Janet Jackson Matters
Channel: Matters
Date: 2021-01-22

Captured on the eve of her debut South African promotional tour, in August 1997, this interview with Janet Jackson reveals more than just The Velvet Rope. A very introspective album, “finding myself is where I find myself,” she declared.

This time around, Janet was focusing on her R&B roots. She spoke to me about exposing her inner, sensual self. “If it’s too much, I apologise,” she confessed at the time. “I have desires, just like the next person. It’s very unsettling. We’re not alone in our feelings.” Most artists would not touch the subject matter, yet Janet embraced it. “I have to do it for myself,” she insisted.

When discussing “Got ’til it’s Gone” – in this interview Janet talks through how the Joni Michelle-inspired track came together. And with Q-Tip in residence, the two made magic. “He has a peacefulness about him,” she said at the time.

“Tonight’s the Night”, Rod Stewart’s classic made it onto the album too… At the point of this recording, he’d yet to hear and endorse it.  “I hope it helps people,” she said, “and that they get something from it. That’s most important.” 

It was a difficult album to make, where Janet went back into her past to realise it. Six months committed and multiple revisits saw The Velvet Rope come to life. Working with the original team, all egos were left at the door. “I hate arrogance,” she insisted. Cathartic, unsettling, as time passed each day after the album was released, Janet got her strength, courage and artistic conviction confirmed with the album’s success.

Here she also speaks of her friendship with Harvey Weinstein in 1997, the same year she received the Lina Horn Award. “I felt so honoured!” she recalls. Janet discusses racism, emotional battles and her inner struggles. More motivated then as ever, Janet, for the first time since Control, Ms Jackson was doing it for herself, no matter what. 

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