INTERVIEW: Jessica Mauboy releases stunning fifth album 'Yours Forever': "There's a whole different cry that I'm reflecting in myself on this record"
Jessica Mauboy has become one of Australia’s most cherished Australian music icons. Over 16 years at the top of the game she has scored three solo top 10 albums and nine top 10 singles, as well as appearing on the Eurovision Song Contest stage twice, acting as a judge on The Voice and starring in the multi-awarding winning film The Sapphires.
A truly versatile artist, Mauboy’s music has traversed pop, R&B, electropop and almost everything in between. She has the enviable ability to subvert expectations and authentically inhabit songs from opposite ends of the spectrum, from the roof raising electronic beats of ‘We Got Love’ to the emotional, stripped back ballad ‘Little Things’.
Today Mauboy releases her fifth studio album Yours Forever, her first album since 2019’s chart topper Hilda, and her first since signing to Warner Music. Mauboy says the album is her most personal and vulnerable to date, with its 14 tracks reflecting her journey of self-discovery and empowerment. It is a stunning album that shows Mauboy at her absolute best - a kaleidoscope of sounds and emotions that explore multiple genres whilst still remaining cohesive and true to Mauboy. With lyrics exploring love, hope, heartbreak and resilience, Mauboy’s vocals are mesmerising - expressively, emotively warm with an engaging huskiness that telegraphs a depth of experience and emotion.
Appearing as part of the wider family of songs for the first time on Yours Forever, the four singles released from the album - the gospel pop of ‘Give You Love’ featuring Jason Derulo, the dreamy pop of ‘Flashback’ and ‘Forget You’ and the thumping dance beats of racial harmony anthem ‘Never Giving Up’ - sound better than ever.
The album opens with ‘Yours Forever', which is a gorgeous, ethereal song with a minimalist soundscape that allows Mauboy’s vocals to shine. “It’s a little prayer and an ode to my teachers: my elders, my parents, my sisters, and my environment. In it, I’m passing on everything I’ve been taught and everything I’ve known,” Mauboy explains.
‘Underwater’ is a driving pop track that combines electronic pop with a beach-guitar vibe while ‘The Loneliest I Ever Was’ continues in the pure pop vein, with impossibly infectious melodies and lush backing vocals while the lyrics give the song a more melancholic edge as Mauboy sings of the loneliness you feel when you are stuck in a bad relationship.
The smooth, mellow vibes of ‘Whitney’ is both a tribute to Whitney Houston and Mauboy’s childhood and missing the things you never thought you would growing up. “Fill me up with this feeling / You’re going to grow up and miss this,” she sings.
‘Tell ‘Em’ is arguably the sonic outlier on the album, in the best way possible. It’s gentle opening beats are soon pushed aside by a gritty, R&B-rap track with Mauboy silencing the voices in her head that tell her she is not enough and announcing to herself - and the entire world - she is “a bad bitch…you are worth it too / You deserve it all baby, yes you do.” It is a deliciously uplifting track that pulls you straight into its world.
‘Little Too Late’, featuring Miiesha, has a wonky piano and soulful, soaring vocals that sees Mauboy brush off a former lover “I had to learn how to let go / And now I’m okay.” On ‘Goodbye’ Mauboy slips into a warm country sound which features a clever lyrical trick with Mauboy singing “I can’t say…”, literally completely avoiding saying the word that forms the title of the song. It is particularly effective when the song ends with Mauboy’s resigned ‘I can’t say…’ before the song abruptly ends.
The album ends where it started, with a short reprise of the opening track title ‘Yours Forever & Ever’. It bookends the album beautifully and brings back to the forefront the feeling of contentment, peace and the never ending power of love after the challenging experiences that inspired the songs in between.
Yours Forever is Jessica Mauboy at the absolute height of her powers. It is an album that tackles deep and moving issues, but retains complete sonic joy and diversity that keeps you invested - and enthralled - from beginning to end. Already a contender for one of the best pop albums of 2024, this is music that will stay with you long after the last note has played. We recently sat down with Mauboy to chat all about the creation of the album.
Hello, Jess it’s so lovely to see you! We are big fans - obviously - of yours at Women In Pop, even bigger now with the release of Yours Forever. This album feels just like an exhale in the most beautiful possible way. There's no brakes on this album, there's no second thoughts. It's so beautiful.
