On new album

Joan As Police Woman pursues her love of jazz

On the new album, Joan Wasser aka Joan As Police Woman once again pursues her love of jazz.

(Bild: Krone KREATIV/PIAS, Paola Kudacki)

After three years, New York style-denier Joan Wasser aka Joan As Police Woman is releasing "Lemons, Limes & Orchards", on which she combines delicate jazz with everyday themes such as love and social upheaval. In October, she will be coming to Ebensee cinema for a concert.

Away from the bead of gimmicky mainstream pop artists, there is still plenty of room for depth and authentic emotionality. Joan Wasser has been combining both components in a particularly special way for some time now. She was a close friend of the great Jeff Buckley and played violin with Antony And The Johnsons (now Anohni) and Rufus Wainwright before concentrating more intensively on her solo career as Joan As Police Woman a good 20 years ago. Motivated by her eternal hero Al Green, she found the courage to come to the fore as a guitarist and singer and quickly became a favorite of music critics. Her albums such as "To Survive" (2008) and "The Deep Field" (2011) sometimes caused a stir among a wider audience, but her down-to-earth form of US East Coast adult pop, which is infused with an intense love of jazz, is particularly appealing to connoisseurs of delicate musical artistry.

Music is like school
Wasser's brand new album "Lemons, Limes & Orchids" was a musical caesura for the 54-year-old, as it was the first work in years that she recorded without drummer Tony Allen, who died in 2020. "I love working with others," she explains in the Krone interview, "it's one of the best things about the job for me. Working with Tony was very special. He was just as interested in new things as I was, he didn't spend a lot of time thinking about it, he just got on with it. For me, writing a new song is a bit like going back to school. I don't know what's going to happen, but I know that something is going to happen. For me, that's sometimes the beauty of music. You can only feel this special magic in this art form."

Compared to "The Solution Is Restless", which was released in 2021, the new album is calmer and also has a different sound. "Lemons, Limes & Orchids" once again places much more emphasis on Wasser's expressive voice and pushes the instrumentation further into the background in favor of a more delicate overall picture. At its core, the current album revolves around the various facets of love and loss, but does not ignore socio-political currents and concerns. It is a musical homage to perseverance in a fast-moving world of disorientation. The song "Longing For Ruin", for example, deals with the fact that humanity is gradually destroying itself and the semi-biographical "Oh Joan" prophesies a gloomy future that is definitely characterized by the US presidential election campaign.

Stimulating creativity
Over the years, Wasser has become so routine that she no longer worries too much about recurring writer's block. "I no longer panic if I can't think of anything for a long time. But I also don't believe in something like writer's block. I believe that there are moments in life when you have to let yourself go and simply enjoy the world. If you give in to this impulse, your creativity automatically returns. Then you enter a phase where you are bubbling over with ideas and don't even know where to channel everything. You never know what will come next or what will happen tomorrow. The sooner you come to terms with this, the more relaxed you can live your life. As empty as I may be sometimes, it's comforting to know that this emptiness will always be filled again at some point."

On "Lemons, Limes & Orchids", Wasser ventures back into her old love of jazz. "A good friend told me that I'd never made such a sexy album before," the artist announced in a press release, "to be honest, I think she's absolutely right." Joan, who is now also active in Iggy Pop's live band, can also rely on a respectable cast list. On board are Grammy-winning bassist Meshell Ndegeocello, Alanis Morissette guitarist Chris Bruce, David Byrne keyboardist Daniel Mintseris and alternating drummers Parker Kindred and Otto Hauser. "I don't think in terms of genres, I just think about what I like," Wasser explains, "if someone plays their instrument in a very special way, then that can change my songs. For me, it's very much about approaching music intuitively and having as much fun as possible."

Reinvention not necessary
With her strong-voiced songs and classic singing voice, Wasser is also a role model - in more ways than one. "Above all, I want to show people that you should follow your gut feeling and make your own decisions. When other musicians follow through on their wishes and do what they think is right, it makes me happy." Her musical leaps follow an instinctive approach to music. "Every new album is a snapshot of the time that has passed since the last album. I never consciously set out to reinvent myself, because I already exist. There's so much different music to listen to nowadays that it's even more important than before to just follow your instincts. Whatever comes into my head turns into music."

Live in Ebensee
Joan As Police Woman is also going on tour with her new album "Lemons, Limes & Orchids" this fall - but without a Vienna date this time. However, fans can look forward to a concert on October 19 at Kino Ebensee. Tickets and all further information about the concert are still available at www.kino-ebensee.at.