LA-based indie-pop artist, Jenna Kyle shares the title track, “Ojos,” from her debut EP today, along with a lyric video. This new bop is the second single from the Ojos EP, will arrive on September 3, 2021. The track represents a new era for the Los Angeles-based singer/ songwriter, producer and live electronic artist, who has actively been leaving her mark as one of the 2% of female music producers in the industry. Jenna Kyle supports women’s rights and LGBTQ equality and stands with The Ally Coalition.
On the new single, Kyle says, “Ojos is the first song I wrote and produced myself. It’s surprising how few women are producing music still, but the doors are definitely open and there’s a strong group of us out here doing it! I vacillate between feeling enraged that there are so few women in the profession, while simultaneously feeling proud to help hold the torch for the next generation of female producers coming up, all while battling the imposter syndrome many of us feel when saying “I am a producer, I produced this myself!”
One of the ways Kyle has explored her newfound producer prowess is to integrate a multicultural world aesthetic that is so uniquely her own. Jenna Kyle’s forthcoming EP is influenced by her travels over the past several years and her long time partnership and collaboration with Brazilian / Argentine drummer Bruno Esrubilsky (Mitski, Hedwig and The Angry Inch, The Band Joseph), which contributed to a globally-minded sound and an influx of Spanish and Portuguese lyrics.
She adds, “Over the past few years, pre-Covid, we toured through Southeast Asia, Europe, and visited South America every few months to be with family. I was immersed in the music and rhythms while meeting so many wonderful people. Language barriers can provide a new opportunity to communicate. You don’t need to understand every word I say to know what I mean. Exploring writing lyrics and poems in Spanish, which I’ve studied through college and since I was a kid, and Portuguese, which is a newer language for me, opened up a more creative process; there’s more room for experimentation within the new rhyme schemes. I don’t get as caught up on a word being cliche. Ojos and all my new music feels like an opening of sound and mind as a direct result of the freedom from self-imposed language constraints, and deepening my skills as a producer.”
The track caught the attention of DJ/producer Sinego, who created a dark, organic house mix of “Ojos,” called La Noche Mix which will be released July 28. This collaboration highlights Kyle’s love of production and connection and takes the track to new places.
The debut single from the EP, “Tell Me,” is also streaming everywhere now along with a new video. “Tell Me” is a capstone of Kyle’s experience of trying on different personas and processes and the video explores the way people present themselves to the world. Kyle co-produced the new single with BAILE(Anjunadeep) and Grant Zubritsky (Verite, Nick Murphy) mostly remotely in their respective Brooklyn studios.
The accompanying music video emerged as an exploration with director Jay Harwood, art director Gina Schiappacasse and choreographer Cesar Brodermann. Kyle strikes somewhat contorted poses in a rotating lineup of wearable art pieces, masks, and headpieces by Brooklyn staple artists including PJ Linden and Max Steiner, nodding to the Tik-Tok and Instagram obsession culture weߣre all trapped in, as she sings ironically “Tell me what to wear, tell me what to think, tell me what to feel inside.”
After a handful of singles, Kyle is carving out her pocket of indie-pop that’s rooted in self-expression with a context that she defines. Her music is a permission slip for others to find their inner voice and go deeply into the heart space that seeks no confirmation or praise, where the goal is to express and not impress. Stay tuned for Ojos, the debut EP, due out this September.
