See It Through: Durand Jones Interviewed
Durand Jones is ready to be true to himself. It’s taken a lifetime to learn, but he’s finally reached that goal, that sense of being at one with his past. You probably know him best as part of the central trio – alongside Aaron Frazer and Blake Rhein – that have spearheaded Durand Jones & The Indications, one of the most formidable outfits in the ongoing soul resurgence. Solo album ‘Wait Til I Get Over’ is something else entirely – bold, lawless, and totally free, it’s the sound of someone returning to his roots, only to emerge as a completely resurgent voice.
“I feel like three Indications records kind of summarises a chapter in a man’s life,” he notes on sitting down with Clash. We’re in the office of Secretly Canadian in London, and he’s got some time to kill before traveling to Amsterdam. Travel, he’s aware, makes him reflective. “I feel like maybe we can take a bit of time and tell my story. I haven’t really been personal with the audience about my life – who I am, what I am, where I come from… so I just wanted to find a way to do that.”
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Much of the material on this solo album was penned seven or eight years ago, before being shelved. They didn’t quite work within the chemistry of the Indications, where each voice has equal input. “It’s a collaborative effort of writing,” he notes. “This was an opportunity for me to be at the forefront, and for this to be strictly my story, my perspective, as someone from the rural Gulf South of Louisiana.”
It’s a record that fully took Durand Jones home. Brought up in Hillaryville, Louisiana, the town was founded by eight former slaves, granted land as a form of reparations in the aftermath of the Civil War. Researching the town’s history, he was struck by the untold stories, by the inter-generational instincts of survival and expression in its Black communities. In short: “I fell down a fucking rabbit hole… and learned so much about where I’m from, and so much about myself.”
He adds: “I wanted to tell this story and I wanted to get it right and I wanted to pay homage to those folks.”
Deciding to return to those songs, Durand Jones spent time across lockdown bringing them to fruition. Research helped – both to root his songs, and to re-centre himself. “I went and visited the plantation,” he recalls. “I did the tour, I went around… and they didn’t even mention anything about Hillaryville, they didn’t mention anything about giving those eight men reparations. They didn’t mention anything about what the average day was like for the people that built that place with their own hands and sustained it for over 100 years. Which was insane to me.”
A sociological sweep informed ‘Wait Til I Get Over’, alongside a sense of place. The deep South – and its soul tradition – supply an eclectic backdrop for the songwriting, which ranges from gospel traditions to Hi Records via his teen years in a punk band.
“I definitely looked to the past when doing this record, especially to my 17-year-old self,” he acknowledges. “I was in this punk band. I really loved rock ‘n’ roll. I was playing jazz, I was playing classical music, and I was singing a lot of gospel in church. And so I wanted this record to encapsulate all of those things. I wanted it to be a record where if I could travel back in time and hand it to my 17-year-old so he would fucking love it.”
There’s even a song on the finished record called ‘Letter To My 17 Year Old Self’ – one of the most cathartic pieces Durand Jones has ever recorded. “I wrote that during one of the darkest points in my life,” he admits. It’s a reflection on a moment that changed him, a brush with the law that exposed his innocence, and left him scarred. “If I could go back in time to let my kid self know… like, yo dude, you don’t have to believe in the dreams that people have for you. You can dream so much more. And you’re gonna be worth it.”
Throughout our conversation, Durand Jones cites some of the true greats of Black American arts – that’s what he aspires to. “James Baldwin really taught me that being vulnerable is the ultimate form of strength. And I’ve never been this vulnerable before. It’s been a really beautiful process of peeling back these layers and finding a new sense of myself.”
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Take the title song. ‘Wait Til I Get Over’ is informing by lining out, an old church technique where the minister – or a choir leader – would sing the first line of a hymn, before being followed by the congregation. A sound not unlike waves crashing on a shore, it sits at the very root of the gospel tradition, and was practised in the rural churches where Durand Jones came of age – not that he appreciated it at the time.
“I thought it was a wackest shit ever,” he laughs. “But they don’t do that stuff anymore. For those reasons… because younger folks feel like it’s old fashioned. But what those elders were teaching me,” he says, shaking his head, “they were handing down traditions that were handed to them. I really felt the need to do this, in reverence to the folks who laid the groundwork for me to do what I’m doing.”
Recorded across multiple takes, ‘Wait Til I Get Over’ features Durand Jones endlessly overdubbing his vocals – it’s a stunning piece of technical skill, and emotional insight. “I just put the mic up and tried it out,” he shrugs. “It was a lot of trial and error, and it took a while to figure out exactly how to do it… because lining hymns have no metre. There’s no timeframe. It’s freeform. But once I got my foot in it, I wasn’t gonna let go!”
If those wonderful Indications records have charted a group’s interwoven evolution – from an earthy Stax sound through to sweet, Chicago-rooted strains – then this new record takes Durand Jones firmly back to basics. “My roots are in the Deep South. And that’s where my heart is. That’s when my voice sounds best in my opinion. I didn’t feel the need to be overtly cool or smooth with this thing. I wanted to be loud and raucous. I wanted to push myself as much as I could.”
In doing so, Durand Jones healed old wounds. The album imagery took the singer back to the worn-out trailer he grew up in, a poor Black family trying to get by. “I remember talking to my stepmom and telling her: I’m going to come back to Hillaryville, and I’m going to go to the trailer and take pictures. And she was like: why would you want to do that?”
“We’ve always been so embarrassed that we lived in this roach-infested trailer with holes in the floor… But I’m getting to a point now to where I’m proud. Yeah, I’m proud. Because I know what it took to overcome when you’re from a place like that.”
Finishing, he focusses his thoughts completely. “I grew up in an underserved area… Black. Queer. But with a dream. I don’t know… I get overwhelmed sometimes… I’m proud. I’m hella proud.”
One of the foremost voices in his new soul generation, Durand Jones has every right to be proud of his journey – both the starting point, and the generation.
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‘Wait Til I Get Over’ is out now.
Words: Robin Murray
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