Estelle is the quintessential eclectic artist - edgy but not (un)necessarily shocking, traditional but modern enough to make her point in the era of precision-tool song production, and forever flitting between genres (across hip hop, R&B, pop, reggae and soul). Classify Estelle at your peril but listen for your pleasure. She knows where she came from and on new album Stay Alta that might just be 1980, in the best possible way.
SEASON 12, EP 2: estelle continues to scale her own, eclectic heights
Estelle is old school. With a modern twist yes, but nonetheless, if this most eclectic of artists leans in any particular direction it is towards ‘classic’. She even says it in one her own songs; "I'm not of-the-moment. I am a classic, yeah, I live at the MoMA” (The Life, opening track of her 2012 album All of Me). She is quite the proverbial eclectic artist - edgy but not (un)necessarily shocking, traditional but modern enough to make her point in the era of precision-tool song production, and forever flitting between a dozen sub-genres (across hip hop, R&B, pop, reggae and soul).
Classify Estelle at your peril.
New album Stay Alta has throwback quality to it that is extremely welcome in the current climate. Although it was conceived as a post-pandemic record, it works effectively as a tonic for the turbulent times we are living through right now. It channels Diana Ross, Donna Summer, Stevie Wonder and…Melba Moore. Like records by those artists, Stay Alta is an organic listen and auto-tune is strictly off limits. But somehow, it is modern.
Stay Alta themes include gratitude, celebration, joy and defiance but not the migraine-inducing platitudinal kind - just the straightforward take it or leave it kind. You should take it. It is album number six across a career of two decades, so Estelle does not subscribe to FOBF, the “fear of being forgotten” that is the scourge of many modern pop artists in today’s fast-flowing pop scene. Instead, she is happy to take her time. There is something to note in her approach about time, longevity, and lineage. Estelle seems acutely aware of whose shoulders she stands on. It’s not unconnected to the fact that The Estelle Show (her 5-days a week Apple Music radio show, which won an esteemed Gracie Award for Women In Media) provides a platform to put her fellow peers and new artists in context alongside legendary artists. Classics and new classics sit side by side - why can’t broadcast radio pull that off? Anyhow, credit to Estelle. It was her idea, her pitch to Apple, and now it's her show. And that is how Estelle rolls.
With Stay Alta, Estelle has once again embraced the album as a cohesive experience. True Romance (2015) and Lover’s Rock (2018) both did that too, the former something of a modern classic - one of my favourite soul-pop records of this century. The album as a body of work is something she respects:
“I think the album is still a thing. I’m not an artist in this for the sake of one song and money. You still have to make a bunch of records to get one single. But I don’t make albums for everybody, I make them for myself, to get something out into the world and remove myself from the fog. I never just wanna hear one song from my favourite artists. It’s like going into McDonalds and eating one french fry".
That is not to say she is not an artist without a hit. We all know Estelle’s big song - now steadily climbing its way into the much-hyped Spotify Billions Club. American Boy is a song that keeps on…but this is not a case of the hit song as an albatross. Estelle does not have an American Boy hanging around her neck like a shop sign.
“I had one split second of a moment after playing it for the trillionth time in a show and I said at the MOBOs that “I know you’re sick of hearing it” but I had to check myself immediately; “no no, you will not curse what you pray for”.
When I ask if it would be nice to have another hit now, she gives me a little bit of short shrift. “I’ve had many since. Conqueror was number one all over the Billboard charts and featured on Empire (the TV show). Thank You means so much to so many people. One Love (with David Guetta) was a dance music hit. There’s a few”.
At this stage, she is a serious artist living outside of the mainstream and not really in need of a hit anyhow. But yes, she is a songwriter and an artist with the potential to strike at any time. She knows where she is from and how to reach deep into that well.
“I see credit and beauty in artists who know where they come from because you then have a well to pull from. If I know funk and I’m a new era funk artist I know where to find that bassline. If I’m a drum & bass artist I can go to that Roni Size beat and sample it or repurpose it. Nothing’s new under the sun”.
Damn right.
I can’t stress enough, if you think that Estelle is a soul artist, you are wrong. Sure, she can carry an emotional depth and vocal range that are hallmarks of soul, but that alone does not define her. She is post genre, crossover - a free expression of whatever influences she is channeling at the time. Her albums demonstrate this perfectly. It does build a sense of anticipation, where will she go next?
We’ll have to wait and see, even if it might be a longer wait than we’ve gotten used to in the constant flow of music these days.
the meta verse (afterword)
When she joins the Zoom call, I explain to Estelle that she has been on my hit list of guests from the beginning and that I’ve been trying to get a ‘soul’ artist onto The Art of Longevity for ages. A few seasons back we tried with Omar, but he wasn’t organised, having been a little flustered after his car had broken down. I love and have followed the careers of Dawn Richard, Leon Bridges, Laura Mvula, and Durand Jones, and would have them on the show in a heartbeat. At one stage, we almost had legendary producer, singer-songwriter Raphael Saadiq on, but the moment passed. Perhaps Estelle can give Stevie a call or pop back around to his place and see if he’ll do it. I can tell him that as a family back in 1980 we bought all the singles from Hotter Than July and that for the whole of 1980 I was obsessed with Master Blaster. It was of course the year that Estelle Fanta Swaray was born, and is the name of her label 1980 Records. Wow - what a year 1980 was musically speaking. I could spend the rest of 2025 wallowing in it.