Singers with Unique Voices: James the Seventh (The Unique Voices Club #48)

Every other Friday, I write a post about singers with unique voices not commonly heard in mainstream music. My goal? To educate emerging artists, music lovers and musical theatre creators while inspiring them to embrace their own quirks. This week, I'm writing on James the Seventh.

TikTok is dangerous. I will start by saying that even if I use it to grow my audience. Besides the tendency to get sucked into a void of hours of mindless scrolling and consuming, we also have the pranks and other stupid things people sometimes do for virality even if it might mean losing your job after the fact. So as a rule, I only scroll for maybe a few minutes a day when I post something. And one of those brief doomscrolling sessions resulted in me discovering James the Seventh. Thank you Lord.

James the Seventh is a Pittsburgh-based Korean-American angsty alt-rocker who employs a variety of vocal techniques and placements that remind me of Kate Bush (listen to the song "Houdini" for reference), seamlessly switching between a chesty scream and a nasally oboe-like falsetto. She initially started out trying to make it in ballet. That is...until an injury sidelined her and she picked up the guitar during her recovery from surgery. Several EPs later, listening to the evolution of her sound as she embraces whatever perceived cringiness over the years, we're glad she made the pivot. As you will see in the full video analysis below, I legit can't stop dancing or fangirling. If you were looking for something to instinctively do the Thriller dance to, look no further:

As always, support all the artists I cover in this series but following what they're up to, listening to their music, and so on. And another way you can support is by joining the Firebird Flock for as little as $14 a month. Not only do you get access to older Unique Voices Club posts, but you also join a group of other music and musical theatre enthusiasts who share unique voices that they discover along their journey that will then be featured later. If you believe in equal power and opportunity for independent, unconventional creatives, then you'll want to sign up. You can do so below.

Sign up for the Firebird Flock!

Stay educated,

Alexia