing music?
Jenni: I think it's definitely changed a lot. I think when I started writing songs, I was kind of 9 or 10 years old and now I'm 20. So I think something that's definitely helped is just having stuff to write about and having been through things, and having experiences that l10 year old me couldn’t write about. And I think as well, something that I've more recently come across is I've kind of stopped being worried about writing things that aren't perfect. I used to be massive on like, if I had sat there with my notebook, I'd be writing and I wanted it to be exactly right the first time. And now I'm so much more comfortable with writing something that sounds absolutely awful, but gives me an idea for something that sounds better.
Not everything is going to be good all the time. And that's fine.
Maria: What is the message that you would like to share through your songs?
Jenni: I think I wouldn't say all of the songs have the same sort of message if that makes sense. But each song definitely has its own kind of meaning and its own kind of story behind it. I think I prefer to do it that way. I think because I'm still fairly young and the songs I've been writing or when I was younger, and like, you know, have not been like I hadn’t that much time to kind of make that much and release that much. I think it's nice to have these little snapshots of where I was at that point when I was writing that song. And, I have some songs that I listen to now that I brought out like two years ago that I'm like, Oh, God, I don't feel like that at all anymore. And I think it's nice to have individual kind of snippets of where I've been at that point. So they are all kind of different.
Maria: What advice would you have for someone wanting to follow in your footsteps?
Jenni: I think for me, the biggest piece of advice I could give to anyone is just stop caring about any of it. I think that's a huge thing that kind of stopped me for a while. I didn't put music out until two or three years ago because I was worried about what other people would think. And then when I put it out, I was like, I can only put it out when it's absolutely perfect and it made a lot of the process harder because I was so worried about it having to be perfect. I cared too much about things that weren't that important. So I would definitely say just kind of like letting go a little bit is definitely the best piece of advice I could give.
Maria: If you can have your fans remember one thing about you, what would it be?
Jenni: It would just be – don't put too much pressure. Don't put too much pressure on anything. And the fact that if you want to do something, do it. If you don't want to do it, don't. And that sounds really stupid but there's been a lot of times where there's been something and I've been like, oh god, I've got to get this done. I've got to do that. And I think I would want the biggest thing for people to take away from me as a musician is just – you don't have to feel like that. You can just do what you want to do when you want to do it. And if something isn't clicking, it doesn't matter. Let's just move on to the next thing.
Maria: Do you have upcoming and future projects?
Jenni: I have something kind of big coming up in May that I'm not meant to mention yet. But that will be on all my social media and things sort of mid May. And then in July, I'm doing some stuff with this UK based charity youth music that will be around on the Internet. A lot of stuff to keep watch for.