Wow, thank you for sharing that because I personally feel it's my most released and relieved in the sense of all of the songs. If I was to think of my previous albums there's definitely that pause, it feels like there's that pause, and then on to the next song. [This album] is delivering a record that felt like it was a story like a time capsule, but it doesn't end. I didn't think about that when I first started writing the album, I just wanted to collaborate and gather people that I'd never worked with before, that I admired from a distance and loved their music and put them in a space where I felt my most comfortable. To go through a really fluent situation where don't feel like you have to try, or you don't have to always fill the space. One great example is working with Nick Littlemore, he really gave me space and permission to really explore. I would walk in, spend 30 minutes of just jamming with these boys, 30 minutes just playing and we would compile these 30 plus minutes of just us recording and jamming all of these sounds and feelings. And then in the second week, we would sift through it and find what I was saying in particular little snippets. It was really a very different process of making a song without force or without feeling ‘I need a song like this’ or ‘I need a song that's going to be on the charts’.
If I listen to how I'm singing compared to how I sung songs from the past, there is a blues, soul tone to how I'm singing in the songs now. Listening to ‘Pop A Bottle’ and listening to something ‘Forget You’ are two completely different ways of singing. It's still a pop tune, but it's the way I'm vocalising it within the song and where it's coming from, which is soul, right? It was that thinking of not putting pressure on myself, rediscovering things that I didn't think were quite possible in the sense of how deep my vocals had changed in the way of telling the story. So when I combined all of those things, it is probably the most in depth that I've been in a whole body of work, through each individual song from ‘Yours Forever’ to ‘Underwater’. There's a whole different cry, a whole different attention that I'm reflecting in myself in this record.
I'm so glad you brought up ‘Underwater’ because it's such a jam. It’s this beautiful pop jam, but it comes with this rumbling roar. Much like ‘The Loneliest I Ever Was’, which is probably my favourite track on the album, I love it.
I love that you mentioned ‘Loneliness’ because it's one of those where it just gets you as soon as you hear those words. Anyone who's ever felt bad or has felt that way, it's such a piercing feeling of having that said to you, or you saying that. It's a form of I hate you. I hate what you've done to me, or I just hate the situation and hate is is full of rage. It’s something that is so unwanted, that you shouldn't feel, that shouldn't be directed anywhere, but that's what I love about it. It's so cutthroat but in a way that it has ‘don't mess with me’ type of thing. It's kind of psycho a little bit, but I love it!
It’s piercing, but it’s a strut, that's what's great about it. Some of the most painful songs are the best bangers, aren't they? When you pull apart the lyrics you realise, actually I've been dancing to the saddest song in the world!
Yes! Oh my gosh, but that's what I love. I think that's why I loved the Bee Gees or Abba so much is because they were able to do that, they were able to make you feel like you're strutting, but then you are singing back the lyrics and you're like oh, shit! Actually, it's quite sad. It's actually tearing my heart apart, but I'm strutting and I'm kind of okay, now I'm embracing it. Now I'm getting life and I'm dealing with it now. I love that way of writing. I've never written a song quite ‘The Loneliest I Ever Was’ to be honest, I think the closest would probably be ‘Inescapable’. It's very different for me and was super fun, but also really, really truthful.
It’s really beautiful, and I like that you say it's different for you and it's something you've never done because much like you said at the beginning about this album. It's almost like you just sort of went ‘I don’t need to be anyone anymore, I'm just gonna sing my songs’. And that sounds really basic, but I imagine it’s really hard to do the bigger you get in your career.
’The Loneliest I Ever Was’ was the super hardest song, it was a song that I really went back and forth with because I wasn't quite sure about the simplicity. The simpleness of it really affected me, it was like ‘do I need to add anymore? Is it too thin? Is it too lonely?’ But I guess on the opposite side that was the whole point, of feeling this loneliness, you're doing this by yourself but you have to embrace it and you have to overcome somehow, or just sit in it. And it's okay to feel that way. I was really caring of it because I wanted it to feel like it was in its right place, and I think that's why it feels so good.
What I think is so beautiful about this album is you have so many sounds and so many nods, but they all work. We grow up all the time as human beings and this is another part of coming of age, where you go I am my inspirations I am my passions. I am my loves. I don't have to fit into this one popstar mould or this one R&B mould, you just pulled it all together. You've even got a track with my Miiesha, ‘Little Too Late’, you two singing together is incredible.
