Insight on Jo Jean's latest song "College Dropout".
Jo Jean is an up and coming musician that recently released the music video to her latest song, "College Dropout".
As defined by Jean, “College Dropout” is a fun playful song that people can relate to about the hardships of being a college student.
When asked about the music video, she explains that it’s meant to tell a story.
“So I'm walking on campus about to work on a project. Then I'm home eating, watching TV after school.”
Jean’s music video for her single “College Dropout” was partially shot at FAMU, where she attends.
“Most of the scenes were impromptu and were thought of by my videographer and director. I just kind of went with the flow. I knew that I wanted to use my campus as one of the locations, [and] that I wanted some scenes to have a juxtaposition to the track.”
She states that the shot in the library with her friends was one of the unscripted acts.
“We wanted to directly showcase the frustration that I was talking about in the song by displaying a chaotic scene.”
College Dropout is a song that originated in Thailand, where Jean was studying at the time. She wrote it when she was feeling homesick and started to look back into her high school years.
She started freestyling the thoughts running through her head to a beat by 8Rokeboy on YouTube, and that’s where the hook of the song came about.
“‘Broke in school it’s not cool, I don’t even wanna be here anyway” because essentially, I didn't.”
She admits that listening to Cuco’s Keeping Tabs, and Beabadoobee’s If You Want To, subconsciously inspired her style of singing in this song.
The song was recorded in mid-December 2019, when she arrived back to South Florida from Thailand.
When asked about college, this is part of what Jean had to say:
“
It’s hard because it’s new and there’s no manual book for any of these things.
We graduate and that’s it, they just throw us out to the wolves and it’s survival of the fittest at that point.”
Her musicianship is often compared to Kali Uchis, Billie Eilish or Erykah Badu.
“All three are very talented and I see the comparisons, but all three aren’t me.”
Jean defines her sound as alternative, which for her means “all that is different from the mainstream.”
