Junglepussy Has Something To Share With You
New York, New York
Junglepussy
4/6/20
Ahead of the release of her trippy visual for “Arugula”, the Brooklyn artist reflects on the balancing act of loving yourself under the public eye.
You’re at a point in your career where it feels like you’re really starting to have fun. Are you able to navigate spaces while keeping a piece of yourself exclusively?
Hell No! *laughs*
Photo- Cheril Sanchez
No, I do. Obviously I do but it really feels like I just don’t. I feel like I have to share myself. There’s no way the people are gonna know what I like, what I don’t like, what I wanna sound like, what I have to say unless I share it. There’s such a fine line between sharing your true self and giving the people fluff. So I do have to sacrifice parts of myself and just share it but that only happens when I’m trying to rise above. When I thought about me not planning to have this platform and this position I realized that it’s bigger than me and I’m just here to do what I’m here to do. This is how I’ve been all my life and now that the internet is out and we have these social media platforms it’s different. When I look back at what I was doing on myspace, AIM, AOL and even before then is all the same. I am very much the same person it’s just different now when all the eyes are looking but I can’t think about it like that. I can’t take it personally but I am healing so I have to take it personally...it’s a constant give and take, a constant battle. I have to give but I also have to make sure that I have enough to give. I have to make sure I’m okay and that I feel safe and secure in my giving by keeping certain things to myself.
With all those eyes on you, how are you able to disconnect?
Do Not Disturb Mode. I just don't touch my phone. I’ll put my phone somewhere around the house and not go on it because it’s so hard as an indie artist. I feel like it’s so much easier when you have a team and they can do all these things for you but for me if I don’t engage I’m not working. I have to be a part of everything I’m doing even when I don’t wanna be. I wanna be creative one day but , no, I have to put my businesswoman hat on and be firm with people who got me fucked up. I don’t wanna do that but I have to.
Let’s delve into your creative work. First: the music. With the tone and messaging in your music there is a balance between aggression and softness in your delivery. Is that deliberate?
No, I think it’s natural. I think everyone is naturally like that. We can all be hard and soft and I love to explore that about myself. People already feel that as a black woman “you’re not lightskinned, you have to be strong”. Through me exploring my masculine and feminine sides I’m able to help other people. I’m able to learn more about myself and be more limitless in that way. I’m never one emotion, I’m an emotional rollercoaster and a lot of people are afraid of emotions. They’re afraid of extreme emotions and when someone asserts themselves and knows what they want. People don’t like that but it comes out and it keeps coming out. It might be even more mean…
Trader Joe (2019)
Director - Vincent Martell
When do you feel you’re at your most creative state?
Sadly it can be when I’m mad. I’ll start saying things and think “oh shit that’s right, put that in a song”. I hate that but it’s true. Or when someone really tries to define me, I’m always quick to be like “No I am not that, I am this, you do not know me, you don’t know yourself etc”.
How have you grown in the time between your first album Satisfaction Guaranteed and your third, JP3? What did you learn?
JP3 (2018)
Album art by Junglepussy
Definitely. When I first started making music I had just gotten out of a relationship so I was off that energy. Like, “fuck you, fuck all guys”. And I still feel that way but there’s more to me than that and I’m not gonna dedicate my music to them. So I started to explore that and I’m actually getting back to myself. It’s kind of weird. I’m now realizing that when I got out of that relationship I was healing through the music so it showed me ugly parts of myself and other people. Then it allowed me to take a look and be like, “this is not all you are’ and now I’m excited to go through this journey of getting back to who I really am and sharing that through my art. I feel like at a moment in time, it was very natural and now the veil has been lifted. During that relationship I remember specifically dying my hair black just to make my boyfriend feel comfortable. I didn’t think it was a problem then but I looking back I don’t know why I was doing that. There was so much dumb shit I used to do because I was healing through the music but I was unpacking and unlearning a lot of things. Now I’m like “why the fuck was you dying your hair black for a guy? He better take all these colors and shut up!”
I just realized that now through my music I’m excited to share more of me. It looks like I’ve been having more fun because actually I have been. I’m not here for male consumption and in the industry, especially with my name, I’ve never had outright male support with the exception of Rico Love who is a legend and shows me mad love. There was a point where I probably wanted to be accepted by the guys or the girls. Now I’m like fuck all of that. There’s no room for me to not do exactly what I wanna do. I don’t wanna die and leave behind content that I didn't believe in or that didn’t reflect me and how I felt at the time. I’m excited for the new stuff!
