Sitting across from Jully Black in a dimly lit Toronto studio, you don't just hear her voice; you feel the vibration of a career built on grit and soul. She is leaning forward, her presence filling the room in a way that makes the gold jewellery around her neck seem like armour rather than ornament. We are talking about the state of the nation, and she isn't pulling any punches. The R&B queen of Canada has always been more than a hitmaker. She is a provocateur with a microphone.
The conversation turns quickly to the systemic failures that define the current Canadian landscape. Jully doesn't offer platitudes. She offers a searing indictment of a country that prides itself on progress while leaving its most vulnerable in the rearview mirror.
"I’ll go back to listening," she says. "First of all, there are reserves and parts of Canada where Indigenous communities don’t have clean running water, this is 2021. How does anybody not have clean water in North America to drink like that in itself? There’s some of the audacities where I think that we need to believe what disenfranchised people are actually saying, I’m a black woman, I’ve said things, I’ve spoken up in different arenas, where it even comes to the entertainment business."
And she is right to be frustrated. The industry has a long history of tone-policing women of colour who dare to have an opinion on their own production or business dealings. In the 519 offices, we’ve seen this play out a thousand times. A male artist demands a specific monitor mix and he is a "perfectionist." A Black woman does it and she is "difficult."
Jully has felt that sting firsthand. She leans back, a sharp smile playing on her lips as she recounts the labels thrown her way.
"I was labeled a Diva for standing up for my band or standing up for myself, you know, labeled difficult, like no, because you ask for something that is right, you’re right," she says. "Why is it that we’ve been labeled and judged, but I think we’re in a time where the fear is gone. You’re finding we’re not able to confirm and find, because my manager is indigenous. And he said to me, as I was helping him to rewrite the script slightly for Lights on July 1."
It is a fascinating perspective on the semantics of reconciliation. We often talk about "discovering" truths, but Jully, influenced by her manager’s Indigenous heritage, views it as a long-overdue acknowledgement of a reality that was never hidden from those living it.
"He said, You know, this isn’t a discovery," she explains. "This isn’t like somebody that discovered some new piece of land, this is confirmed. So even though the language that we’re using, it’s not like we’ve discovered No, you’ve confirmed what the Indigenous community already knew existed."
But Jully isn't just looking outward. The internal shift she has undergone over the last few years is rooted in profound loss. Watching her on the Juno stage recently, there was a weight to her performance that wasn't there a decade ago. It’s the kind of gravitas that only comes from staring down grief.
"I’m giving you such a hopscotch because I’m writing a book," she admits. "In fact, I just got a book deal. So it’s going to be all in my book, but from where I am now, I’ll give you a summary. My mom passed away three and a half years ago, and it really taught me a lot. It’s taught me a lot about fearing less."
This distinction between being "fearless" and "fearing less" is where Jully’s current philosophy lives. It is a more human, more attainable version of bravery. It’s about the incremental shedding of the anxieties that keep artists small.
"There’s one thing some people don’t want; to be fearless," she says. "It’s like, we don’t want to be fearless, we have to fear less. And really be able to start to understand that we matter. And all of the things that mean something to us, do mean something to us, if you want to pursue, knitting, then pursue it with all of your heart and soul. So I’m on a mission. If you could see it, I got this tattoo. It’s a bridge. I realized that I’ve been given a very strong gift, connecting people, and helping people even through my social media, to be empowered women and girls, to love the skin that you’re in. So my music in the beginning has given my validation, so to speak."
And that bridge isn't just ink on skin. It is the role she has occupied since she first broke through. She is the connective tissue between the old guard of Canadian soul and the global juggernauts like Jessie Reyez or Alessia Cara.
She looks at me, really looks at me, and the interview dynamic shifts. She isn't interested in a one-way interrogation. She wants a connection.
My mom passed away three and a half years ago, and it really taught me a lot. It’s taught me a lot about fearing less. There’s one thing some people don’t want: to be fearless. We don’t want to be fearless, we have to fear less.
"But now, my significance really lies in sitting here with you, and taking this opportunity to have a conversation," she says. "I want to know what your dreams are. I want to know you, you’re here to interview me. But you’re equally as important, and I’m absolutely nothing without you. So that’s where I’m at."
Despite the philosophical detours, the music is still the engine. She mentions her new project, *Three Rocks and a Slingshot*, a title that suggests she is still very much in the business of taking down giants.
"I’m at a place where there’s still music, I have a new album that’s been mixed and mastered right now called 'Three Rocks and a Slingshot'," she says. "It’s an ode to David and Goliath, because all it takes is you got three ideas even, that you just can really stand behind or your three emotions, whether you’re full of love or full peace, full of forgiveness, just find your three, and put on your slingshot. And when that negativity or that doubt, or those limiting beliefs start to creep up your way, know we’re humans, it’ll happen, you put that slingshot and you hit it with some love. So that’s where I’m at in my life."
The 50th Anniversary of the Junos provided a moment of high-definition clarity for Jully’s place in the pantheon. Sharing the stage with Liberty Silver wasn't just a performance; it was a corrective measure for a history that often forgets its pioneers. Liberty Silver won the first-ever Juno for Reggae/Calypso in 1985, yet her name isn't spoken with the same reverence as the rock legends of the same era.
