Jayda G releases "Feeling alive", her new single out now on Ninja Tune.
“Lose yourself tonight” sings Jayda G during the final breakdown of new single, “Feeling Alive”. It’s as much an uplifting affirmation as it is an instruction to the listener, who should have no problem obliging to the emotive stabs and a driving rhythm that shortly kick back in to close out the track in triumphant, hands-in-the-air fashion.
On “Feeling Alive”, Jayda — the Grammy-nominated Music Producer, DJ and Environmental Toxicologist, draws on the more upbeat elements of her most recent full-length ‘Guy’ which, despite its heavy and personal themes at times, is ultimately filled with hope and joy.
“'Guy' was really me exploring and, you know, pushing my sound to the next level,”
she explains.
“‘Feeling Alive’ is me kind of taking that into a real pure dance music form. Knowing that my album was largely about loss and grief and death, this is me focussing on the joyful celebratory part of my life, because I know I have a lot of things to be happy for!”
“Feeling Alive” came to life during a recording session with Sam Knowles AKA Karma Kid and Baz Kaye — who co-produced the track — as Jayda recalls:
“We were just sitting in the studio working together, and I was very conscious of just wanting to focus on how good life can be, and how I really want my music to emulate that this time around.
We talked a lot about different times in our lives when we were feeling really good and positive about life, and I started telling them this story from when I was living in LA, and I was driving down
Sunset Boulevard late at night, seeing all the lights and everything going on, and how I just felt just really alive at that time.
That’s how we hit on that tagline of “feeling alive” which helped form the sentiment of the whole track.”
The result is an undeniable summer banger, one that’s already been firmly road-tested across Jayda’s busy DJ schedule — which she maintains even while heavily pregnant, including a roadblock set at this year’s Glastonbury festival, Tomorrowland and a debut set at Pacha in Ibiza. The track has also been named BBC Radio 1's Hottest Record.
The single also follows the recent UK and US launch of her feature length film “Blue Carbon”, which Jayda presents, and which also features additional music from RZA (Wu-Tang Clan) and Brazilian icon Seu Jorge; and accompanying single “If We Only Knew”, which drew on field recordings taken throughout the filming process.
Directed by Emmy/BAFTA-winning filmmaker Nicolas Brown (The Serengeti Rules) and produced by multi award-winning studios MAKE Waves and HHMI Tangled Bank Studios, the feature-length “Blue Carbon” documentary is an environmentally-focused musical journey. One that follows Jayda on a quest to understand how Blue Carbon — the term given to three key coastal ecosystems that fringe every continent: seagrass meadows, mangroves and tidal marshes — can help to mitigate the effects of climate change, and how we can protect these fragile ecosystems from further destruction.
Additionally, Jayda has recently launched her new podcast series “Here’s Hoping”, which aims to be a platform for scientists, environmentalist activists, authors, musicians, psychologists, artists and Jayda herself, to discuss why they still feel hope, and the tools we can use to foster and maintain hope, for ourselves, our community and our planet. Guests have so far included the likes of Elijah, Alluna, Stephanie Yeboah, Alice Aedy and Leah Green, with The Guardian recently including the podcast in their ‘Best of the Week” roundup, describing Jayda as ”a proper force of greatness.”
“Feeling Alive” is out now on Ninja Tune, alongside an official video edited by director Greg Barnes.
Picture by Jedidah M