PARIS JACKSON
Daughter of the King of Pop, Michael Jackson, the 24-year-old singer, musician, actress and model is finding her own way gracefully. With her hypnotic gaze and affinity for Radiohead and folk music, the California native has a very rock side to her idiosyncrasies, and in her frankness and activism is perfectly in tune with the aspirations of her generation. Numéro spoke to a punk princess whose boots are firmly planted in the realities of our times.
With her blue-lagoon eyes, dishevelled blonde hair, mystic tattoos and sexy-scruffy air, 24-year-old Paris Jackson seems like one of those archetypal Californian girls you run into at Los Angeles gigs and beaches, her cool, radiant and slightly cosmic aura immediately captivating whoever she meets. On
Instagram, she reveals a certain spirituality, thanking the moon amidst a gang of undressed girlfriends while performing a sort of shamanic ceremony. When Numéro spoke to her over Zoom, the singer-songwriter, actress and model joked about her Californian clichés. “I thought I was unique and special,” she laughed, “but when I saw the second season of You, on Netflix, where they poke fun at people from LA, I realized I’m a total Californian stereotype!” And, like all hip Californian girls, she comes across as very relaxed and low profile. “Sometimes I go on stage in my pyjamas. I always put comfort before everything, even if I doll myself up for an event and adore punk designers like Matthew Williams from Givenchy and Vivienne Westwood. I particularly like wearing soft, oversize clothes that make me feel I’m wrapped up in a duvet.”
But, behind the image of a wellborn, pretty young woman (she came into this world in 1998, in Beverly Hills) whose godmother was Elizabeth Taylor and whose godfather is Macaulay Culkin, there is a depth and a spleen that make her yet more endearing. Being the daughter of a king is not necessarily easy, nor does it automatically guarantee happiness. Paris-Michael Katherine Jackson’s destiny to date has been littered with obstacles and doubts. The “King of Pop,” Michael Jackson, fathered her with the nurse Debbie Rowe, who, after the couple divorced, was absent from her life until her adolescence. Brought up by Jackson on his Neverland ranch in Santa Barbara, Paris was protected from the outside world, as though living in an unreal bubble, to the point that, when the family appeared in public, Jackson would mask his children (Paris has two brothers, Prince and Blanket) so that they would avoid media overexposure.
It was only on her father’s death, in 2009, that the world discovered Paris Jackson’s sweet face and moving expression at the very public funeral of one of the greatest stars in the history of music. She was deeply affected by the passing of her idol, when she was just 11 years old. Taken in by her grandmother, she was constantly followed by paparazzi, which led her to suffer from PTSD, aural hallucinations and paranoia – even in the safety of her own home she still saw the flash bulbs pop. She was also the victim of brutal online harassment, all these difficulties so young in life leading to her frequenting both a Utah clinic and Alcoholics Anonymous as an adolescent. After several suicide attempts, she set about rebuilding her life, and, like her father, it was her passion for music that saved her. “I started the guitar at 13, but it was only three years ago that I seriously committed to music. Before that, I already had a creative approach, but of all my passions it’s really songwriting that came to seem essential to me. For me, music is cathartic. If I write a good song, I immediately feel better afterwards. Even if it doesn’t work so well when the song is bad,” she laughs.
In 2020, Jackson, who had already begun successful careers as
a model (posing for Calvin Klein and walking the runway for Jean Paul Gaultier) and an actress (appearing in Star, Scream and Gringo, alongside Charlize Theron), released an EP with her then boyfriend under the name of The Soundflowers. After that came an album, Wilted, which was both an artistic and commercial success and revealed her spiritual, melancholic and dreamy timbre – that of an “old soul” – set against authentic and intimate pop, rock and folk melodies. “I don’t consider myself a singer,” explains Jackson. “I can’t reach the notes of a Mary J Blige or a Whitney Houston. I see myself more as a songwriter and musician.” With modesty and humour, she defines herself on Instagram as a “mediocre Thom Yorke impersonator” – Yorke being the singer from Radiohead.
Among her influences, the British band is right up there, but she also likes heavy metal and the hard-rock singer Alice Cooper, going so far as to miss her high-school prom in favour of a Metallica concert. She confesses to her love for stage diving, and to having had “Mötley” tattooed inside her mouth in homage to the glam-metal band Mötley Crüe – just one of the 50 tattoos she wears, which reference, among others, her father, David Bowie, Prince, John Lennon and Van Halen. “I’m a fan of indie, folk and rock. All the artists I listen to, like the Nashville band Kings of Leon, have changed my life with their songs. I don’t hold anything against the music that’s played on the radio, but at home I need to listen to tracks that have a profound effect on my being and transport me.” Jackson is currently working on a new album inspired by 90s grunge, Smashing Pumpkins and Nirvana. Moreover, watching her over Zoom, she strangely resembled Frances Bean Cobain, the daughter of Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love.
But, even if music is the art form that attracts her most right now,
Jackson has not abandoned her
One of the most exciting singers and producers of the moment, the celestial-voiced 36-year-old American already has a long performing history behind her: a former member of the synth-pop duo Chairlift, she has worked with Beyoncé, Charli XCX and Christine and the Queens, to name just a few. The bewitching Polachek, who is the new face of Loewe, spoke to Numéro about the power of pop and the role of the artist in these troubled times.
