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French rockers / metallers JIRO released, back in February, their debut album. On this occasion, the guys took time to answer a couple of questions for us. Learn more about this record in our new interview!
Hello JIRO, thanks for taking the time to answer our questions. To start this interview, please introduce your band to our readers.
We are JIRO, a new alternative metal band from the suburbs of Paris and we have just released our first self-produced album “Resilience”. We’re 5 friends who have known each other since adolescence, and we spent the last 3 years of our lives setting up JIRO and shaping our artistic universe. We arrive on the french metal scene with the firm intention of going straight ahead, regardless of the difficulties we encounter. We are above all enthusiasts who launched this project against all odds, in a very complicated post-covid context. But whatever, we’re hungry and overflowing with the desire to make music together.
How would you describe your sound?
Metal purists would tell us we make rock music, rock purists would tell us we make metal. JIRO is based on this balance between heavy rock and extreme metal. We are as much inspired by the choruses of Linkin Park as by the breakdowns of Spiritbox. Our music revolves a lot around the electric guitar, the art of the riff and wild solos fascinates us. We want to keep a certain warmth in our songs, and not to dehumanize our music. Indeed, modern metal is our main source of inspiration, but there is a certain linearity in the sound and composition of artists these days. We try not to fall into the stereotype of the overproduced metal band by bringing feel, nuance, clear and saturated vocals… A lot of our inspiration comes from stoner and grunge, which are very raw, very sincere styles of music that don’t cheat. We seek to find the right balance between modernity and authenticity.
Your debut album is out since February 2023. How long have you worked on this record?
Like many bands, we started recording our album “Resilience” during the lockdowns. We haven’t set foot in the studio, everything is homemade. 3 years passed between the beginning of the recording and the release of the album. Some songs were written years ago, others were changed during recording… It was a very disjointed and exhausting process, especially since we really handled it all alone. In the end, we are very proud of it and above all learned a lot of things both about our artistic vision and about ourselves.
The artwork of your album is sick. What’s the meaning of this visual and who’s the artist behind this amazing artwork?
We’re not going to make friends, but the artwork was made by artificial intelligence. In fact, we already had artwork done by a graphic designer, which we were quite happy with. The visual had been delivered, the graphic designer was paid… But the AI imposed itself on the whole world and we wanted to test it. In the end, we were completely satisfied by the proposals we got after a few tries and decided to use them for the album. So we paid a graphic designer for nothing!
We absolutely do not regret this choice even if we have observed some reluctance. We think we have to know how to move with our time and use the tools available to us. It is up to us to know how to control them and use them to serve us intelligently. However, for the next releases to come, we will start again on a work with a graphic designer. The AI allowed us to define our purpose on this album but we do not wish to ritualize this process of visual creation.
How would you describe your usual writing process and how do you split the roles between the different band members?
On this album, everything more or less started with the guitars. To be honest, our composition process is not revolutionary, it often starts with a riff. However, some songs were created from a text, a theme that is close to our hearts. From there, we let our minds wander, everyone goes home with the initial idea and explores their imagination to structure the rest. We put everyone’s proposals together, we sort them out… We move forward step by step.
Everyone is equipped with their home studio and can therefore record themselves and bring their own ideas to life. We send each other a lot of demos, we kind of do surgery with everyone’s ideas until it gives a coherent structure that we like. The golden rule is that we compose for ourselves, not for others. A song can be unorthodox, the important thing is that it has meaning for us. At the end, it’s Thomas (drummer) who puts everything in order, does the pre-mixes and the arrangements to prepare the final recording. He is also the one who mixed and mastered the album.
You also revealed a music video for your single “3 Masks” ahead of the release of your album. How was the shooting of the music video?
We were lucky enough to work with a director friend who put us in the best possible position. We were able to create this clip in professional conditions, in a studio, with a team. It was fantastic. We had lots of ideas but a tight budget, so the challenge was to acquire the right equipment and make it all fit in one day. We somehow managed to do it, which required a lot of preparation beforehand. On D-Day, we had our friend guide us throughout the shoot. We started very early and finished very late, but we did it!
Last but not least. What plans have you got in store for 2023?
2023 is a pivotal year for us. It’s the year when we unveil our existence, our first album, our first concerts… It all starts now, and we have everything to prove! We are in the process of setting up a small summer tour as well as concerts in Fall, which we hope to announce in the coming weeks. We work very hard to offer a high quality live show, but we know that we will have to do a huge amount of shows before taking a significant step. The advantage in JIRO is that no one has any illusions: we know it will be long and difficult. So 2023 is the year when we put our foot in the stirrup and start moving forward.
With this strategy in the background, we had to overcome a major obstacle since we recently separated, by mutual agreement, from our singer. We have already found and recruited our new vocalist that we will announce in the next few days. So the major challenge is to succeed in reorganizing the set with the new line-up. In parallel with all this, we are already moving forward on new songs with our new line up, since the 3 years spent releasing our first album also made it possible to have a lot of ideas for what’s next.
What we can tell you is that we are taking a much more violent artistic direction and more assumed on the metal aspect. We are really impatient to show the fruits of our labor, but we will take the time to do things in order. We will therefore defend our album “Resilience” to the end, while preparing the sequel with a 2nd album for which we will give absolutely everything.
