A Dirty Dozen with JAYNE KELLI – October 2025

Photo credit: Daniel Shippey

According to a recent press release: “After over a decade of crafting lush, harmony-rich Americana with her duo Swearingen & Kelli, Michigan-born Jayne Kelli is stepping into the spotlight alone with a new body of solo work that isn’t a detour—it’s unfinished business. Emerging from the alt-country tradition she helped shape, Jayne’s upcoming releases mark a cinematic shift. The songs are raw, piano-heavy, emotionally haunted. Some sound like pages torn from a secret journal, evoking the spirit of ’70s vinyl and the ache of the alt-fem ’90s—with a character voice unmistakably her own. Kelli’s songwriting is at once intimate and expansive—rooted in confessional storytelling and threaded with lyrical tension. She distills emotional unraveling into elemental metaphors, allowing ships, white horses, and jet trails to carry the weight of escape and longing. Her lyrics strike that rare balance between poetic and plainspoken—always accessible, never predictable.” We get Jayne to discuss new music, influences, and more…

1. Tell us a little about your latest release. What might a fan or listener not grab the first or second time they listen through? Are there any hidden nuggets you put in the material or that only diehard fans might find?

“Only in the Dream” is a cornerstone song for me. It’s a song built from intensity and obsession, and it was my mission to translate that in the studio and through the music video. It’s foreshadowing more work on the way – haunting, dark layers of steel and strings woven around piano arpeggios.

2. What got you into music, and can you tell us about the moment you realized you wanted to be a musician?

Music was always the way I processed the world. I grew up in Michigan, daydreaming in my bedroom, always singing something to an audience of Barbies and stuffed animals. I’m lucky my parents had me when they were older – I was exposed to all the greats of the 60’s and 70’s. My dad would play his Martin for the neighbors while my mom sang harmony. Everything from Jim Croce, Bob Dylan, and Glen Campell to John Denver. My first musical crush at age 5 was Elton John, and later, my favorite songwriter, Paul Simon. At 14, my dad’s Martin disappeared into my room with me, and that was pretty much my pastime from then on.

3. Building on that, is there a specific song, album, performer, or live show that guided your musical taste?

Fiona Apple’s When the Pawn…, Radiohead’s OK Computer, Jagged Little Pill by Alanis Morissette and Tori Amos’s From the Choirgirl Hotel became the soundtrack coming from my bedroom. I used to sneak out at night with my Walkman and walk to the open field by my house, lay on the ground, looking up at the stars with those songs playing. I’d be too afraid of bugs to do that now. My exposure to the greats of folk and country was my first layer, and this was the next that helped form my affinity for darker songs. There’s yet another layer added into the equation, but we’ll get to that in a future release!

4. If you could call in any one collaborator to do a song with, who would it be, and why?

There would be a lot of them, but if I’m going by my mood right now, Matt Bellamy. I’m ready for him to release a solo piano record. He can outsing and outplay me (and probably most people), so he’d have to carry the weak link.

5. What is your favorite activity when out of the studio and/or not on tour? What do you like to do to unwind?

Right now, I have no activities besides working on my music career. I’m quite boring right now. But getting out into nature is a MUST for me. I’m still regulating my nervous system after mold exposure for years (thanks, musty beach house in Florida). Second would be reading… I’ll get back to that one day!

6. How would you describe your music to someone who’d never listened to you before? What is the one comparison a reviewer or fan has made that made you cringe or you disagreed with?

I’d say “piano-folk for seekers and feelers.” It’s ethereal but grounded, a little dreamy but not afraid of truth.

7. When your band is hanging out together, who cooks, who gets the drinks in, and who is first to crack out the acoustic guitars for a singalong?

Post show, if it’s just AJ and me or one of our good friends that pops in on vocals or drums, we are sharing a delicious tequila and just dreaming and talking away.

8. When was the last time you were starstruck and who was it?

I had the opportunity to perform with the Maui Pops, and, the morning of the flight out, Paul Simon passed me in the airport. He was alone wearing a baseball cap and glasses, and wore a little red-beaded wristband. My Martin case was at my side, and I gave a slight smile, but didn’t dare blow his cover in the airport at 5 a.m. Too much reverence to be a pain, but I did miss my opportunity.

9. What is the best part of being a musician? If you could no longer be a musician for whatever reason, what would be your dream job?

Connection. There’s nothing like having a stranger tell you a song said something they couldn’t put into words or comforted them during a tragedy. The stories people have told us after shows, or written to us, are the fuel that keeps me going when this career gets overwhelming.

10. What is one question you have always wanted an interviewer to ask – and what is the answer? Conversely, what question are you tired of answering?

Q: “What do you want listeners to feel when they walk away from your music?” A: That they aren’t alone. That the quiet things or intense emotions they feel are shared by someone else. The question I get tired of? “What genre are you?” because it always feels like a box I don’t quite fit into.

11. Looking back over your career, is there a single moment or situation you feel was a misstep or you would like to have a “do over,” even if it didn’t change your current situation?

I’m a self-professed perfectionist, and I’m working on getting better with this. I took an entire record I recorded off of Spotify a long time ago because I want to tweak production to match who I am now. I also remember my blood sugar being dangerously low for a TV interview, and my answers, needless to say, were pretty flatlined.

12. If you could magically go back in time and be a part of the recording sessions for any one record in history, which would you choose – and what does that record mean to you?

Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours. Not only for the songs, but to witness the energy in that room – chaos and heartbreak turned into harmonies that still resonate decades later. That album is proof that beauty rises out of disasters. And, come on, it would be fun to witness Paul and Art work together on “The Sound of Silence” record.

JAYNE KELLI LINKS:

OFFICIAL SITE

INSTAGRAM

Category: Interviews