As far as lockdowns go, Lola Lennox, the 31 year old daughter of global musical superstar Annie Lennox, had a good one. When I interview her, Lola – also a musician – describes the special moments she experienced with her mother, who made the decision at the beginning of 2020 to move from London to Los Angeles – where both Lola and her sister, model Tali Lennox, both live. A typical evening might consist of drinking a glass of wine together in the garden of Annie’s secluded, restored mid-century home in the Nichols Canyon area of LA's Hollywood Hills, “watching the hummingbirds and chatting about life”. Bliss. Lola pioneered the move, relocating to LA a few years ago with her Canadian boyfriend, Braeden Wright.
But it’s not just your typical mother-daughter bonding, because Annie & Lola’s relationship is a musical and professional one, too. The pair famously dueted on Annie’s hit song from her Eurythmics days, ‘There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)’, during the live-streamed One World: Together at Home concert event coordinated by Lady Gaga, bringing Lola – who is a classically-trained performer and has been learning music since the age of seven – into greater recognition as a musician in her own right. More recently, Annie has served as an executive producer on Lola’s upcoming debut EP, while Braeden is on hand to co-write her songs. Talk about a family affair.
Today, we’re talking in relation to Lola’s new single, ‘Want More’, an upbeat, infinitely-listenable song which has notes of her mother’s soulful, Eurythmics influence mixed with a more poppy beat.
What was the inspiration behind your latest single, ‘Want More’? I’m sort of addicted to it, by the way.
Thank you. I wanted to write songs that had a little bit more depth about the human condition. I've written a lot of songs about love and heartbreak. And I was like, there's so much more to me and to the world that I want to put into my music. When we look around, there's a sense of always wanting. I struggled to find satisfaction in my life where you can have a certain number of goals and then you reach the goals, and then you're onto the next thing. We're living with social media, where we're always seeing this highlight reel. It's a struggle to be content where we are. I see that in myself a lot, through the work I do with music, through how I look. We all have these goals that are seemingly positive, but they can sometimes tip into this kind of more toxic area. For me, it's a goal in life to be content with where I am in the present moment and to be able to enjoy making music for the pure love of it. To live my life and see my friends and connect with people on a more pure level, that's like my favourite thing to do in life. But we can all get sidetracked. ‘Want More’ is a reflection of that feeling. Musically, there's a pace to it – you feel like you can't sit still.
It’s interesting what you said about moving away from writing songs about romance. Do you think we’re moving away from that craze for pop-y love songs?
Yes! With artists like Billie Eilish…there's a lot of artists that are talking a little bit more about them as an individual and how they perceive the world. Don't get me wrong, love and heartbreak songs are always going to be some of the best songs in the world ,and that's something I'll still be writing about and focusing on. But I just think, as human beings, there's a lot more to talk about. I appreciate other artists that are expressing that in today's musical culture.
You cite your musical inspirations as Nina Simone and Dusty Springfield. What is it that you love about them?
They just sing with such raw emotion, like their hearts on their sleeve. They put their soul into the musical expression. It's so vulnerable and real. And there's something also refined about that kind of music from, from the past. Like, I love music from the sixties and seventies and the more kind of old school classic genres the blues and jazz, and these really like epic singers, like a do and dusty and women who can really like put some power into their voice. Like for me, that's a really moving thing.
Has anyone seen…. a white rabbit?
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Obviously you grew up around music, as the daughter of Annie Lennox. But how did your own individual musical tastes form when you were growing up?
I remember when I first started to listen to all different genres, like David Bowie and Kate Bush and Prince and stuff. We had an iPod on the wall, when I was younger, and my mum put all her CDs on it, hundreds of different albums. I didn't know any of the artists at the time. It was how I discovered Nina Simone as well. I discovered so much music that way. I enjoyed school, but I didn't connect with the academic side of things – only the music classes. I loved going to choir, and I had singing lessons, so when I started to see these musicians writing, creating and expressing these sounds that are so out there and interesting, that sparked something in me.
Your mother, Annie Lennox, was an executive producer on your debut EP – what’s your working relationship like?
