Rookes and Pop’s New Definition

Pop is often an umbrella term for many artists, and people have a general idea of what that means across music history. But the past few years have seen much cross-pollination coming in from other genres. Where the lines were previously clear, much blurring of the idea of pop has occurred in music. A real slice of that can be heard in the debut album from Rookes, called ‘POPNOTPOP’.

We previously wrote about the career of Rookes, the creative alias of producer and songwriter Jenny Bulcraig, back in September for ‘Consent’. This was the first single and music video taken from ‘POPNOTPOP’. To assist in completing the record, Rookes received the Do It Differently grant from Help Musicians in 2020.

It was in March the same year that Rookes co-founded 2% Rising, a Facebook group bringing together women and gender minorities working in music production. The name of the group is based off a study published by the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative in January 2018 that found just 2% of music producers in the industry were women. Rising to 150 members within a week of forming the group, the total membership currently stands at over a thousand.

During this time, Rookes was also the recipient of the MPG Scholarship, allowing her to study a Higher Education course of Music Production at the Institute of Contemporary Music Performance in London. All of this gave Rookes time to hone her production skills, having already worked with several artists on their music, as well as remixes.

For a slick demonstration of such skills, and a journey in bringing ‘POPNOTPOP’ to life, Rookes created a YouTube production series. Beginning in February 2020, Rookes explored the making of the album in twenty-two videos. She dives deeper into the lyricism, the sounds she created, and even has a chat with an album collaborator.

After almost three years, the ten-track ‘POPNOTPOP’ was finally released in November 2022, and featured two collaborations, three singles and two music videos. When we first spoke to Rookes back in September, she gave us this teaser for the record:

‘This album is like climbing right into my brain for an hour, and finding out that it’s quite rich and stimulating in there.’

Press play - let’s spend an hour with Rookes.

‘Church is just a gathering, church is what you make of it.’

Right from the beginning, ‘POPNOTPOP’ delivers the listener a world of sound with the introduction of ‘Sweat’, the album’s third single. Laced with a vocal sample, thumping beat, guitar riff and sombre piano chords, on paper the combination is mismatched. But here, the wisdom of Rookes’ production is the key that brings together these component pieces, giving you something to dance about.

‘There’s glitter in the darkness, and there’s a fire that can’t be drowned, so meet me on the dancefloor, we’ll Sweat our demons out.’

Across this album, one thing that cannot be underestimated is Rookes’ lyrical ability. She articulates each subject poetically but always with an ear for melody while maintaining the catchy element so characteristic of pop music. ‘Sweat’ is a great example of that, and by the third chorus, the listener is hooked on Rookes’ pulsing beats, up-strummed guitar and breathy backing vocal arrangement. It’s a song that could swallow you whole on the dancefloor.

‘The way I talk has you up nights, like sex with the lights on, like nothing you’ve known before.’

‘POPNOTPOP’ is wrapped in desire, and none more so than ‘Pervertere’. A more dangerous sounding beat keeps up the momentum to this song, with anthemic synth breaks and twinkling bell-like percussion. The sparser arrangement places focus squarely on Rookes’ voice, the artist creating a closeness between herself and the listener, epitomised by the lyrics:

‘Baby relax, you’re in good hands. And I’m a creep when you are near.’

The production is taken to the next level with the talents of Portuguese guitarist MEMA. Her contributions can be heard throughout the song, but it’s the repetitive sequence of notes concluding the track that bring a grittier feeling to ‘POPNOTPOP’. A perfect choice for the likes of the intimate ‘Pervertere’.

The vibe is immediately different with a sole opening piano chord in ‘Bad Code’. The melody is pensive and the beat here is deeper, the kind you’d feel in your chest if you were in a club. Rookes’ voice is closer still, as if you were behind the pop shield. There’s an anxiety in ‘Bad Code’, a lyric born out of a troubled mind.

‘There’s a Bad Code in the system, you can see it in my eyes, I have to rewrite myself again to stay alive.’

