Without experimentation, innovation is impossible. For Rochelle Jordan, this desire for sonic expansion has been long embedded into her fusion of futuristic and ancestrally soulful R&B. To listen to a ROJO song is to absorb a phosphorescent but subtle blend of sampledelic 90s pop, vintage UK house and garage, 31st century electronic bangers, airy late night ballads, and progressive hip-hop.

On Play With the Changes, her new album on TOKiMONSTA’s Young Art imprint, the Toronto-raised, Los Angeles-based Jordan showcases not just her own personal evolution, but a path to pushing sound forward. It presents her as a modern heir in a lineage of powerhouse vocalists with style and imagination: everyone from Whitney Houston to Celine Dion, Aaliyah to Amerie, Kelis to Mariah Carey.

Born in London to British-Jamaican parents, Jordan and her family relocated to the eastside of Toronto in the early ‘90s. Her father, a drummer, encouraged her love of art and instilled an appreciation for Northern soul, and Jamaican reggae and dancehall. Bleeding through the walls of her childhood bedroom, the adolescent Jordan soaked in the record collection of her older brother: funky UK house, nocturnal drum and bass, garage, and all the gospel samples contained therein.

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