Yeah, it's been great. We have this little studio in her guest house and me and my boyfriend – he's the producer, so him and I will work on the music together and she'll kind of drop in and give her insights. We all get on really well. We each have a role to play that balances out the team really nicely. I've learned a lot from seeing my mum, how she sees music and how musical ideas come to her. Up until the last, maybe two years, I'd written a ton of songs, but I hadn't finished that many songs. I'm learning more about the fine tuning – the subtle layers within a song, and like little things that give it life and colour and sounds. She's got ideas coming out of her ears. So it’s inspiring for me to witness that, when I'm making my own music – to see how to flesh out a song fully rather than it just be like a demo.
Do you have a close relationship in general, too?
Yeah, like we live 15 minutes away from each other. Especially during the pandemic, Braeden and I would just go and sit at hers. She lives up in the [Los Angeles] canyons and they have like little hummingbirds… I'd just sit with her and have a glass of wine and look at the hummingbird and we just chat about life. She moved from the UK to LA [during lockdown] and I moved to LA a few years previous to that. And I'm so glad that she's here.
Did she move to be near you?
That was part of it. Her husband [obstetrician and gynaecologist Dr Mitch Besser] also has a son here. I think she just felt like it was a positive chance. The weather helps. There are ups and downs to both America and the UK, but we're happy overall to be in LA right now.
I read that you shot the single for your 2020 single, ‘Pale’, when you were in lockdown. What was the experience like at that time, as a creative person especially?
Yeah. We’d planned to have the single out before the lockdown and I hadn't done a video, so we were like, right, let's just roll up our sleeves and make the most of this. Everyone who's an artist had to do the same thing. So we had like a camcorder, and my boyfriend shot it. It was in my apartment, we used a lot of like what's the word? Like, I can't remember the word, but when you layer two images on top of each other, so we were using little editing tricks to make it feel more interesting. At that time, everyone was at home having to get resourceful and figure out how to make things work, whether it's people having to homeschool their kids or how to get the shopping in. Everyone was having to think out of the box at that time. And that video reflects that time.
Let's discuss your upcoming EP. What are you hoping people will take away from it?
So it's coming out in October. I literally just finished it. It’s going to be a collection of songs. Some that I've already released and two new ones: one’s called ‘Dreamer’ and one's called ‘Hourglass’. Compared to my singles, which are more upbeat, this EP has a more emotional tone – because my favourite is to sing sad, slower songs. ‘Hourglass’ is a more melancholic song, while ‘Dreamer’, like its title, is shimmery but also had soul and depth – I’m excited to share it.
Ms Smith, you're a goddess.
What are the best and worst things about having followed in your mother’s career footsteps?
Well the best is that it's incredibly inspiring to see a woman who's so strong and has such a connection to her artistry push herself to make something perfect and meaningful and great. So the best part is being able to witness it. I would watch the shows and go on tour with her and see albums coming together. That definitely was like the most inspiring thing. I don’t know what the worst would be. Because I was surrounded by music as a kid, it just came naturally to me. I don't know if I would be doing the same thing that I'm doing now, if I hadn’t witnessed it as a kid – hearing the power of music and seeing how it touched me, I just thought, I want to make that part of my life.
You collaborated with your mum on a performance of ‘There Must Be An Angel’ to raise money for the World Health Organisation during 2020. I also see you’re raising money for your Mum’s NGO, The Circle, via your Instagram bio link. Do you see yourself moving even more into the charitable giving space yourself?
Definitely.Being a woman in music, l really want to be able to inspire other women to feel like they can do whatever it is they want – to inspired that feeling of strength. I'm also really interested in protecting the environment and saving the planet. So whatever I can do that comes my way to support different NGOs and charities, I'm totally open to helping those things. For my life right now, I'm primarily focused on the music, but as I continue to grow, I would like to make that a priority. Because it's so fundamental to help others.
On that subject, what’s next for you? Do you see yourself branching out of music at all?
I don’t see myself branching out of music. It's just who I am. It’s more about what I’ll be doing within that. When I go back to LA, I'll be shooting a music video for the EP. Then I'm gonna take a little time out and start writing an album and putting ideas together for a bigger collection of songs. It’s exciting, because when you are doing singles, you're kind of thinking of songs in isolation. I’m excited to give a narrative of a whole story of different songs and to dive into whatever that might mean. That's the next chapter.
Lola Lennox's latest single, ‘Want More’, is out now.
