By DCist Contributor Teta Alim
According to soul singer Reesa Renee, being a musician in D.C. is much like a special family recipe.
“You go out of state to taste some pork chops but you’re like ‘this ain’t like the pork chops my auntie makes,’” she says.
The Prince George’s County native has a lot of love for the DMV and it seeps into her music, which is highly influenced by jazz, soul, and go-go. While her 2012 debut album Reelease seemed liked a direct homage to her influences, her latest EP Lovers Rock transforms those sounds into one all her own.
With a music buff for a father, Renee grew up on a steady diet of go-go and other funk sounds, citing Chuck Brown as an early inspiration. Her brother is a producer and she started off writing poetry to his music and singing over his beats. It wasn’t until the deaths of close friends and her struggles with depression and bipolar disorder that she found that music has always been there. And used it as a release.
“I’ve always been an advocate on finding and honing in on whatever your release is,” Renee says.
Her songwriting process begins with focusing on the cadence of her lyrics, much like poetry. Her music has a life of its own. With every listen of “Got Me Loose,” one of the first songs she wrote, there was always something new to discover, whether it’s the way Renee uses her voice or an elusive beat.
“I’m really infatuated with love and relationships,” she admits. Taking notes from Sade, who also has an album of the same name, Renee took this new release to challenge herself with her songwriting, being more vulnerable and hopefully adding a more visual component to go with the music. “Lovers Rock” is about her different experiences in love.
“A lot of people are afraid of love, including myself,” she says. But she thinks this introspection has made her a stronger artist. “That’s what art is, it’s a state of being vulnerable.”
“Lovers Rock” is firmly rooted in the present. While Renee keeps her soulful vocals, the jazz and go-go influences make way for more contemporary R&B rhythms that shift her closer to Tinashe or Rochelle Jordan rather than Erykah Badu or Jill Scott.
For a love album, the high energy is decidedly refreshing; there aren’t any soaring ballads or heart-wrenching pleas, but there’s still a tenderness and deliberateness that comes through the heavy bass beats and curling synths. Highlights include the hypnotic “Controversial,” the jazzy pop flair of “Hello Mama” and the fast-paced reverence of “God Energy.”
Renee doesn’t mess with labels, she’s happy to leave the issues of genres and styles up to everyone else. When it comes to her music, it’s all about a feeling.
“Even if they don’t understand it, at least they know what it feels like,” she says.
Reesa Renee is having an album release party tonight at The Huxley. It’s also her birthday!
