Justine Blanchet is a Canadian country singer currently residing in Nashville, Tennessee. After her inaugural performance at The Bluebird Café, Blanchet now lives and works in the heart of country music.
Off the back of the Canadian Country Music Awards (CCMAs) where Blanchet networked and performed, she joined Tea With G to chat about her new song, ‘What I Got’ and what it’s been like to put such a vulnerable piece of music out into the world.
With over 30,000 organic streams on Spotify in the first two months, ‘What I Got’ is Blanchet’s fastest growing song so far, demonstrating the upwards trajectory she’s currently on.
“People love it,” she says about the track, “it’s my most personal song to date and a new season of music for me.”
‘What I Got’ is an intimately vulnerable track, navigating the heaviness of a heartbreak. With her soul laid bare in the name of art, Blanchet speaks about what it’s like to do that so publicly.
“It’s definitely been tricky,” she says, “I can say that I wasn’t thinking about the press questions or media questions when I released it.” We laugh as she recounts her hindsight during some probing interview questions.
The subject of Blanchet’s track – the inspiration, if you will – is still in her life which is a topic that has proven difficult to navigate for mutual friends.
“It’s not about picking sides,” she goes on to say about the pull between friends, “the song isn’t about being bitter and unwilling to move forward, it’s pretty much saying, ‘do better next time’.”
Putting the song out a year to the date of the breakup, Blanchet was able to take back her power through her voice and share her story, helping her to move on.
“I think that was the biggest lesson I got out of this release. I got to heal from it.”
Having played the song multiple times before even recording it, Blanchet is now comfortable performing it without it causing too much pain.
“I had sat in the song,” she says, “and yes, it brings back painful moments, but I think this song also serves as a good reminder as to why this person is no longer my significant other.”
Now, in her performances, Blanchet finds peace in using it as a method for others to feel validated and understood.
“I just hope people can relate to it and feel heard and know that they are definitely not alone.”
It’s not all tears and heartbreak for Blanchet though. This track isn’t marking the tone for her new music – she’s not in her sad girl era – but marks acknowledgement that her songs are mindful and have a ‘deep truth’ to them.
“As much as I have sad songs that have come out of that season of my life, I think at this point the next release will follow a little bit in that theme, but it’s more on the comedic side.”
Balancing letting the track breathe and looking at what's next:
I think I’m always thinking what’s next and so it’s a mindset that is hard to leave sometimes – even in my personal life – it’s hard to sit in the moment and just enjoy what’s going on. I guess it’s kind of like a false idea when I release something and I’m like, ‘I’ve got to give some more because listeners want more’. Once you’ve built a bit of a discography on your platforms and you have some songs out there, if they’ve listened to everything on Spotify they come over to social media. I have covers that I release sometimes, there’s more on YouTube, or come to a live show, there’s always gonna be more. So I try to show up more in that way on social media. I think of all the artists that I know, we probably have one or two releases per year. They’ve very expensive and it takes a thought out plan, so I try not to give myself too much pressure when it comes to that because I’m going at a pace that I can financially, mentally and physically. To do more than I am right now – which is about two singles a year – I think I’d go crazy. There’d be some wacky songs out there…
Favourite part of the track:
As a songwriter, we like to hide little gems in the lyrics. When we get to play them live, I’m like, everybody quiet, listen to the words. They’re so smart. We just love those little nooks of genius lyrics, if you will. I love the second verse specifically – and no one really pays attention to the second verse typically. You remember the chorus, normally, but I think my favourite is the second verse because I wrote it in the third person. So I say, ‘she’, but really I’m referring to the person I was before the relationship. So if you go back and listen to this song, I’m actually referring to myself, even though I’m saying she – the intent was to refer to me, but it also refers to the next person.
Dream collab to write or perform:
Goodness, well…I got to meet Michelle Wright at the CCMAs and I would love to write with her. That would be so much fun. And then performing, I think visualy would be very funny…
It was at this point that our call cut out and I was left hanging in suspense. But after a charged few minutes of wondering who the dream performance would be with, Blanchet returned to put me out of my misery.
…whoopsies! Turns out you can’t leave your phone in a sunny window. Anyway, I thought it would be really funny visually if I got to perform with Shania Twain because I grew up listening to her music so much that I sort of sound like her a little bit, especially when I do her songs. So just visually, especially because we’ve got like the same hair colour and all that kind of stuff. I think it’d be funny. And we’re both from Canada!
Stay up to date with Justine Blanchet through her website or connect through her social media.
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