Since emerging from Toronto in 2011, have been a mainstay in listener’s libraries for over a decade, and just last week they released their fifth LP, ‘’, a pivotal work that illustrates the duo entering a new chapter as co-creators, and ultimately best friends.
‘Two Roads’ comes at a time where listeners are needing something edifying after a long summer – a fresh, uplifting, journeying soundtrack evoking memories of more fulfilling times just as the chill of Autumn creeps in. and elevated their signature sound while still retaining the core of what we have come to love of the duo. The whimsical collection bridges the cool-blend RnB feel of their past offerings with dusky post-rock riffs, electro-pop and French touch inflections.
CLASH sat down with Majid Jordan to trace the transition between their last effort and their new work, trusting their synergy as co-creators, recognising the perils of press intrusion and recapturing the spark of inspiration that ignited their career on an all-encompassing album.
Congratulations. How does it feel to be adding another body of work to your repertoire?
It feels really good. This album is the most transparent, honest album that Maj and I have made. Every album that you make is a different part of your journey, especially if you’re along that road with somebody else for so long. Maj and I have grown up with each other. We’ve lived with together, we’ve spent so much time together, so they’re all important albums to us. This one was the one with the least resistance. This time was like, “why don’t we just put our lives first?” That choice has led to an incredible album and a better quality of life altogether. This album is transparent about where I’m at personally.
It’s been three years since ‘’, what’s happened in those three years?
: I’ve never seen Jordan more himself, and I feel the same way. We’re leaning into the things we love, and the people that give us energy, and that’s resulted in us wanting to bring that energy forth in the music. I remember the very first conversation when we were getting serious about booking in studio time, Jordan was telling me, “I just really want this to have energy because when I wake up in the morning these days I feel so full of it and I feel so good. I want the music to reflect where I’m at in life”.
Even today, I’m trying to maximise whatever energy I have inside of me to make the most of every day and every moment. Sometimes you hit a wall, you lose sleep, or whatever, because of a schedule. But finding a way to bounce back and put that into your work, I think that’s what we really wanted to do with this project. It’s like no matter, we were going to see it through. No matter what we were going through, we were going to be optimistic and feed that optimism and that energy into the music. It will hopefully move people physically, not just emotionally. With our music before, you could sit down, listen to it, and maybe reflect on stuff. But this one will actually make you move.
At what point did you turn to each other and agree it was time for another album?
I guess it was around June or July last year, and we had gone on a couple of tour runs for ‘Good People’. We lived life. When you release an album, it’s not just about working on it, putting it out into the world and seeing if people buy your CD like it was 20 years ago. After you release an album, you’re in the mix of getting behind it, being present and connecting with people. We did that for two and a half with ‘Good People’. This time we went to London for two weeks and worked with Clementine Douglas for two weeks. Alex Lestig was there too. He’s a friend of ours, a great producer. We knew we wanted to make music with people we knew and felt comfortable with. A lot of the sound you hear in it is reminiscent of different times in our music. We go to a certain place, we work on music, and that’s the time capsule. Then we move forward.
‘Two Roads’ feels bouncy and liberating. Has there been a shift in your influences to produce this record?
As we’ve grown, the people around us have grown as well, and we always have friends that we’re listening to music with and showing us new things. My uncles collect vinyl, one of them has an extensive collection. We have listening days where he’ll show me stuff he’s found. I’ve gotten into going into record stores and finding random things in the bin and just putting them on. Over time I’d show them and I didn’t want to like say, “Oh, this is a song I want to make”. It was more like this is the sound that happens when we make music together, and it wouldn’t necessarily be the same if it wasn’t the two of us coming together to make it. And I think that’s why you have the thread there, because it’s still the two of us and the dynamic hasn’t really changed over time. We understand our roles, we understand our strengths, our blind spots, and we fill in the gaps for one another.
An example is ‘Cold’. Jordan said this intuitive thing and I started humming the “no, no, no, no, no”. He’s like, “that’s the part”. I wouldn’t have thought that would be such a significant part of the song, because nothing else was there at the time. It’s moments like that where listening to what the other person is doing, capturing that idea, laying it down without too much thought, and not thinking too much between the moment it starts and the moment it becomes a song, becomes the biggest influence. It’s recognising one another’s perspectives, decision making and the conversations that happen between the two of us and the people that we work with.
When you’re writing together how do you find something that works as a duo?
We both hear a song and we both gravitate towards the same elements. It’s a unique thing that we’ve shared since the beginning. There’s such a similarity that when there’s a difference, it turns into this new, unique idea, There’s things that we both want to bring to the table that are separate. I think it’s cool to have two people. We’ve said this before because it’s kind of like you have like a referee, right? If you’re making music and you’re releasing it by yourself, there’s no limitations. When you have two people, you’re both looking at this one thing with two different perspectives; it’s not a cheat code, it’s a benefit of having two people.
The title ‘Two Roads’ feels like an homage to both of your individual journeys. What is the meaning behind it? From where does it derive?