Crunchy synths fizz behind the chorus, Rookes singing with passion – ‘I can’t get what I want, because I don’t need fixing.’ The producer has an eye for detail as she sings, ‘until the glass is raining,’ followed by a crystalline tinkling. It’s moments like these where Rookes draws you further into ‘POPNOTPOP’. In a time where individual songs are pulled from albums for playlists, ‘Bad Code’ benefits from following ‘Sweat’ and ‘Pervertere’ as the listener settles in for the ride.

The second single from ‘POPNOTPOP’ was released back in mid-October and is characterised by its interplay between bassline and plucked string sound as a musical staple. Rookes builds ‘Paint’ by applying layers to the canvas, adding percussion during the first chorus and subtle synths breezing past like cars on a highway.

This reaches its pinnacle with Rookes’ line, ‘And if I let you in, why don’t you Paint into me, the things you can see are missing,’ climbing in a burst of backing vocals, but easing off just as quickly as it arrived. The final moments of ‘Paint’ feature a plethora of sounds, from baroque-esque strings, feedbacking synths and pinging percussion. A track different in pace and style from the dancier openers, and the more inward ‘Bad Code’. But there are more stylistic changes on ‘POPNOTPOP’ yet to come.

The music video for ‘Paint’, directed by Marshall Mowbray and shot by James Westlake is a playful take on the lyric. Filmed at Pirate Studios in Hackney, the visual stars Rookes alongside performer Jordan Stovall, (aka Wanda Whatever) as they interpret the intimacy of the track, and navigate the body language associated with it.

‘Perhaps we only love the people we were when first, when first we once met, rather than the strangers we became.’

‘PBB’ pulses through the ears via unrelenting synths, stomping bass drum and snapping percussion. With this song, Rookes has managed to capture the feelings surrounding the immediate aftermath of a break-up, but why it can be a good thing for a person especially if those in the relationship have drifted apart and become strangers. Rookes conveys this without buying into the idea that melancholic lyricism should equal a similar musical landscape. There always comes a point post break-up where a person wants to dance again, and this is it.

‘Tell the truth, even if it hurts you, even if it gives you the post break-up blues.’

‘There’s a past that colours my present, I am just a shade past heaven.’

By contrast, ‘Ready’ centres on Rookes’ almost folk electric guitar playing, laced with reverb, allowing it to integrate better with the beat and waves of synths introduced later. But the electronic elements on this song are dealt with a light hand, focusing more on this artist’s lyricism and overall message.

Rookes’ voice is sweet, and her delivery is heartfelt, especially during the chorus: ‘No matter what I say, I’m Ready. I’m Ready for something new.’ It’s amazing to think a track like ‘Ready’ could exist on the same record as ‘Pervertere’, but Rookes pulls it off with ease.

‘Jenny reached out to me during the first 2020 lockdown asking if I’d like to work on a song with her. She sent me a few ideas, and I was really drawn to the chorus of Tiptoe. I sent over some verse and middle 8 ideas - playing around with themes of distance and longing, something I think a lot of people were going through at that time. There was a sense of timelessness and feeling adrift, and the only thing you could do was wait. Jen and Katie had also recently set up 2% Rising, which was really empowering for me at that moment in time (and still continues to be!). I suddenly felt a lot more confident to produce and explore new creative territory.’ – Austel

With shimmering guitar that creates a glistening musical landscape, ‘Tiptoe’ is a duet with fellow 2% Rising member Austel. The voices of both artists blend together beautifully, with Austel taking the lower harmony and Rookes in her upper register. Production is managed carefully which emphasises the two vocalists, allowing them space to breathe in the song’s structure. ‘Tiptoe’ is perfectly positioned following ‘Ready’, when the listener is primed to really absorb all the textures the duo creates.

‘This is a passing state, but it feels like forever, it feels like fate. When there’s nothing more to do or say, on Tiptoe I’ll wait.’

Recently, Austel attended the Music Producers Guild Awards with Rookes and other members of 2% Rising. Like Rookes, Austel has also received funding from Help Musicians to assist in the release of her forthcoming debut album. There’s real chemistry in their writing and performance in ‘Tiptoe’. We hasten to suggest further collaboration wouldn’t go amiss!

