The mysterious new artist The Jordan attracted over 500,000 streams of her first two tracks, ‘You Don’t Even Know Me’ and ‘Naked in the Sun’, despite no-one knowing anything about her and maintaining a minimal social media presence. But today The Jordan is revealed to be the Dutch singer and songwriter Caroline Van der Leeuw, best known as the voice of Caro Emerald. Their many accomplishments included a UK Platinum-selling debut album ‘Deleted Scenes From The Cutting Room Floor’, the UK #1 follow-up ‘The Shocking Miss Emerald’, performing on Glastonbury’s Pyramid Stage, and selling out London’s prestigious Royal Albert Hall.
The reveal comes as The Jordan announces that her debut album, ‘Nowhere Near The Sky’, will be released on February 10th via Cooking Vinyl. She launches the album by sharing its new single ‘The Room’.
Emphasising the depth and breadth of her artistic transformation, ‘Nowhere Near The Sky’ is The Jordan’s extraordinary, game-changing debut album, a new chapter which introduces a new name, a new sound, and a new quest for total candour and unvarnished truth. Her vocals are purer and more powerful than anything she has recorded before, fresh trip-hop and folktronic textures wrap her voice in magic and mystery, and after years of doubt and repressed feelings, her songwriting finally pulls back the veil.
Caroline says, “The freedom of starting out with a new name is huge – it immediately tells people that this is a brand new start. Taking another alias that sounded a bit like Caro Emerald would have been too confusing. But I didn’t want to ‘become’ someone else, I just wanted to be me. And that’s reflected in the choice of the name The Jordan. It’s a reference to the neighbourhood I grew up in, and where I first discovered that I had a voice.”
‘Nowhere Near The Sky’ is the product of Caroline’s feverish creativity, an outpouring of songwriting which expresses who she really is – the focus entirely on the music rather than its marketing. Its themes reflect her new outlook, with issues of identity, new starts, self-determination and empowerment recurring motifs throughout the record. The album features production by the Ivor Novello winners David Kosten (Bat For Lashes, Everything Everything, Chris Martin) and Eg White (Florence + The Machine, Sam Smith), plus Wieger Hoogendorp, Robert Biesewig and Wouter Hardy. Portishead’s Adrian Utley also contributed to several of the tracks.
The Jordan’s new single ‘The Room’ provides a wondrous introduction to the album as its opening track. At first it’s sparse, with The Jordan’s beguilingly beautiful vocal exalting the life-affirming rush of love and lust in all of its glory. From that ethereal opening it ascends into a glorious, choral wall-of-sound with a spiritual ambience. The accompanying video sees Caroline reveal herself as The Jordan for the first time, as she embodies both partners within a couple.
She adds, “‘The Room’ describes the most pure form of intimacy between two people. They could be lovers, married even, but they could also just be two strangers crossing paths. Whatever the context: they are here, in one room, together. Feeling intensely connected.”
‘Nowhere Near The Sky’ is now available to pre-order HERE, with ‘The Room’, ‘Naked in the Sun’ and ‘You Don’t Even Know Me’ all provided as instant downloads. In addition to the album’s digital/streaming release, it will also be available on a range of physical formats including CD, standard black vinyl, an ultra clear vinyl (exclusive to HMV and select independent stores), transparent turquoise vinyl and signed test pressings (both exclusive to The Jordan’s official store) and three different coloured cassettes.
The Jordan will preview the album by playing two special intimate debut shows this summer, first at London’s Tabernacle on September 13th before heading to Amsterdam to play Bitterzoet on September 16th. Fans who pre-order the album here will receive access to a pre-sale for the London show that opens 10am on Wednesday August 24th. Remaining tickets go on general sale from 10am on Friday August 26th.
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