Banks
Banks is a woman of few words. Born Jillian Rose Banks, the 26-year-old songstress started crafting songs when she was 15 to help her deal with her parents’ divorce. And the dark emotional streak and fragility certainly show in her music that’s likened to acts like The Weeknd and Aaliyah. Cutting her teeth by uploading her songs to SoundCloud, Banks inked her first recording deal with Good Years Recording and released her debut single “Before I Ever Met You” in February 2013. Another EP titled Fall Over followed, but it wasn’t until her second EP London that music critics finally lauded her as the next big thing to watch out for. True enough, by late 2013, accolades by BBC and MTV streamed in and various media outlets were paving 2014 as Banks’ breakout year. In September 2014, Banks released her much anticipated debut album Goddess to rave acclaim. With her mesmerizing live performances, Banks has been doing the live circuits rounds and will be performing in Singapore for the first time at the fifth edition of St. Jerome’s Laneway Festival Singapore on January 24 at The Meadows, Gardens By The Bay. If dark R&B and sultry vocals are your thing, Banks’ performance is certainly one hell of a show that you wouldn’t want to miss.
Inch Chua
With Laneway adding in Singaporean acts like [.gif] and Hanging Up The Moon for this year’s line-up, we thought it’d be fun to get some of our local musicians to interview some of the selected Laneway acts. Chatting with Banks is none other than Inch Chua, singer/songwriter who is currently based in Singapore, New York and Los Angeles. Inch has released her latest album Bumfuzzle in 2013 and has been actively playing festivals around the world. Read on and find out more about Banks giving her heart away, getting calls from prison and the importance of being who you are!
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Hi Banks! You’re an L.A. girl and went to USC (University of Southern California). I was in L.A myself for 2 years and I love that place! So, what do you listen to when you’re driving around in traffic?
Hmm, it depends. If I am working with a certain producer, I’m usually listening to that person a lot. I like to dive into whatever I am working on. Sometimes, it also depends on what kind of mood I’m in, I could listen to Drake or Lauryn Hill or something like that.
You cite Fiona Apple as one of your all-time influences. Which is your favourite Fiona Apple song?
It’s really hard to choose! They’re all so special. Maybe “Never Is A Promise” as it is a beautiful song which influenced my style a bit earlier on.
Are you excited to come to Singapore for Laneway?
Of course! It’ll be so incredible, I can’t wait!
What can we expect from your Laneway performance next year?
My heart. My music is my heart, so it’ll be like giving my heart away, I guess.
You’ve always been a very honest performer. You’re not social media averse as well; you’ve given your number away to fans so they can call you, text you and connect with you. Do you have any memorable conversations where something weird or awesome happened during these calls?
I started getting calls from prisons! There was this one day where all of a sudden, I got 6 calls from 6 different prisons and I continued to get them every day and I couldn’t really figure out why this is happening. I guess I was in a magazine that they got in prison or something like that but it’s still pretty crazy getting messages from different inmates!
Wow! Won’t you receive an automated message from prison calls though? Like an advance notification that this particular person from this specific prison is trying to contact you…
Yeah, I was getting a lot of messages like that. Press 1 to accept call from Army State prison or whatever. One time, somebody did get through and it was a really long, genuine message about his 11-year jail sentence. It’s really crazy.
That’s very cool! Amazing and intense at the same time, but really cool! So, tell us more about this new album that you’ve got coming up?
It’s just me at my most pure and my most honest. It’s a deep layer of who I am in this moment. It touches upon the main events which I’ve gone through. A lot of dealings are keenly documented on it. So I guess when I am much older and I listen back on this record; it’ll definitely make me remember this time to a really intimate degree.
Is there anything you’ll like to say to young women who want to be just like you?
Listen to Banks. Be who you are because that’s really awesome and you are all f**king awesome!
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Banks will be playing St. Jerome Laneway Festival Singapore on January 24, 2015 at The Meadows, Gardens By The Bay. Tickets are priced at $165 (not inclusive of processing fee) and are available at eventCliQue and SISTIC.