We previously wrote about the release of ‘Consent’, the first single from ‘POPNOTPOP’ back in September. This first preview of the album wowed us with its production, and its honesty in unpacking Rookes’ personal experience. In our Q&A at the time, we asked Rookes to talk us through the songwriting process:

‘Myself, Katie Tavini and Steve Kerrison from Weird Jungle worked hard as an engineering team to get it right. Consent was the penultimate song to be written for the album, and to be honest I was in two minds as to whether to write at all because of the subject matter. I’m not usually one for shying away from controversial topics, but the events that inspired it still felt raw to me. In the end it became a song of necessity because I was struggling to crystallise my thoughts and feelings around these events, and the moment I finally gave myself permission to sit down and write in the summer of 2020, the whole thing came tumbling out.’

‘Consent’ single artwork designed by Rookes.

We’re familiar with the work of Katie Tavini especially, another co-founder of 2% Rising. As well as engineering work by Bloc Party, Arlo Parks and Ash, Tavini has worked on music by Alice Mary, Crouton Cannon, and the latest album by The Subways called ‘Uncertain Joys’. Here, Katie Tavini acts as co-mixer and mastering engineer for ‘POPNOTPOP’. Rookes discusses her influences and Katie’s input into ‘Consent’:

‘The second verse was revised a few times. I wanted to choose powerful enough imagery that people could still wrap their brains around without flinching, so the mix of almost conversational versus more image-based lyricism was deliberate; but I am deliberate about most things, generally speaking. I also wanted to generate something empowering without avoiding the everyday grief that was embedded in the experiences, so I let the production and arrangement reflect that as much as I could and leaned into my more rock-based influences like Alanis Morissette, St. Vincent and PVRIS to inspire my choices. They felt like obvious reference points in terms of music that reflects relatable rage. The remaining production aspects grew slowly over time. Working with Katie on the mixing process was remarkable, and she really inspired me to elevate the track (and the whole LP) in ways I wouldn’t have done if I had tried to finish the mixing alone. The bass track, for example, was finally run through the outboard compression gear in her Brighton studio, which gave it so much more heft.’

‘I want to be kind, but I’m in too much pain. I want to believe that people can change.’

‘Versailles’ is full of energy and showcases Rookes’ excellent programming work on the string arrangement heard throughout. Lyrically, this song explores self-doubt using the grandiose metaphor of Versailles:

‘Some things I never had ‘til now. It feels like trouble as I soak in the power. Gold leaves. I can see how people go crazy in places like these.’

Though the strings are central to this track, the way Rookes builds ‘Versailles’ gradually gives you more to listen to every time. From all the percussion layers, additional vocal parts, almost mechanical synths and ethereal pad instruments, ‘Versailles’ is a song that could be heard in two ways. Luckily for her Patreon subscribers, Rookes has made an acoustic version of the track that focuses more on its organic elements. ‘Versailles’ is a masterclass in pop production.

‘Each encounter starting small. A touch, a look, a word, that’s all.’

‘POPNOTPOP’ concludes intensely, but not with beats or hype, but with a hymn. The album begins with references to church, and the final song, called ‘CTL’ feels like you’re transported to one. But you’re the only one there, resonating with the sound of Rookes’ multi-layered voice. This song feels liberating, uplifting, like a moment captured, immortalised in a snow globe.

‘And even from afar, I can see, I can see you are designed to Catch The Light, and it’s like I’ve been holding my breath all my life.’

And you can’t help but hold your breath with Rookes. ‘CTL’ feels like it’s over too soon as it ends with rejoicing, championing intimacy as the rest of ‘POPNOTPOP’ does, but in a way that celebrates the self. There is much positivity to be heard on this album, and it’s summed up beautifully in this song.

‘POPNOTPOP’ represents growth in many ways. It’s a document of Rookes’ production prowess, showing you how a song is built, with enough of all the key elements and the avoidance of overindulgence. In each of these tracks, Rookes seeks to serve the song, rather than herself – an essential quality in a music producer and arranger.

