Next Wave #902: Jimi Somewhere

In Association With Vero True Social

Drawing inspiration from movie scores and adolescent nostalgia, Jimi Somewhere has created an alt-pop landscape we’re more than thrilled to dive into. “I’ve always made music, like ever since I was super young I’ve been writing songs,” the prodigal alt-pop talent – real name Benjamin Schandy – tells Clash over the phone.

The Norwegian glo-fi wonderboy is out in LA, working his musical magic in the sunshine far away from the foggy nowhere town he’s from. Hailing from the industrial forest town Hokksund, Schandy possessed the ballsy dream of working with music from a young age. He tells us: “Ever since elementary I’ve always had a dream of doing music and having that as my like job. So it’s kind of always been working towards that.” 

At the tender age of 17 his endeavour took the shape of Jimi Somewhere. His debut EP, ‘MEMORIA’, maps out a sense of gripping nostalgia swirled with dreamy alternative pop production. “Both me and Milo (producer) are very nostalgic by nature and we’re like very drawn to things that are nostalgic. We had really great teenage years and I guess that kind of made us want to write more about it, and dive deeper into it, which likely creates nostalgic music I guess.”

This rose-tinged nostalgic view of his teens may also take the blame for the tag that has increasingly come to describe Schandy’s sound. His “coming-of-age indie” might be rooted in his obsession with the film genre, but that’s not the only element he draws on.

“I mean, coming-of-age is about teenage stuff, growing up and overcoming obstacles you have growing up," he says. "I guess that’s what a lot of my music is about as well, which is why it falls into that. The soundtrack to coming of age movies is also similar to the type of guitar chords we use or the type of sounds we’re going for.”

”I try to make my music as cinematic as possible, so it kind of feels like listening to a movie – when you listen through my project.”

There’s certainly a sense of timelessness to this aspiration, however, Schandy points out that adolescent is a fleeting source of inspiration. “As we get older we’re not gonna be inspired by the same stuff and making the same stuff gets boring after a while, we’re always evolving”.

Pondering where his project might go next, Jimi Somewhere seems to transcend a creative fluidity. “We never want to be in the trend or anything like that, we just want to create…. I want to be like an ever-evolving artist who’s not in any box. Kind of like Kanye where every project is something completely different from the last one, but what’s always there is the passion and the intuition”.

For now, he’s enjoying the big city life of LA, “You’ve gotta be where you want to make it I guess”, and working towards his debut album, “which hopefully will arrive next year – we’re in album mode”.

The world had best watch out – we’ll hopefully see more from Jimi Somewhere soon.

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Words: Aurora Henni Krogh
Photo Credit: Dev Dhunsi

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