Jem Cassar-Daley is making her own mark
Jem Cassar-Daley wasn’t always going to follow in the footsteps of her famous father. But a gift for music, singing and storytelling has seen her embrace the musical life with her debut album tattoos used to come off in the pool.
When InReview speaks to singer songwriter Jem Cassar-Daley, she has just finished a run supporting Vera Blue on the pop star’s national tour, performed her own string of showcases at BIGSOUND in Brisbane, and sung on stage with Australian music icon Paul Kelly. But these are just the warm-up for the talented young artist’s main event: a national tour to support her debut studio album tattoos used to come off in the pool.
It’s fair to say things are happening for this 25-year-old indie pop performer, who is the daughter of country music star Troy Cassar-Daley and singer and TV presenter Laurel Edwards. While the talented Cassar-Daley is keen to pave her own way in the industry, her foray into music came, unsurprisingly, courtesy of her country music pedigree.
“Music was a massive part of our childhood growing up for me and my brother,” Cassar-Daley says. “We learnt to sing when we were very young, just sitting around with our parents and singing harmonies.
“We’ve also pretty much gone to Tamworth [Country Music Festival] every year since we were little, and Dad would often get Clay and I on stage. I was pretty terrified when I was young to be honest.
“I wasn’t a natural born, just-run-onstage-and-sing, I was a bit more shy than my brother. But they are my earliest memories of just clinging to Dad’s leg on stage because I was terrified.”
Gradually, after embracing musical theatre at school and growing in confidence, the young Cassar-Daley began to find her voice and love of songwriting and performing live.
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She does admit, however, to having a back-up plan when she first left school, enrolling in a Bachelor of Arts degree – until parents convinced her to focus on music.
“I had a big idea about putting music on the back-burner, just making sure I had my ducks in a row and I had a degree lined up… music was the thing I’d fall back on,” she says.
“But I’m really grateful that my parents encouraged me to pursue music, because it’s always been what I wanted to do.
“I was always writing and playing as many gigs as I could, but my parents encouraged me to just go out and experience life and see if I liked performing, and I just fell in love with it. From then on it’s just everything to me; I wake up every morning and think about songs that are in my head from the night before. or think about gigs.
“I just live and breathe music, I love it so much. There’s absolutely no Plan B for me for sure.”
Keen to avoid being pigeon-holed into any one genre, Cassar-Daley descibes her sound as “a mix of a few different things”. Early influences included different genres and styles of music, not just country, including rock and “yacht rock” – which her mum used to blast, she says.
“I think with genres, everyone can be kind of put into a little box but I love to see how artists evolve over their albums,” she says.
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The title of Cassar-Daley’s debut album tattoos used to come off in the pool was inspired by her first tattoo at the age of 21. It was a piece of wattle, a flower that was left at her Nan’s house after she passed away several years ago.
“Someone left it at her property after she passed away but we didn’t know who,” says Cassar-Daley. “They left it without a note, but it just really signified and represented Nan in a really beautiful way and it was such a lovely gesture so I had it tattooed on my forearm.
“By brother and I used to love the stick-on tattoos when we were little, and we’d swim in the pool all weekend and they’d come off really easily.
“I just had this moment of thinking, ‘there’s no way this one is coming off’, and it was this real coming of age moment of growth for me. This newfound responsibility and just being an adult and I think a lot of the through-lines of this album, especially being my first, are about growing up, and navigating life as a woman and a young woman, and just trying to work things out and using experiences to just figure it out along the way.”
From catchy pop tones of songs such as ‘Cool Girl’ to the more soulful ‘Growing’, her debut album launches Cassar-Daley as a gifted storyteller with an authentic, heartfelt sound.
“I just resonate with every single song and I feel it so deeply,” she says. “I hope people can hear it top-to-tail and hear the progression and the journey. I wanted these songs to be like a tattoo and really mark a point in time in my life.”
The performer says her parents are always the first to hear her songs, from the early demos to the final product, and she values their creative input, saying they’ve been “nothing but supportive of everything”.
Touring with Vera Blue has also been a source of inspiration, and a learning experience for Cassar-Daley who has been a fan of the singer since her teens.
“Just listening to her music and hearing her stories and seeing her stagecraft and artistry was so inspiring, particularly as a young woman in the industry,” she says. “I’ve just come home with such a rush of blood, and I’m so inspired to write the next album – and this album has only just been out for two weeks.”
Jem Cassar-Daley will perform in Adelaide at Jive on Friday September 18, and Fortitude Valley’s The Brightside on Saturday September 26.
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