It’s also a detail of personal and emotional situations in which Rookes deals with using her songwriting. Everything is held in balance on ‘POPNOTPOP’, giving a glimpse of this producer’s life but inviting you to dance to it, bask in it, or have your breath taken away.

Continue reading for our Q&A with Rookes. We ask about the making of ‘POPNOTPOP’, including her collaborations with MEMA. and Austel, the feedback from the 2% Rising community and working on the ‘Paint’ video. We also talk to Rookes about her love for a good playlist, and what she would add to one this year. All this and more below!

1. Your debut album 'POPNOTPOP' was three years in the making and released back in November. After all this time, how did it feel to finally have this record out? Was it a mixture of emotions?

A huge mixture. I knew that because the record was being released independently and because of the limitations of my time and resources that I had to let go of the idea that this record would reach as broad an audience as I would have liked. I did everything I could, but I lost a lot of valuable contacts in the pandemic - people forgetting about me or just moving on to different things, so I had to accept that and trust that POPNOTPOP would reach the people that needed it. In terms of the coverage I could get for it, the fact that every press review was a rave was truly gratifying, because I had worked so long on it and poured so much of myself into it.

In the end, I made the decision to pivot the purpose of the album release into building a portfolio for my production skills; by way of showing artists what I was capable of as producer. It worked! I’m now working with several new production clients on great projects, which is making me very happy indeed.

2. You said before that 'Consent' was the penultimate song written for 'POPNOTPOP', what were the first and last songs written for the album?

Thinking about it now I’m pretty sure the first song was ‘Ready’, because I wrote it in the spring of 2017 and I can remember exactly where I was. It was the first song I wrote on my Telecaster, which was recently bought, and I was noodling around in DADGAD in my room in Kensal Green when I came up with the guitar riff. I have a long term obsession with this tuning, because one of my favourite songwriters, Fink, writes in DADGAD frequently, and I started messing with it back in 2010 when I was teaching myself to play ‘This Is The Thing’.

Back in 2017, I think I had just seen him on the Sunday Night Blues Club tour at the Jazz Cafe in Camden, so I guess I was feeling inspired. The funny thing is that when I’m writing songs, I rarely hear them in my head being sung with my own voice. In this case, it was my friend Eve Singleton’s voice that I was hearing in my head as I was composing it. I should probably tell them that some time!

The final song I wrote for the album was ‘Sweat’, actually. It was an unplanned song, but I’d been imbibing a lot of disco during 2020 to keep my spirits up during lockdown so I guess it was inevitable. I had spent weeks and weeks composing and producing intensely, and felt like I had hit a really powerful momentum. So, I decided to see what else would come out even though I had what I felt like was my quota of songs for the record. The answer was ‘Consent’, followed shortly after by ‘Sweat’. And that was the moment I decided to stop, for the sake of deadlines - because I could have gone on and on.

3. There are all manner of keyboard instruments and programmed drums on this record. Is it sometimes difficult to audition a sound when there are quite literally thousands of combinations to choose from? How do you make those decisions?

Honesty, I go by instinct a lot, which is probably just a combo of my ADHD and my subconscious. I don’t chase presets that directly reference other song arrangements very often, but sometimes it just happens because I’m a sponge and I recreate what I absorb to a greater or lesser extent, but through the lens of my particular style. A lot of the time, I will just flick through a trusted preset library and find something that feels right, whether it’s synths or drums, or as close an approximation as I can get, and then I’ll fuck around with adding effects; filter, EQ, distortion, reverb, etc. until the shape fits roughly what my brain is reaching for. That process is often more efficient for me than endless library browsing.

4. You put forward some of this music to the 2% Rising Facebook group for feedback, what was the best bit of advice you got from that community on this record?

Oh, God… that’s a tough one. There was so much of it. Most of it was mixing tips. Actually, probably the best tips I got were about panning - to make the best use of the stereo field - and then also mixing in mono, then converting to stereo after. I also started experimenting lightly with Stereo Spread after those 2%R Listening Parties, which can really flip the width of your mix. You can’t go nuts with it though, otherwise your mix starts to sound like a soup; sparingly is best. I did that with certain string parts across the record - on Versailles and Sweat in particular, I think - and it made them sound epic.