The virtuoso singer-songwriter and keyboard player Caroline Polachek has made a name for herself with her own brand of adventurous synth pop, over which her powerful, celestial voice soars to bewitching heights. Born in New York, in 1985, the young Polachek learned the synthesizer and sang in a choir, and would later land herself a research grant at the Villa Médicis. Whether
she appears under the pseudonyms Ramona Lisa or CEP, or under her own name, the former member of the successful synth-pop duo Chairlift (in which she cut her teeth from 2005 to 2017) always seems in tune with her times. In 2019, she released the sublime Pang, an album of oneiric pop that captures the euphoria and despair brought on by being in love. Her talent has opened the door to an
impressive number of collaborations, among them Beyoncé (as cowriter of No Angel in 2013), Blood Orange, Sébastien Tellier, Charli XCX and Christine and the Queens. Mixing Greek mythology, the gothic, the fantastic, the mystic and the surreal, the 36-year-old seems at home in every genre, and has also composed music for contemporary ballet and art performances. In the wake of her recent performance at Coachella, in the Californian desert, Numéro caught up with a new type of pop star whose creativity knows no school or limits.
NUMÉRO: In April you appeared on stage at the Coachella Festival. What was that like? CAROLINE POLACHEK: I’d already played a few times at Coachella, as a guest invited by other artists, but this was my first solo appearance. I was very happy to be able to try out the aesthetic of my next album. We built a giant smoking volcano on stage – it was magic! After two months with Dua Lipa on his Future Nostalgia Tour, I felt ready to perform for a festival audience. I like festivals just as much as intimate concert halls, but I confess I have a preference for the bucolic.
Your two recent singles, Bunny Is a
Rider [2021] and Billions [2022], seem to suggest you’re headed for a more experimental sound.
I like to go from one sound to another, and I never feel held back by what I’ve done in the past. Both these songs will be on my next album. In the lyrics – but also in the music – I was looking for a form of abstraction. The idea was to have lyrics that seem to come from a dream, by which I mean something that isn’t too narrative.
Billions talks about our consumer society. When asked about the song, you said, “The overabundance of this world overwhelms me. Sometimes it seems like the ultimate tragedy, the Earth being pillaged and destroyed for it. Sometimes it seems pre-human, beyond morality, sublime. I don’t pick sides, I just live here, with you. How does it feel, being so rich?”
I don’t like to say too much about what my songs might mean – I prefer to leave that to people’s imaginations. But yes, it’s a song about abundance, both physical and emotional: the fact of having too much.
I started from the Greek myth of the horn of plenty, which overflows with fruit and flowers, as a metaphor to talk about our world today.
Your track So Hot You’re Hurting My Feelings [2019] became a dance challenge on TikTok, and videos featuring it have been viewed over 330 million times on the app. What’s your reaction to that?
I’ve always thought that, after you release music, it doesn’t belong to you anymore. And I like the way that all sorts of people from all over the world have appropriated this song, interpreting it their own way when reprising the choreography I devised for the video. You never know what will happen after you post a video. In this instance I was very surprised, because the track went viral on TikTok over a year after it came out as a single. Friends were calling me saying, “Look at that one dancing!” It didn’t stop. In the end I redid the dance myself on TikTok in order to close the loop.
You’ve already been compared to Kate Bush, Björk and Enya. Who are your main influences?
I’m very inspired by contemporary artists like Rosalía or Doja Cat, who play with sounds. I like the idea of having fun with music, but my influences are often more abstract. In May 2000, on a trip to Italy, I was very moved by the landscapes, especially those in Sicily. The contrast between the economic situation and this long and very deep history that stretches back to the Roman empire impressed me greatly. The dark red, the different shades of brown, the golden, the sublime active volcanoes, the incredible mix of chaos and joie de vivre – my experience on the island really touched me.
In your videos, photos and album covers, you seem to pay a lot of attention to details, as though they were mystic clues to entering another world – a giant key, a ladder, a maze, strange dogs, etc. The dogs you see in the video for Door, for example, are greyhounds, which are linked to the concept for the album Pang, which talks about adrenaline. It was inspired by the rapid sensations the body has to adopt in the face of stress and instant decision-making. Greyhounds, which are bred to run very fast, seemed to me a good visual metaphor for adrenaline, but also for my music. They have magnificent lines, and they’re also mythological creatures: their high-strung bodies symbolize fear, pain and suffering. Among the other symbols you find in my imagery there is the key, which represents the unattainable and what you have to risk to get something. Is it possible to be both free and secure? I don’t necessarily answer these questions, but I ask myself them. As for the door, it offers the possibility of exit, of an opening, but are we able to reach this door?
In several interviews you’ve said you feel connected to the Romantic movement. Your music sets off very strong emotions, a bit like the Stendhal syndrome...
I’m extremely attracted to strong feelings. For me, beauty is often a combination of pleasure and melancholy. Very strong emotions are involved, such as joy, sadness and confusion. The things that possess these contrasts are the ones that move me the most when I look at them, so I try to recreate that in a certain way in my music.
In this chaotic period we’re going through right now, which is marked by the war in Ukraine and by the coronavirus pandemic, what role has art played in your life? And what role do you think artists should play in our lives?
We are very lucky to live in a culture that values both artists and the freedom of expression. Art and artists have an enormous power in that they are able to connect us directly to our bodies and emotions without having to go through words. They also allow us to connect ourselves to the textures of the world that surrounds us. In Los Angeles, every day, I see concrete roads covered in trash and buildings that are crumbling away before our eyes. Electro music has a strong link with the urban landscape: in the manner of a metaphor, it seems destined to connect our minds to the reality and to the technology around us. The artist’s most important task is to put us in harmony with the place where we live.
Caroline Polachek, Billions (Perpetual Novice), out now.