After a year of pandemic lockdown Melbourne artist Karly Jewell is brushing off the musical cobwebs and jumping headfirst into 2021. Not only has Jewell been able to announce that her latest track ‘Dancing With The Devil’ is set to appear on the new Murder In The Rue Morgue Vol II compilation but she has also been welcomed into the Rue Morgue Records family as they release the track on limited edition vinyl.
There is clear excitement as Jewell explains to me how the relationship with Rue Morgue began. “The producer that I work with, Mat Robins, works really close with John,” she explains. “John saw what I was doing with Mat but he had also seen a lot of what I had been doing over the last few years. He saw that I was always at it and had live shows all the time. I just tried to push everything that I was doing and he really recognised that so I was so thankful for that.”
Robins has been a huge help with a number of Rue Morgue artists over the past couple of years and Jewell tells me that he is brilliant to work with. “He is awesome to work with,” she says smiling. “I have worked with other producers and they all have their really strong points and they all have reasons that I like to work with them, but Mat and I have a friendship and we feel really connected through music.”
“I think also being friends with him means I always feel really comfortable in all situations in the studio,” she goes on to explain. “That means we are able to deliver each song because each song has different emotions and I can be like ‘hey Mat I am going to cry my eyes out’ and I can do whatever I need to to get that feeling for that song. He just puts me in a really creative space where I am completely comfortable which I feel is very important for artists because if you don’t the people or if a manager has put you in a studio with a producer that you don’t know so I guess you haven’t really got your guard up but you aren’t being your true self. But with Mat you feel that you can just be completely you and he is great to work with and he catches things. He works really hard and he just pushes you hard as well.”
As the interview goes on Jewell begins to tell me what Dancing With The Devil is all about and why the track means so much to her. “The track was really personal,” she says. “I wouldn’t say that i suffer from depression badly but it has been part of my journey. Things get rough and things happen in life and it is that realisation that it isn’t what happens it is you that lets that in. Even if it is depression I sometimes get lost in the dark and I write myself out of things.”
“Anybody that has that if they can turn that around and take that on as their super power then they are winning,” she says as we concentrate on writing to get yourself out of dark times in your life. “Depression isn’t always a bad thing it can be used as your strength and I guess I have had a meltdown where I have just been in my room for three days crying and I felt all that but then I was like ‘No.’ I started to write and then I realised that I was the boss, I’ve got this. Yes this will follow me forever and yes I will have to live with it forever but I am the one that is leading this dance. Depression is something that I have learnt to step aside from it and realise that it is just a feeling… that is how I look at it. That’s when I write and it really is trying to find something good from something bad and I will always write when I am in the dark.”
“With Dancing With The Devil the devil wasn’t supposed to be the devil,” she goes on to explain. “It wasn’t about anything evil, when people say we are fighting demons it is another word for depression so that is where the title came from – it is my devil, it is my depression. I was taught from a very early age that my guitar that was given to me was my diary and my grandfather said to me “when you have nothing at all you will always have music.” To me it is escape when I have nothing at all and I will always use that.”
Dancing With The Devil is out now as a limited release from Rue Morgue Records.
