Merryn Jeann, a mesmerizing folk singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, is the latest artist to prove Australia remains a veritable hotbed of musical talent. She’s currently based in Naarm/Melbourne and Bundjalung Country/Byron Bay Shire where she’s completed both her solo work and one collaborative project. Overall she’s released three albums over the last five years, each overflowing with her tender poetic reckonings.
One of the definitive elements of Jeann’s music is her effortless entwining of the profoundly intimate with the grandly universal. Her 2019 debut album Merryn Jeann offered a brief but beautiful introduction in the form of seven lilting tracks. From the eviscerating introspections that pour out of “Am I Plastic?” and the twinkling swell radiating from “Home” to the heart-wrenching lament of environmental imagism that is “Canopy.”
That first EP confirmed she was both a coyly sagacious lyricist and a spellbinding conjurer of intricate pieces. Her softly murmured words and gently plucked tones emerge as a winding path you’re lulled along with lucid grace. Ever the avant-garde artist, Jeann set out to organically grow her sound for her next project. Together with Australian singer/songwriter Kyson and Chris Hill (a.k.a. Holy Machines), she founded the music and art collective OSOO.
A year after its formation the group revealed a debut LP Shade Under Your Hands, where across 14 tracks the trio dipped their souls into a wellspring of genres, including jazz, lo-fi, modern pop, and Southeast Asian sources. Surrounded by the collective’s sumptuous and riveting melodies Jeann’s vocals become a glowing north star by which to navigate their truly hypnotic creations. You will be hard-pressed to pull yourself away from the record, especially as it presents an opportunity to hear her luminous vocals glimmer alongside a dreamy array of soundscapes.
Just this year saw the release of Jeann’s sophomore album DOG BEACH (2024), produced by Rob Ellis and created with a wealth of talented fellow musicians. From the moment it begins with the dusty folk musings of “Nude in a Waterhole,” with its bursts of clamorous horns and spiraling percussion bridging jazz with tints of psych-pop, the wayfaring sound of the record is forged with beguiling spectacle. Other standouts in the collection include the buoyant growths that bleed into orchestral ecstasy on “Subconscious Love Connections,” the off-kilter pop that spills from the euphoric “ME B4 U,” and the surreal rapture of the cinematic “Nun at the Airport.”
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With her second effort, Jeann has pulled herself into the celestial company of contemporaries like Caroline Polachek and Weyes Blood, as well as indelible iconoclasts such as Feist or PJ Harvey.
Words: Steven Ward
Dog Beach is available on all streaming platforms.
Visit Merryn Jeann on her Instagram to stay updated on new releases and tour announcements.
Watch the music video for “SUBCONSCIOUS LOVE CONNECTIONS” below!
