Nashville singer-songwriter Jordan Brynn approaches her work with a critical eye. Her new song “Won’t Ever Have Me” sweeps us back to suburban high school hallways and overconfident jocks, a joyful kiss-off to the guys who think they’ll have it all and, sometimes, they’re actually wrong.
Who are your biggest influences?
My biggest musical influence is definitely Taylor Swift. Her writing exemplifies storytelling and lyricism at its finest, while also maintaining this sense of youth and authenticity. I think that honesty in storytelling is what I admire so much and have taken to heart with my writing. I also see a lot of influences from Olivia Rodrigo, Ben Rector, and Julia Michaels in my writing.
Name a perfect song and tell us why you feel that way.
I would call “Our Song” by Taylor Swift a perfect song. Not only does it make you feel like you are driving down the highway in a perfect love story, but it paints such a vivid picture in your head. I think it leaves listeners realizing that the best things about our relationships are the small, unique moments and not some idea of love that the world gives us. Most of all though, it is one of the most fun songs I’ve ever heard. Even as I’ve grown older, hearing that song preserves this sense of youth and lightheartedness, and I think saving up these feelings and being able to feel them again with music is what makes it so special to me.
Do you start off with the music or lyrics first? Why?
Honestly, my writing process can look different every time, which is something that keeps it exciting for me. For the most part though, it kind of happens simultaneously. I’ll usually sit down with my guitar, start strumming some chords, and then write the first line or two. Sometimes, I have no clue where the story is going until I write those first few lyrics. Being someone who really values storytelling in songs, though, writing the lyrics is definitely my favorite part. Half of my school notebooks are filled with lyrics I come up with in class.
Does your album have an overarching theme?
I would characterize my EP as a record of teenage heartbreak, the scars left behind, and the lessons learned. It’s a culmination of a lot of the feelings that come with being a girl so infatuated with the idea of love in high school and now college. This EP is full of a lot of remembering, and at times, too little forgetting.
Tell us about the first song you wrote.
The first full song I wrote was called “You Told Me,” and I probably wrote it when I was 10 or 11. I remember telling my voice teacher that I wanted to write a song, being sent home with some piano chords, and writing it in an hour. It was about this relationship, something that I knew very little about at the time, where I had been promised so much and yet found that all the things he told me were lies. In other words, I’ve been writing teen heartbreak songs before I was either a teenager or someone who had experienced heartbreak.