5. MEMA. really adds such a different flavour to 'Pervertere', what was your reaction when you first heard her parts?

I was blown away. She nailed it in terms of delivering production elements that elevated the arrangement, which is really what additional production is meant to do. She sent sub parts and ear candy and, of course, those incredible, dirty guitar parts at the end. Listening back to those parts had me clutching my face and squealing in my chair. I wanted to use everything but I knew I had to curate a little to stop the track feeling overloaded, so I took my time, selected the most compelling parts, sometimes moved them around, and eventually everything clicked into place. But it was an embarrassment of riches, let me tell you.

Austel. Image Credit: johnwilliamsphotography.co.uk

6. And Austel features on and co-writes 'Tiptoe', how did that track come together? Was it a joint writing session or something you sent to Austel for her to add to?

That track was one that I had already started writing before the pandemic started. I had a chorus and a chord progression. I had shown it to a couple of other potential collaborators, but I hadn’t liked the way that they had dismissed the essence of the sentiment I was trying to capture. When we got locked down in the spring of 2020, I sent it over to Austel kind of on a whim - what I had, plus some thematic ideas. We’d been pals for some time, and I thought it would be an opportunity for good cowriting practice. We developed it passing it back and forth over email. At first she played along with the chord structure, recording a Rhodes part, then added the verses and the chorus harmony. I could tell it was perfect straight away. We talked about the vocal arrangement, and what a bridge could look like, and I sent some lyrics for Austel to finish the bridge melodically. We then recorded our parts separately in our home studio set-ups, and Austel sent hers over as wav files for me to add to the DAW project. It was a great collaboration, we’re both very proud of it.

7. I love the playful nature of the 'Paint' video, what was it like working with Wanda Whatever on that set? Was there much rehearsal to get to the finished visual?

Wanda and I have been friends and collaborators for some time now - they also featured in the “Liminal” video for my second EP, which we shot at The Glory. When I was storyboarding the ideas for the “Paint” video, I knew I wanted a gender non-conforming person to play opposite me, Wanda was the first person to come to mind. They have such great screen presence and a strong dance background, so it felt like a no-brainer. Happily they were excited by the concept, so we structured a weekend of filming at the dance studio at Pirate in Hackney. We originally wanted to incorporate BSL into the choreography but unfortunately we couldn’t find a deaf consultant in time, so we took elements of lyrical translation and improvised them into the choreo by way of gesture inspiration rather than direct translation. We took one day to devise and rehearse together then the next day we shot the whole thing. The shoot was covid-safe too (we shot in April 2021), so in-between shots we were distanced and masks on, with a skeleton crew of two - my DOP James Westlake and director Marshall Mowbray.

8. The string arrangement in 'Versailles' is beautiful. For those with no knowledge of DAWs, MIDI or scoring programmes, how did you compose these parts?

There are about 6-7 key layers of strings at play here. The swelling, orchestral pads were courtesy of Spitfire Labs. The rest are layers of double bass, cello and viola, provided by ROLI’s MPE software (MIDI Polyphonic Expression), which you can see me demonstrate via Seaboard and Lightpad Block controllers in the Versailles production episode of the POPNOTPOP series on YouTube. I think two of the layers were provided by orchestral strings presets in the Equator synth engine (designed by Rafael Szaban - aka Electric Himalaya who remixed “Liminal”), then the more individual instrument layers were constructed via the SWAM Acoustic soundpacks via the ROLI Noise iOS app. My main inspiration for the strings was Björk, actually. I had been listening to the Song Exploder podcast and in her episode she talks about constructing her string parts on “Stonemilker” and how it was like weaving a basket around the song. I kept that mental image with me all the way through “Versailles”’ production process.

9. The backing vocals in 'CTL' are an essential part of that song. Are you sampling your voice to create that effect? It sounds as if you're playing them like chords on a keyboard?

