Music, depth & beauty: Conversation with Jhené Aiko

Jhené Aiko Efuru Chilombo, 26, has flown some distance from the ice and snow of New York, arriving at the secluded Rockhouse Hotel with her camouflage Hello Kitty backpack slung over one shoulder. She isn’t the first to fall in love with this Jamaican hideaway, which reminds her of Hawaii, where some of her Japanese […]

Jhené Aiko Efuru Chilombo, 26, has flown some distance from the ice and snow of New York, arriving at the secluded Rockhouse Hotel with her camouflage Hello Kitty backpack slung over one shoulder. She isn’t the first to fall in love with this Jamaican hideaway, which reminds her of Hawaii, where some of her Japanese relatives live.
Jhené 2011 mixtape, Sailing Souls, which Jhené produced with the duo Fisticuffs and recorded with an impressive group of acquaintances from L.A. music circles—Ab-Soul, Kendrick Lamar, Gucci Mane, Miguel, and Drake—impressed legendary producer turned Def Jam exec No I.D. so much that he made her the first artist signed to his Artium imprint. “I could see a new R&B forming,” says No I.D., “following in the footsteps of Frank Ocean, Miguel, Weeknd, and Drake. She had these witty rap complexities to her lyrics, with these very digestible melodies. I knew it would connect and I knew that females hadn’t heard a female doing it.”
“The Sailing Souls mixtape, that was the height of me going through all of this stuff,” Jhené recalls. “I’d just had my daughter and I was working at a vegan café and I wanted to do this mixtape, so I was recording after work. I just needed to release all my frustration and my heartache and pain. It’s [easier] for me to write about that type of stuff than [happiness].”
The child of a Japanese, Spanish, and Dominican mother and an African-American, Native-American, German Jewish father, Jhené grew up in L.A.’s urban pop scene. Her older sisters, Jamila and Miyoko, sang in the group Gyrl, and Jhené landed a deal with Epic Records when she was 12. She released various remixes, soundtrack cuts, and features and toured with B2K on the Scream 3 tour. At age 15, she had a solo album deal on the table but decided to take a break from the music business instead. “I was in high school,” Jhené recalls, “and there was a new label boss who wasn’t well versed in who I was or my music. I was just like, ‘You know what? I want to get released.’ ” When she got back into the game, she made sure it was on her own terms.
When she was 20, Jhené had a daughter by O’Ryan, the younger brother of B2K singer Omarion. They called the baby Namiko Love, meaning “child of the wave,” after a book by the Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh. “He has a story about how there’s no difference between the water and the wave,” Jhené says. “There’s no such thing as birth and death because the wave cannot die; it’s all water. Things manifest when the conditions are right, and they don’t manifest when they’re not right. But there are no ends, no beginnings, just continuation.”
A close friend and collaborator of Drake, they met shortly before he released the pivotal 2009 mixtape So Far Gone. “I had just found out I was pregnant,” she recalls. “No one else knew and I was still just recording. I went into a session to meet him through a mutual friend. That’s how that relationship formed. He was nowhere near who he is today, even though the underground music people were like, ‘He’s next!’ ”
“I look up to Drake,” Jhené says. “Everything in his whole career is commendable. He can act, he can rap, he can sing. I can relate to him. He’s mixed; I’m mixed. Everything he does, I take note because I feel like he’s doing a really good job of being, like, well-rounded. And not only that, he’s really talented. I’m always asking him for advice with stuff and trying to figure out how he deals with being such a big celebrity.”
On the Internet, everybody seems to know for a fact that Jhené is sleeping with the men she makes music with. Anonymous authorities will verify that Donald “Childish Gambino” Glover is her lover since they recorded that song “Bed Peace” together. “We have the same publisher,” Jhené explains. “We have the same sense of humor, very sarcastic and dry. It was automatically like, ‘I like you! We can be friends.’ ” She says the rumors about them being together don’t bother her. “He’s an actor. We’re both creative people. We are friends and we hang out. We’re just friends but I’m also single, so you never know what friendships can develop into. We like each other as people, so you know, who knows?”
For his part, Glover says, “I met with her for dinner after her performance on Jimmy Kimmel. We talked about nothing, nothing about the song. Then she sent me the song and I wrote it that night.” He emailed it the next day. “She’s a super-special being, this is why I love her. I think she’s special. Even if we were together, she wouldn’t really belong to me. She doesn’t belong to anyone.”
Jhené has a unique way of dealing with the pressures of celebrity. “I just tell the truth,” she says. “If someone asks me something, I respond—without compromising another person or telling their secrets.” She’s nothing if not open, a quality that only makes her more attractive. So is there a special guy for Jhené these days? This lucky guy, who she says is “kind of” in the industry “but not like I am,” is definitely not Drake or Gambino. And he had better be able to take a little competition. “Me, I’m a free spirit,” Jhené says. “I don’t know what the future holds. I could meet someone tomorrow and I’ll have to call you and be like, ‘Remember that part where I said there’s a person? That changed. It’s a new one.’ Just because you never know, I’m young.” Until then she’ll just keep on making music. After all, there are no ends, no beginnings. It’s all water.
Courtesy: Complex.com