There are those born into music and those who claw their way in, fingernails shredded and spirits undeterred. Jessica Lee Morgan, it seems, is of both tribes, genetically predisposed and yet bracingly self-made. The daughter of songwriter Mary Hopkin and production wizard Tony Visconti, she might have simply basked in a familial glow, but instead, she has charted a course through the industry with wit, wisdom, and an admirable refusal to suffer fools.
Her latest venture, You Know What You Should Do? is not just an album but a book, a dual-pronged, sonically and literarily woven exploration of the perils and peculiarities of the music business. In this conversation, we traverse the high roads and back alleys of her career, touring with Bowie’s finest musicians, and dispensing pearls of hard-won wisdom.
You Know What You Should Do? is both a title and a philosophy. What’s the worst piece of advice you’ve ever received about the music business, and how did it influence this project?
Give everything up and focus on music, and you’ll be successful. If you give everything up and focus on music, and you’re not successful, it’s crushing and then you have nothing. Making music today involves knowing all you can about how the business works, and transferrable skills that you will gain in other workplaces are invaluable. If you don’t, you’ll be left in the dark and at the mercy of others.
Your songs tackle themes like mental illness, fame, and ambition. Did you write these as a way of processing your own experiences, or do you see them more as dispatches from the frontlines?
Yes, my music is my therapy. I write about my own and others’ experiences in the hope that listeners will identify with and benefit from them. I love it when people tell me, at a show perhaps, that a particular song resonated with them.
You’ve road-tested these songs with Tony Visconti’s Best of Bowie/Holy Holy, The Blow Monkeys, and Robyn Hitchcock; what did you learn from playing them live before locking them down in the studio?
When you play live you can test out the best mood and groove and tempo for each song. It’s just me on guitar and vocals and my partner Christian Thomas on bass and backing vocals, so we’re down to the bare bones of the song. Sometimes words change, or the pacing between verse and chorus. You can tell what works and what doesn’t. And when the headliners come up to me after and say they liked the songs, that’s extremely gratifying. Those guys don’t give praise lightly.
The album and book seem like two sides of the same coin. If someone could only pick one up first, which would you recommend and why?
The album would only take 45 minutes or so to experience, but if they have the time, the book really lays out all the details. It’s where I came from, what I learned, and what I advise, and I really hope that it might help people, or at least explain the enormous hard work it takes for an independent musician to get their music to their audience.
You describe the music industry as an encyclopedia of misinformation. If you could correct just one myth for up-and-coming musicians, what would it be?
Well, I describe my book as a subjective encyclopaedia, but I like your line better! The myth I most dislike is that being good is good enough. Being fabulous isn’t even enough. You have to know what you’re doing, have some knowledge of the business, be able to write, arrange, produce, get your product made. You also need stage presence. Even if you get signed to a big label, you should still know what’s going on otherwise you’ll get exploited. The industry is full of horror stories. Don’t become one of them.
Having your own label, Space Records, gives you creative control. What’s the most liberating and the most frustrating part of being your own boss?
I can choose what I write, sing, perform, wear, look like. I can do a folk album followed by an EDM album. However, in my earlier days I would have welcomed being told what to do and what to wear because a lot of the time it feels like shooting in the dark. My mother, Mary Hopkin, always said I would have hated answering to a record label, as she did, but I’d have liked the chance to find out for myself!
You’ve been singing with Holy Holy, revisiting David Bowie’s music alongside your father, Tony Visconti. What does that music reveal to you now that you might not have noticed as a child listening to rough mixes?
I sing, play 12-string guitar, saxophone and percussion, so I guess I do David Bowie’s parts! Learning all those songs has given me a greater appreciation for the arrangments and what went into them. Bowie recycled themes, explored genres, stretched concepts, and the fact that we can pull these songs off live is enormously gratifying.
You’re selective with your live performances, what makes a gig or collaboration worth saying yes to?
Now, it’s the money, frankly. I’ve toured all over the UK supporting some amazing people and I’m enormously grateful to them for the opportunity, but having to sleep in the van and subsist on houmous and carrot sticks wore thin in the end. I just need a bit more of a profit margin and creature comforts at my age. However, some of the notable gigs I talk about in the book are no-brainers. Ralph McTell at Festival Hall? Ok then. Sir Ian McKellen in Swansea Grand, reading Dylan Thomas? Oh alright. Some gigs are just an honour to be involved in. If there’s less money, then the other people on the bill have to be older and more famous than I am, and I have to respect them.
You incorporate the Alexander Technique into your teaching and performing. Has it changed the way you approach music, or even life itself?
Absolutely. The Alexander Technique teaches us to be quiet in ourselves, and perform to the best of our ability with the least strain. Every performer should learn it. Every human should learn it. I teach all sorts of people but am slowly getting more musicians onto my list. It has helped me to deal with overload, with the ups and downs of the business, mental illness and stress. My dad, Tony Visconti, also trained as a teacher, and he uses it when working with musicians to get the best out of them. Sometimes we work on each other before going on stage.
You took You Know What You Should Do? on a virtual tour. Do you think online performances can ever replace the real thing, or do they serve a different purpose?
Nothing beats playing live to a room full of attentive people having a great time. The performer gets an immediate response, and to me it’s communication. There are downsides – the travelling for performers and audience for instance, and post-pandemic, the behaviour of some audiences seems to have got worse.
Live streaming helps us reach fans who would never make it to a real life gig, and during our shows we have people tuning in from the USA, UK, Japan. They love to chat in the chat box and they’ve formed a real community. There is a place for both, and I’d love to see more live gigs streamed, legitimately, so we can have the best of both worlds.
If someone reads your book and listens to your album, what’s the one lesson or feeling you’d want them to walk away with?
That knowledge is power. And the power is yours.