When we first started, it had very Motown sound. I was working with Styalz Fuego and I told him I needed a bit of almost almost ‘mama’ vibes. If you think of the greatest, iconic background singers you know, that's how I wanted it to feel but with these female soul spirits in there. Just hearing Miiesha’s song ‘Damage’, and then her version of ‘Neon Moon’ I was like, ‘wow, I need that’. I wanted her to bring her herself and her story and her ‘little too late’ into this song. When we started to rework it we brought in almost like a waltz, a beefed up waltz, brought the pianos up, brought a little bit of organs in there and made it feel like ‘you’re too late, bye!’ Bringing Miiesha in was such a dream, I've always admired her from a distance and to actually have her physically in the studio was a whole other level. Hearing her journey of self worth and self doubt made the song even bigger and braver and just gut wrenching. I'm here to stay, I know who I am and I'm moving forward. It was magic. Not only were we there to do a song, but we were there as music people and music lovers and writers. It was really nice to be so open with her and have her be open back to me and do this song with such love and heartache, but also to send it off.
It's gorgeous and the two of you together just sounds incredible. You've always been so giving in your career and so elevating, particularly with female artists. I want to talk to you about the opening song and title track ‘Yours Forever. This is your give back and your thank you. Can you talk to me a little bit about this track because it opens and then quietly closes the album.
Yeah, thank you for bringing it up. I worked with Styalz (producer) and Shun (co-writer) for two weeks in Melbourne, I'd never done songwriting in Melbourne before, and I'd never worked with Styalz and Shun. Shun flew from LA to spend two weeks with me to do some writing, and it was absolutely magical. I just felt so comfortable with her and by that point we'd had written four other tracks and this was the fifth song that we almost didn't finish, but it felt it was finished in a way, which was so odd. I told her I'd always wanted to write a hymn, I grew up in church, I did a little bit of background storytelling to her and I said I feel like writing a hymn today, something that almost felt like meditation that people can feel in their own way. You're really special alone time where you get to talk to whoever you talk to, whether it’s a spirit or your friend, just to heal. ‘Yours Forever’, I just feel like it was giving back, I kept saying I just want to give back. I've always given back, that's kind of my thing as a living, breathing human. But I want to say that to who ever it is for - your family, your loved ones, your friends, or people who you meet along the way or that you haven't met yet. And thinking about the afterlife and whether you're in any of those worlds that you’ve given your best, you've given all that you have and you've experienced everything that you could have, or that you want to do. It's really an inspirational song of healing.
For me, all I've ever wanted to do was try and be a good person, be honest to myself, be honest to the people that I love as much as I can and be loving. Time can go fast, and if you haven't said what you have to say, you might not get the chance. I just wanted to write a song about that, and all of a sudden it became this bigger thing that I didn't expect it to be. We couldn't quite work out whether it was a song or an interlude or something that was just in between. Originally it was going to be that interlude between songs, but it became its own thing. And I'm glad that I was able to not kind of push it away because after writing that song, I remember going on to every other session and being like, let's just go with the flow, I'm just going to write, I'm just going to storytell and whatever I hear, that's what the song is going to turn into. I feel like that song really became a roof for me for what I was going to write next and being as truthful as possible in the process. I didn't expect it to be the beginning of the album. After I put all the songs together, it was going to be the outro but then after thinking a lot more and, I wanted to divide it and for it to this time lapse, almost a circle of life, time never ends. This song is like the ticking clock but it actually it just keeps going around.
The infinite loop, which is why it closes the album so. It's really beautiful. Jess, thank you so much for your time and congratulations on such a beautiful album.
Thank you for your time. I'm really excited to be a part of Women In Pop, every time I pick it up or every time I read Women In Pop, there's a huge strength, for anyone who picks it up and reads everything in there. It's one of those where I feel very honoured to be part of to be honest. Feeling very much a part of women power. I truly do my music for women, it's that reflection of what I go through as a woman and hopefully that will translate to other women who are going to be stronger, who are going to embrace or acknowledge those painful things or those celebratory things and to not fear. I feel really, really proud of this record because a lot of me has dived really deep, and I'm glad that you get to translate that for women.
Yours Forever is out now via Warner Music. You can buy and stream here.
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Read our 2019 10 page interview with Jessica Mauboy in issue 7 of Women In Pop Magazine
