Jessame Raz Berry is no stranger to the music scene. He had grown up surrounded by talented family members such as his great uncle, the legendary Chuck Berry, and his dad, Al Berry, a traveling bassist who had recently retired from Avril Lavigne’s band. In addition, The Los Angeles-based artist had his own experiences working behind-the-scenes with artists like Jafaar Jackson and Damon Thomas before embarking on his own solo career. I had the chance to talk to Jessame in his home studio as he was editing a music video for an upcoming song.
On March 11, the music video for “Body” featuring Ajiona Alexus was officially released. With such amazing on-screen chemistry, it came as a surprise that the two artists didn’t know each other beforehand. “I remember getting home from tour and my manager put us together in the studio. I didn’t even know who she was.” His sister had known of Ajiona from her role as Sheri Holland in Netflix’s adaption of the novel 13 Reasons Why.
“When I meet someone I never have a preconceived idea about who they are. I don’t let that skew how can interact with them” which made it so easy for Jessame and Ajiona to work so easily with one another during their initial recording session. “We were vibing, listening to beats. Then John Murry co-produced the song, played this one beat, and it was really something. It reminded me of the 90’s. I took a freestyle take at it and then from there we were just like flowing creatively, it was easy process.”
They had wanted to do something different with the music video. “Honestly I think we didn’t want to do your typical performance video with lip sync and all that, but we wanted to have a concept behind it. With her being an actress and me being a singer, she was kind of getting into signing for the first time so I kind of wanted to get into acting for the first time, per saying. I was thinking, what would people be intrigued by? ” Jessame continued, “we’re robbing this house. It’s kind of random, but it’s worth it. It tells a story. I’m there performing at the house and then little do you know we actually are working on how we are going to flip the situation. How can I get the money from your man and you’re playing him too and he doesn’t know? It’s pretty crazy.”
Whereas “Body” delves into talking through physical action and outward appearance, “17”, Jessame’s latest single, discusses a part of him that you cannot see. He says that writing this song “kind of forced me to write from outside of myself .” “I’d been in a really just emotional state because I was in a very sensitive spot in my relationship. And I was just thinking – what if I died? What would I want my girlfriend to know? Would you take me to Heaven? Would you lie with me? Would you cry?”
When writing the song itself, Jessame said that “I started thinking about all the qualities that I have that maybe she [his girlfriend] loves about me and what I love about her…I got this from my father, I got this from my mom, this is what I’m trying to work towards, this is what’s going on in my life.” In this vulnerable state, Jessame was able to write 3/4 of the song in 2 hours. “ ¾ of the song was done in 2 hours and then it took me three months to finally re-approach the song and finish the second verse. Really, a lot of the song was done in that that night because all the inspiration was coming out of me.”
His favorite line in “17” was: Everything you see in me / Visions of eternity / It’s all too real to me. “That makes me feel so complete as a man. You see so much to me but I see so much in us, it’s all so real to me.”
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