‘Two Roads’ was the name of a song, and we felt that song was the best thing we’ve ever made, in our history. It’s different to anything that we’ve made prior to it. I was really blessed to meet Jordan and we’re blessed to have the career that we’ve had. I know that I wouldn’t have learned so many things about myself, art and music if it were not for him. I’m in a place now where I’m happy to continue the road and trust the path ahead. It’s been here before and it’ll be here after you. We’re just slotting into a timeline in this existence, and that’s how this album feels.
It’s a time capsule on this road that we are both walking along. Time is an interesting thing. Jordan said we’re always rushing but we took our time on this album. ‘Two Roads’ as a title is not too deep. It’s just the name of the song that we loved. We are two people, we are trusting in our path, and we’re committed to it. We were young when we started but we’re still here. It’s very rare that you come into music, this industrialised version of art, and leave feeling healthier than when you came in. I feel so much healthier today, and much more joyful. I’m proud of this album.
Knowledge and perspective can only really be achieved through lived experiences. When you guys started Majid Jordan, did you think you’d achieve this level of mindset?
I believed it the whole time. It may not have been so clear at that moment but even going to things like Hot 97 and seeing how these cogs turn, how narratives are formed, and how the media operates as a presence in the greater consciousness of this world, was character-building. They call it the press because it applies pressure and it can be used to target individuals. You go into these places knowing that there is some sort of maliciousness and some sort of energy behind the scenes. It’s not every person, and it’s not every journalist, it’s just the nature of the beast to sell a story, to build and monetise tragedy to create these narratives, like what happened with the late Cambridge professor Jason Arday.
Being from where I’m from (Bahrain), selling out shows across North America, being from a place in the world where you get criticised and characterised as a savage, there are many phobias and misunderstandings made about the people that you were surrounded with. Having someone like Jordan was so important for me. He’s from the other side of the world, who said “I’m not going to believe any of these stories, I’m going to go in with an open mind, I’m going to listen to you, and I’m going to support you musically in order for you to express things that you were maybe never able to articulate in a normal conversation.
There’s always some pressure. I think for Maj and I, who are well-educated people, I think the music environment has been hilarious. We’ve been very malleable people at certain points in our lives because we were young people. I was 18, Maj was 21. We were kids! At some point you’re very impressionable but then you have another person to kind of view this whole thing with and be like “let’s just make music that we love. Let’s go back to this simple thing”.
Do you find your individual stories bring a new colour to the sound you make as a duo?
It’s weird how things work out in life. We love what we do. We love music. We love to meet people. We love playing the shows. We love the core of everything about it. And we follow that. Sometimes you desire a certain type of success, like I’ve had moments in my life where I have chased that, but with ‘Two Roads’ we didn’t. I wanted to make an album and make something that excites me and reminds me of when I was 17 and was very excited to show my friends. I wanted to replicate that feeling. If you if you look away from what it could bring you, I think that’s when it really happens. But that needs to be a subconscious decision. It can’t be conscious like you have to force your head away from it. I think this approach painted a whole new picture for our music.
Did you travel anywhere different to record, to get a new perspective?
We were recording in London at length. It felt like interval sprints at times, as we would do two weeks in London, two weeks at Sony Studios in LA, two weeks in Toronto. It was about six to eight weeks of making the songs, and the rest of the time was post-production. Some of the songs were produced in a certain way, and then Jordan flipped them, and they turned into something else. That’s something cool that Jordan has always done. He’ll find a melody or an idea that he likes, that I’ve recorded, and he’ll produce around that. An example of that on this album is ‘Things Just Feel Better’, which was a completely different beat and where he took it to was so cool.
Another example: I was in Bahrain and I worked with this group called the doghounds, which is the first time I’ve worked with a Bahraini act as someone who’s grown up in Bahrain, and they’re a part of this project. Jordan’s dad is on the same song. It felt like a family affair. It’s the track ‘See You Again’. It was one of the singles that had another beat, and Jordan reproduced that and took it somewhere new. His dad ended up recording guitar, and it became what it is today. So those are new things that we haven’t done before.
What’s the one piece of advice for a musician aiming to have longevity?
Don’t think about it too much. Lean into what you love and know that you are influenced by things that make you feel good. It could be that simple. Recently I’ve been listening to older classic rock that I grew up with, and for a long time I thought I couldn’t listen to this music because we’re an R&B duo. That’s a ridiculous thing to think. I’ve been leaning into that and finding the beauty of the small things that inspire me to make more art for the world.
Be open to new experiences. Be open to new ways of thinking. Be generous with your time, and your ears. Observe yourself in relation to your environment and the people around you. Understand that music is a communal thing, and if you don’t share your talent, your talent doesn’t count for anything. It might as well not exist. If you can sing or you can write, then find someone who can play guitar. Take the time and effort to genuinely build those relationships from an intentional place. Don’t treat people like things you can step on and take from. Understand that you’re all moving through it together because it’s not a transactional thing; it’s an eternal thing, and it will live beyond.
Encapsulate the ‘Two Roads’ experience in two words?
Major Jordan.
: Joyful commitment.
‘Two Roads’ is out now.