Well hello there, and welcome to the eleventh i should tell you, where I interview cool musicians who will answer my emails. The same three questions about food, every time, just to see what kicks can be achieved. This time I’m talking to the super duper fly Janine and the Mixtape, who is from New Zealand but has made Brooklyn, NYC, her new home. Lucky thing.

I seriously love this lady, not least because of her aspirational ways with eyeliner. That’s quite a big part of it, really. She has one of the biggest, richest voices you’ll ever hear, but uses it kinda sparingly and carefully and doesn’t bust out the American Idol-style melisma just because, which is what I would do given the same set of pipes. She writes, produces, makes beats, does it all, and what you get is r’n’b with 90s excellence (let’s face it, a lot of 90s r’n’b, even the most drum-machine-keyboardish stuff, is untouchably good) plus a lush yet moody spaciousness. I know that possibly doesn’t make sense but I can’t fight the adjectives that appear when I listen to music, okay?

I adore her song Bullets, but you should really listen to her new single Hold Me, which premiered on Vibe.com, what! It’s way beautiful, and is from her upcoming album Dark Mind. (Love that name.)

Thanks, Janine! (Who signed off her email to me as Janine and the Cookbook, which I thought was pretty cute.) The interview will start…now.

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