Ushering in a new era of artistry today with new EP My Way, British singer-songwriter Yola is reflecting on times she felt her way of creating wasn't supported — like when she worked with Black Keys vocalist-guitarist Dan Auerbach and his Easy Eye Sound label.
A track-by-track breakdown of Yola's latest for Rolling Stone points to the artist's 2021 album Stand for Myself — produced by Auerbach and released via his label — as an effort where "her full range of artistry — as a singer, arranger, producer, and instrumentalist — was sidelined."
Per the publication, Yola "fought to get her preferred musicians on the record, fought to have the track "Dancing Away in Tears" released as a single (a fight she lost), and fought to insert herself more into the recording process, to little avail."
Yola told Rolling Stone that the creative process with Easy Eye Sound, involving in-house songwriters and musicians, is "cookie-cutter bullshit."
She added, "It's what they did in the old days: People have no agency. That was something that was celebrated, so I can see how people hold that up as a way to operate. But it's also a waste of my skill."
Rolling Stone notes the experience prominently influenced My Way's title track, on which Yola sings, "You wanted control / But this is misery."
"I like a diss track," Yola shared of "My Way," explaining, "This song is about when you're trapped and you can't just evaporate because you have to be in this space. It's about the levels of which I had to go through, mind gaming, after someone tried to mind game me. This song is really about how I really tried with someone: "I'm interested in you as a person and how you operate. Let's be collaborative. But you just can't seem to not want to invoke the mammy paradigm, which is the plus-size Black woman who serves you at the sacrificing of herself."
She clarified that 'someone' "isn't just one person," explaining, "This is a genre that would find me all the fucking time. ... As much as 'My Way' was about work, it also reflected into the personal space. 'My Way' is the decentering of everyone else's narrative from my narrative. 'My Way' equals agency, me being able to have a say over my own life, for the first time, at age 40."
Hear Yola's My Way EP below.