The words ‘soulful’, ‘effortless’, and ‘like butter’ are becoming synonymous with Elli Ingram, the 26-year-old Brighton native who has been blending R&B, soul, and jazz to her will since her breakthrough cover of Poetic Justice and EP Sober seven years ago. We called each other from our respective parents’ homes because this is the reality we are living in.
Building off the success of 2018’s Love You Really, Elli has been moving steadily towards the release of her sophomore album to be released this year, leaving the singles ‘Bad Behaviour’ and ‘Flowers’ in her wake.
The latter is a simmering broth of resentment and dishonesty, with the refrain “love me or leave me” haunting the song
Both tracks are set on a sauntering funk bassline completed by lush instrumentation, with Elli’s vocals melting over them. The latter is a simmering broth of resentment and dishonesty, with the refrain “love me or leave me” haunting the song until its final moments.
After the greetings and pleasantries – the inevitable ‘how are you finding lockdown?’ – had finished, she explained that ‘Flowers’ came from a deeply personal place. “It’s written about someone that you love who’s being dishonest and the love is falling apart because of their behaviour,” Elli explains, “I’m always a bit suspicious of men giving women flowers to say sorry.”
“I had this idea of a man who keeps coming home bringing more and more flowers even though he was out being an a***hole, thinking it’s what she wanted, and all the flowers are dying. The love is dying. Everything’s dying. So, it’s just a really cheerful song about a love that’s slowly dying.”
The trifecta of death jarred against her otherwise sunny telephone demeanour. Elli goes on to say that this more serious and introspective look is a taste of what’s to come in her upcoming release.
I’m not beating around the bush at all with any topics, I’m letting the emotion come out
“Flowers is a really good indication of where the rest of the album is going to go,” she states, “I am definitely trying to make a more serious and classic sounding album. My lyrics are always extremely personal, but I suppose I’m not beating around the bush at all with any topics, I’m letting the emotion come out.”
What does a classic album sound like, in the Elli Ingram universe? “Quite heavy, quite smoky…” she replies, “I just love it when you hear the tone of the music and you’re instantly taken to that place. You can feel where you are, and the rest of the album is definitely going to be in that world.”
Three years have passed since the release of Elli’s critically acclaimed debut album Love You Really. I wondered whether her process has changed since then. She told me that she has grown in stature and confidence, qualities she has carried through into the production of her upcoming album.
“It is different,” Elli explains, “because with all the releases up until now I was working solely with Felix Joseph and Aston Rudi, my two producers from Brighton, and I’m now working with new producers and trying out new things so that’s instantly thrown in a new dynamic.”
Even if I’m absolutely chatting sh*t to a producer and he has no idea what I’m trying to say, I’ll still do my best to get as involved as I can
“Felix and Aston are so creative, so it was very much a collaboration working with them. It still is now, but I have control of the reins, I’m more mature and I know what I want more, I’m much more vocal so I can communicate the sound that I want to create more clearly. It’s definitely a progression.”
This, in turn, freed her to mine from her own experience, to trust her instinct.
“I just started to believe in myself more, if I had an idea, I would vocalise it. As you grow older, as you learn more things, you become more confident and I feel like I can express myself better now. I’m not afraid to get stuck in, even if I’m absolutely chatting sh*t to a producer and he has no idea what I’m trying to say, I’ll still do my best to get as involved as I can.”
As the interview wound to a close, I asked about the importance of the popularity of Elli’s stirring 2013 cover of Kendrick Lamar’s ‘Poetic Justice’. Internet virality can be a fickle mistress, and as such I was interested to know whether this screen-based success translated into real-world results.
“Poetic Justice had a huge impact,” Elli replied, emphasizing huge, “I was brand new to the scene, I didn’t have much of a following, it was one of the first things we put out and it gained so much attention. It got put on WorldStar and loads of people saw it so that really opened a lot of doors.”
We were coming up to London and meeting publishers and record labels so that video really did have an impact on my career
“It introduced me to the music industry, we were coming up to London and meeting publishers and record labels so that video really did have an impact on my career.”
Elli is getting through lockdown driven by a desire to get back into the studio, to keep writing, and to gig again. She is shaped by the energy of her city, empowered by the ability to be “free and creative because everyone’s so open-minded,” but set markedly apart from the sadcore that flows from the shores of the Brighton scene. Keep an eye out for Elli’s next album, if your taste inclines towards the smoky and the soulful.