Ditto! So you’ve started getting into film recently. In that experience were there certain things you were able to do working in film that you can’t do in music? Are they equal?
Support The Girls (2018)
When I got casted for the movie (Save Our Girls) I thought that actors were magical people who knew how to memorize the whole script but they’re not. That relaxed me. I write, read, and perform my lyrics and it’s the same thing with acting but it’s somebody else’s vision. That’s fun because sometimes I get so deep, I’m on the ocean floor with my shit. Sometimes I need to come up to the surface and give a different perspective.
I love developing my characters and showing different parts of me because I realize I have so many emotions that five of them need to go into one bucket, seven of them need to go in another bucket. It makes me feel better about myself finding somewhere to put all of this because it’s just too muchhh. Like I said, I didn’t plan for any of this. Growing up I was always super creative. My junior high and high school were art schools. I went to FIT. I was just always creative and wanted to do art…or something. I didn’t know!
When I started doing music on my own I learned I could do everything I loved in one. I could use my voice, I could be funny, I could make rhymes,. I could style myself, I could come up with my own hairstyles...but then I was like “oh shit, this is a lot! This is a JOB!” And I’m not basic so people are scared to give me support.
You know, when you have a complex vision, not everyone believes in it. When you find the people who do, magic happens. I feel like that’s how it is with my work I’m always seeking the right team players to work with. A lot of the time it doesn’t happen but when I find the ones that do come through? It couldn’t have been more perfect. Right now everything is uncharted territory so it’s hard to gauge whether you’re doing the right thing. That’s not the point. The point is to do what you feel is right and follow that through to the end.
Female empowerment and self confidence is a big part of your music. In this social media age, there are a lot of people preaching topics like these and things they don’t practice. Do you feel like the message is compromised if people don’t live by their motivational words?
I don’t know. That runs through my mind often. It’s one of the reasons why sometimes I have to be the bigger person. I know I’m here for the people and what I’m doing is for the greater good of the community , for legacy, for black excellence. It sucks that a lot of people are perpetrating a fraud and a lot of this empowerment is performative and getting visibility. All we can ask is for people to be more mindful of how they’re treating women and how we’re uplifting each other. But…if you’re not actually uplifting anyone then what are you doing? It gets me a little jaded because I don’t see the need to not practice what you preach. If you’re not supportive at all to women, don’t use that as a weapon to get followers or some kind of humanness about you. This is just how I am and I literally thought everyone was on it until I experienced many people aren’t in real life. I have sisters, girl best friends...I got all my tattoos when I was 18 and one of them is this “Girl Power” tattoo. I’ve really been like “yeah girls we can rise above! Let’s do it!”. As years went on I learned there’s an image to be had behind looking like you support women without actually supporting women. It really made me sad but I guess the youth needs to see that support because I didn’t see it growing up besides girl groups. It needs to be real!
I do blame corporations because they’re the ones cutting the check and making others think “If I do this, I can be that”. Also the social capital from perception. It's all a scam! Scam likely!
There are artists who have been super authentic to me and I appreciate it so much because I didn't realize everyone isn’t like that. I guess my feed is a perfect world of people who are trying to be better.
Photo: Caity Renee
What is your key to maintaining self love and rising above false messages in the digital age?
I recite positive affirmations. My affirmations are like “Bitch you know you poppin’. You deserve to be loved and ate from the back. You deserve all the crab legs and the crab cakes and the designer ramen noodles…”. I remind myself what I deserve and match it against what people try to offer.
Sometimes when you share a picture of yourself and post it, everyone’s already seen it before you got a chance to really love it. I’ll be staring at the screen and tell myself “Shaina put the phone down!”. When I put the phone down, I feel like a zap from my pineal gland. I’ll take a deep breath and reality smacks me like “why are you shocked? You always knew you were that person”. It’s just about reminding yourself that none of those things matter, have fun with sharing it. But I’ll be damned if I age myself over social media politics, fronting ass motherfuckers, all that shit!
I’m inspired by how legendary artists have transitioned through all these different ways to share music and they’re not bitter. Like Trina is never hating on nobody. I had a show with her and she’s a good ass performer still! I look at artists like that and think you don’t have to be a stupid, stank hater.
What bothers me with this new age is these kids don’t have respect for nothing! And you have to because when the apocalypse comes and you need double A batteries and I got a Costco pack of the double A batteries where you getting your batteries for your flashlight bitch?! You’ve gotta learn to work with other people and just be.
There’s no reason to be undercover loving or to be undercover shady.
Arugula (2020)
Director: Caity Renee