Today, Black feminist punk band Big Joanie have announced their second album Back Home, set to release on Nov 4 via Thurston Moore and Eva Prinz’s Daydream Library Series (UK) and Kill Rock Stars (US).
Along with the announcement comes rock ‘n roll ballad “In My Arms,” which arrives alongside a summery video celebrating queer love and friendship.
In the four years since their debut, the band have meticulously honed their craft to incorporate new styles. The band builds on their tightly knit, lo-fi punk formula to bring forth a collage of blazing guitars, downtempo dance punk, and melancholic strings that evoke the full depth of the band’s expansive art punk vision. “I’d say part of it is us having more experience in the studio and knowing what we’re capable of,” says Chardine. “When we did the “Cranes in the Sky,” single for Third Man, I feel like that was a changing point as to what we can do in the studio, in the sense it doesn’t have to be a copy of what we can do live.”
Recorded at Hermitage Works Studios in North London, Back Home was produced and mixed by Margo Broom (Goat Girl, Fat White Family) and features violin courtesy of Charlotte Valentine (No Home). The album title references a search for a place to call home, whether real or metaphysical. “It’s about the different ideas of home,” explains Stephanie. “Whether that’s here in the UK, back in Africa or the Caribbean, or a place that doesn’t really exist; it’s neither here nor there.” The band worked with multidisciplinary artist Angelica Ellis to design the striking embroidered cover art, which is a depiction of Chardine’s nephew at the barber. The artwork is a reference to the embroidered wall hangings popular in Caribbean homes post-Windrush that were a callback to the homes they left behind.
Outside of Big Joanie, all three band members manage a formidable array of solo projects. Stephanie is a freelance music writer and became a published author last year with Why Solange Matters. Estella works on the music program Girls Rock London and is part of the collective behind Decolonise Fest with Stephanie. Chardine chairs the Equalities Commission at Musician’s Union, is a prominent voice in the LGBTQ community and is working on a book about Black feminism.
Despite their many accomplishments, there is so much more the band wants to achieve. With their boundary-breaking approach to punk, radical politics, and an appreciation for earworm melodies, Big Joanie are set to become important voices for a new generation of punks.
Big Joanie is:
Stephanie Phillips: singer and guitarist
Estella Adeyeri: bass and backing vocals
Chardine Taylor-Stone: drums and backing vocals
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