Written by Tyra Buckley
An amalgamation of entrancing guitar rhythms, raspy vocals and blues, and possessing some unspoken grace that all the best artists do, Ava Joe embodies the role of a musician. Her talent spans more than just songwriting; the daughter of a musician, she plucks the guitar strings with purpose and taps into the vein of nostalgic jazz.
Although she has been working within the industry for years, writing, studying, and creating music, Black Smoke is Ava’s first Spotify release, already amounting over 80,000 listens exactly a month after its debut. We should be preparing to see her catapult to success.
A seductive kind of jazz, it’s a perfect mix between Duffy’s Mercy, Lana Del Rey’s Burning Desire and the distant crooning of Elvis Presley, with clear inspiration from the likes of classic Billie Holiday and the more contemporary Amy Winehouse. Managing to combine these influences is no easy task—perfecting jazz alone is tough—but Ava, with a perfect pitch and rhythm, does so beautifully. It almost feels as though you’re sat in smoky speakeasy at the height of the jazz movement, serenaded by live, real music rather than the electronic, auto-tuned pop cranked out today.
She’s also inspired by more modern artists, like Raye, Remy Bond, and Stephen Sanchez, all of which are paving the way with their own, almost nonconformist styles. Ava is undoubtedly one of them. “[Raye] has given me a lot of hope, because she’s one of the many artists right now that seem to be just making the music they wanna make. Like, there is a lot of artists that are making old sounding music right now, which is honestly so, like, inspiring and so hopeful to see. Because, I don’t know, a couple years ago, it seemed like that sort of music wouldn’t really push through, but it’s so good to see.”
Black Smoke is also a ballad of toxicity, a cautionary tale of a past relationship spent smoking weed and sitting around, aiming to make other people—young girls, mostly—feel more validated in their exes. To feel understood in their romanticising. “We see Black Smoke as a toxic thing that you shouldn’t breathe in. I guess its kind of a metaphor for my ex, in this case, has the black smoke, but also it ties in because we used to smoke together.”
“I want people to feel understood, heard and seen. I think that’s probably one of the reasons I do it. The whole point of it for me is to help people with my music. And a lot of what I write about is sort of what it’s like to be a young woman and the good things that come with that, but also the darker side of things. And I know, unfortunately, most young girls have seen the darker side of what that looks like. And I write a lot about the darker side of it. And I just hope that when people hear that, they understand it and they feel heard and seen and just know that they’re not alone as well.”
Nowadays, it’s becoming increasingly harder to confine music to one genre. In a generation fighting for freedom of expression, it’s too restricting to label any non-generic song “alternative.” Ava doesn’t really believe in genre anymore, considering the mass amounts of music being produced in the height of this digital age where anyone can record a song from their bedroom. Despite this, she tells us, “my roots are in rock, but my soul is in jazz.”
“Yeah. I mean, that’s the simplest way I can put it really, but I guess it’s a bit soulful as well. Maybe alt jazz, also bit grungy. Definitely influenced by a lot of grunge, like Nirvana, Elliot Smith, and people like that as well.”
By not placing a limit on herself so early on, Ava has complete autonomy over her sound; the gates of music are completely open to her, and we’re excited to see what she does next.
It’s clear that her father raising her with rock music, singing to her the classics and lullabies, has bled into her music, but what Ava creates, on her own or with producers Evil Genius, is uniquely hers. Like with Black Smoke, Ava claims the lyrics “almost sing themselves in a weird way,” taking on a life of their own, as all of the best music tends to do.
She tells us that she used to watch her father play, and “it was something that felt so far away, but I knew that I really wanted to learn. “If it wasn’t for [my dad], I don’t think I’d be as passionate about music as I am.”
And the passion is clear. When she talks, describing her earliest memories with music, her favourite performances supporting Connie Talbot and her headline show at Paper Dress Vintage, even her pre-performance nerves, she beams with devotion. Music runs in her veins. “You just have to know that this is what you’re meant to be doing. And sometimes the rest is very necessary. Like, you need to live. I always say, like, living is 95% of the song.”
And living she is, performing not only her first festival at Liverpool Sound City Festival in 2025, but she’s also making an appearance at the Colours Hoxton on 24th February 2025, presented by AEG. She will likely be stage-bound for most of next year. “But, more than anything, I was just really happy to get it out and just start the ball rolling now with, like, more releases and things,” she says, smiling, likening it to Christmas Eve—knowing something big is coming. “I just feels like I’ve got so many songs that haven’t been able to be heard yet. So I just can’t wait for everyone to hear them.”
“My dream is to play on, like, the Pyramid Stage [Glastonbury] and things like that, and obviously Reading and Leeds because I grew up going to a lot of festivals, like Coachella and stuff. So, that is my main sort of dream show. But then also, like, smaller venues like Shepherd’s Bush and places like that. And then, much further down the line, I can start dreaming about stadiums. But I’ve always been much more of a festival girlie, to be fair.”
The single is fronted by an image of Ava, lay down with her blonde, Sharon Tate-esque hair splayed out, looking as though she’s being consumed by flames. Despite its fitting the theme, it was unintentional, a fallout of pieces of film bleeding into each other whilst developing, but Ava makes it work with this casual sort of admiration for the things that go wrong. It’s better to embrace them, to embody them, than to perfect them.
“I work with a photographer, Lydia [@lydsthatpicstook], who is amazing, and she wanted to do a test shoot with me. So we went to this little studio, and she took a few pictures on her new camera. And then she got the film developed and — I’m not a photographer — I’m pretty sure there was some issue with the film. Basically, there were three pictures in one. And then, I looked at the pictures and thought this worked so well. It was a happy mistake.”
You can find Black Smoke, and Ava’s latest track Polly Pocket on Spotify now.
