Victoria-based duo Jansz & June, a.k.a. Auto Jansz and Andrea June, has just released its second album, After We’re Here. The album’s wide sonic palette and varied lyrical content can be both soothing and striking. Janz is a former member of the Canadian roots band Barley Wik. She’s been involved in the punk music scene in Winnipeg and has released solo recordings that have earned a positive reception. Andrea is known in writing circles by her surname Routley; she graduated from the Canadian College of the Performing Arts and the University of Victoria. Her song “The Tide” was shortlisted for the Island Singer-Songwriter contest in 2010. Coastal Spectator writer Emmett Robinson Smith recently spoke with Andrea about After We’re Here and life as an artist.
You both come from expansive artistic backgrounds: Auto as a former member of Barley Wik, and you, Andrea, as a graduate of the Canadian College of Performing Arts. How have these experiences shaped your idea of what music is and can be?
The way I make music has definitely changed over the years. Like many people, as a kid I was introduced to music through piano lessons and choir, with the focus being on interpreting classical, notated music. I learned to look at music in a bit of a snobby way, with classical music being the top “real” music, and folk music, say, being at the bottom of this hierarchy, which is totally crap and also completely paralyzing when it comes to writing your own music. To make the long story short, I explored musical theatre, opera, jazz, pop, country, and finally landed on writing original songs. I think getting to know these various styles and techniques has completely eliminated any lingering insecurities about the value of any one of those types of music, and that stratified way of looking at it. For Auto, playing in Barley Wik really informed her idea of what playing music is all about. It’s about the collaborative work of playing together as a team, forming that musical connection. Coming from different music backgrounds, we had pretty different ways of talking about music or working on a song, but we found a way and I think these different backgrounds have brought a lot of energy to the songs we write.
I noted a diversity of sounds on your new album, After We’re Here. Who are your major musical influences?
We definitely have different musical influences, and it’s always interesting to hear from people what they think we “sound” like, because it is often not musicians we would name as influences. Many people comment that some of our songs remind them of Sarah McLachlan, who is fantastic, but not someone I ever listened to — although we have all heard her music! Maybe she is impossible not to be influenced by for someone of my generation? Paul Simon is another musician we’ve been compared to. For me, the influence can be on a particular song. In our first album, “The Tide” came out of “Bist Du Bei Mir,” by Bach, which I’d been playing on the piano. On this album, I wrote “Lucky” after listening to a lot of Neko Case — I wanted to write a song with that same direct, unadorned vocal quality. Auto is a lover of swing and ragtime and she tends to lean more toward this style. Doc MacLean is one of her favourite musicians and she had the chance to open for him this summer in Victoria!
There is a unique storytelling element in your lyrics on After We’re Here — “Devil And The Deep Blue Sea” is a good example. Where do you get these ideas for songs?
Auto loves to write songs about famous — or should-be-famous — Canadian women, and “Devil and the Deep Blue Sea” is one of those songs, a true story about a hard-working rancher’s wife, Irene Murdoch, who challenged the law in Alberta to award women a fair share (women couldn’t even own property in Alberta until the 1970s!). “Outlaw” is a song about my sister who can be pretty fiery and reached her tipping point many times in Victoria when it comes to the policing of each other that can happen and the many bylaws — all the bylaws referenced at the end of the song are real bylaws in Victoria! So be careful not to act too “contrary” in a public park.
Many moods are present on After We’re Here. I compared the delicacy of “Paper Boats” to the brazenness of “Outlaw,” for example. How does your creative process vary from song to song?
Some songs start with a story, and it’s a matter of finding the music to match, while others might being with a melody line, or a chord progression, or just a hook. “Paper Boats” started with a chord progression and wanting to write a melody that was all one note, a delicate tapping kind of thing. The water imagery and the lyrics came out of that. “Outlaw” was definitely inspired first by my sister, and I also wanted to play a tune on piano that was a bit honky-tonk. I’m not sure if it ever totally sounded honky-tonk because it will be our own version of that…And the version of it on the album is more bad-ass than honky-tonk, which was really fun to see that evolve into something different. Auto is amazing at exploring the possibilities of a song, turning it upside down, altering the time signature, inverting the melody — she’s very playful in the way she works on a new piece, which is a wonderful quality and makes her a lot of fun to play music with!
What’s next for Jansz & June? Any upcoming shows?
Auto plays locally with lots of other musicians, but we’re mostly taking the winter off. Day-jobs are a reality of life in the arts, but we’re writing new songs and looking forward to performing together again soon.
Emmett Robinson Smith is a music reviewer and UVic student.