“CTL” is entirely constructed by only voice and keys; that’s its special secret. I used some pads, but other than that, you have only voice and piano samples, and all the voice samples are mine. I really wanted to highlight the idea of the voice as an instrument. I wrote and sang each harmony in order to sound like chords on a keyboard, and processed them to make them sound as even as possible without losing their human tone. I also pitched them up and down and played with the formant of them using a vocal transformer plugin to make them sound like other people, but they are all me.

10. And the words to that song. Wow. Was there much refining of that lyric? Do you do several drafts of a lyric before you come to the finished version?

Firstly, thank you for the ‘wow’. “CTL” was always meant to be a ‘wow’.

Secondly, this song was actually written before the pandemic, although the arrangement went through several revisions in the album making process. Originally I constructed it using loops I’d composed through ROLI’s Noise app again, then the lyrics were actually adapted from a poem I wrote in the spring of 2019. I was going through a period of processing my early experiences of queer sex, but I was also struggling to articulate to my straight friends how different it was from heteronormative sex, especially in terms of power dynamics. Then Wanda Whatever commissioned me to create a short piece for a queer cabaret, so I wrote this poem and then created “CTL” as a response to that brief and performed them both as a part of that piece. I’d already done so much thinking and journalling around the topic that the words came easily.

11. To celebrate the release of 'POPNOTPOP', you did both an electric and an acoustic livestream, showcasing the songs in different ways. Do you get the same type of nervousness performing to a camera as you do when performing to a live audience?

It’s much easier for me to perform for camera to be honest. My ADHD allows me to become very anxious and easily distracted before and during performance with a live audience in front of me, but if it’s just me and a camera then at least I have the illusion of being alone and distractions can be kept to a minimum.

12. I've been waiting to ask a producer this in a Q&A, how do you feel about the rising interest in AI music?

Ah, mate, honestly my answer is short and boring: to me, AI is just another tool. Good or bad outcomes depend on how we use it, just like the internet or any other piece of tech. It’s arguable that to a certain extent we have been using AI for some time already, through things like musical sequencers and randomisers. So really, my feelings around it are pretty neutral.

13. Finally, I enjoyed your story of taping Imogen Heap off of Radio 1 back in the day, and I know you've carried on making mixtapes the modern way. What five songs would you put on a mixtape right now?

Hahaha, yes I suppose I have kept up my mixtape fascination, haven’t I? Here’s my current top 5:

Welcome To My Island - Caroline Polachek

I was at her launch gig for her new album a few days ago and listening to a few thousand people bellow the word “DESIIIIIIIIRRRREEEE” less than 5 minutes after it started was a whole new level of euphoric.

Crumbs - Rebecca Black

I am here for the renaissance of Rebecca Black and you should be too. She’s femme, queer and over here… and her new album is excellent. Fans of hyper-pop should dig all the way in.

replay! - Kimbra

I’m a huge fan of Kimbra and although the rest of her most recent album didn’t really sell me, this opening salvo is so utterly superb. It’s Kimbra at her production best: versatile, sexy, angry, flawless.

Karma - Taylor Swift

You’re allowed to be surprised by this one. I have never, nor will I ever, claim to be a Swiftie, but I can admit when something slaps. This is a light, poppy slice of something more interesting than the average - celebrating life’s good things with only a mildly sinister undertone, and catchy as fuck.

Hot (Don’t Date A Musician) - Dream Wife

I’m lucky enough to know a couple of the ‘Wives’, and their thrashy, lively tracks are always worth paying attention to. They also deliver feminist bangers with their tongues firmly fixed in their cheeks, which I love.

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Stream and download the music of Rookes, as well as purchase CDs and T-shirts from her Bandcamp page here.

Listen to the music and productions of Rookes on Spotify via the Complete Rookes playlist.

For more information about Rookes, visit her official website here.

Support Rookes on Patreon to get early access to music releases, CDs and online performances.

If you’re a woman or gender minority working in music production and you wish to join the 2% Rising community, visit their Facebook group.

Follow Rookes on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter @iamrookes.

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