"That moment, it was very interesting, because there’s a big gap between our careers," Jully notes. "I feel like she’d never got her flowers just like people say to me, I didn’t get my flowers. It’s interesting. Now with social media, there’s a bit of Canadians and Canadian artists and R&B and Hip Hop, whether it’s Drake or the Weeknd, or Alessia Cara, or Jessie Reyez, now the world is starting to get to know Canadian urban artists more. But me coming up, there wasn’t social media the way it is now."
There is a maturity in how Jully views her predecessors now. When you’re young and hungry, you’re focused on your own climb. When you’ve reached the summit, you realize who carved the path.
"I could offer her more empathy than when I was younger," she says. "I was like, okay, as a bridge, that was cool. But I was really thinking about me. And now I see the next generation. And they give me some flowers. But now I’m like, you know what? Without a Liberty, there’ll be no Jully. Without Jully, there’d be no Jessie or Alessia. Without Deborah Cox, there’d be no others. We have to really start to celebrate one another more. So it was very important. I’m glad I got the call to be up there with her and to celebrate the 20th Anniversary of Hip Hop."
Naturally, the media loves a "comeback" story. It’s a clean narrative arc that sells magazines. But for an artist who has been consistently working, even when the cameras aren't flashing, the term feels like an insult.
"I didn’t go anywhere. So that’s my answer," she says, her tone sharpening. "People like to come back, come back from where? So that’s something that I’m on a mission to eradicate as well. The music business could be so superficial and unlike, you know who’s gone away, or who’s in the Hall of Fame, or who’s washed up."
She draws a brilliant parallel between artists and other professionals. You don't ask a surgeon where they’ve been if they haven't performed a high-profile operation in a year. They’ve been practicing their craft.
"You don’t say that about doctors or lawyers or nurses and musicians are the ultimate physicians," she argues. "We are the physicians of the world. I think, it’s important for especially the media, to start to re-brand and start to rephrase that type of labeling where it’s like, hey, whoa, like where you been? Well, hey, my mom had pancreatic cancer. So I was taking care of her. You know, there’s things where it’s like, I’m honored to be able to."
The demand for constant content is a modern sickness. The idea that if you aren't posting, you don't exist, is a trap Jully refuses to fall into.
"Back in the day, you could put out an album every three, four years," she says. "It’s not a comeback. It just happens to be when you’re writing your songs. But because we live in a time where the attention span is so short, society’s like, Oh, is this a comeback? I didn’t go anywhere."
But for those of us who remember her opening for the Black Eyed Peas in Saskatoon, Jully has never really left our heads. That show was a masterclass in crowd control. I can still see her on that stage, commanding the audience with a simple call-and-response that felt like a religious experience.
"To be honest with you, I started by saying when I say peace, you say love. Right," she says, explaining the origins of her famous chant. "So that was the entry point. I wanted to associate peace and love with my name, Jully Black. So once I start off, she’ll say love. And then when I say you, Jully, I’ll say Black. It’s like you’re still saying peace and love. Right? So that’s how I got it to happen."
We dive into the archives, specifically "Seven Day Fool." It’s a song that has aged into a complex piece of cultural commentary. Originally an Etta James track written by Berry Gordy Jr., its themes of domestic subservience hit differently in the 21st century.
"Ah, that’s a very good question. You’re going deep," she says. "Today, I would say that it makes me realize that my mother’s generation, grandmother’s and beyond thought they had the rule to basically submit only. I’m down with taking care of your man, your family. It can be the role of the woman. But I’m of two minds. One is, I like that. It represents a woman that saying, Hey, I have your back. I’m going to be the matriarch of this family, and wash and cook and clean and do all the things and know that my family is taken care of."
But Jully is also a student of the industry. She understands the power dynamics of the Motown era and how male songwriters shaped the "female" voice to suit their own desires.
"On the other hand, I recognize that sometimes the songs of the 50s, 60s even 70s that were written by men for women, because Berry Gordy Jr. wrote that song for Etta James, you start to realize the role the male writers were putting women in," she notes. "Even Aretha Franklin has songs that were written by Otis Redding, you know what I mean? So I started to kind of do my research and when Smokey Robinson wrote that song for The Supremes, his viewpoint on what women should do, or where they should be, was from a male perspective. So it’s very interesting."
We wrap things up by talking about her latest single, "Mi No Fraid." It’s a track that leans into her Jamaican roots and demands a level of emotional honesty that most people are too terrified to provide.
"Yeah, it’s interesting because it’s out, but it’s not officially out," she says. "So we’re going to be shooting our video and all that. So, in a nutshell, and maybe you can relate to this with anybody in life. Have you ever had that person in your life or people where they’d be like, Oh, I wanted to tell you, but I didn’t know if you could handle it, or I thought I would hurt your feelings. Or I didn’t know it was too much for you to handle, like anything not even talked about romantically. Have you ever experienced that before?"
The song is a plea for radical transparency. It is the sound of a woman who has survived the worst life can throw at her and has no time for people who try to "protect" her from the truth.
"So the song is basically saying, Hey, give me the option," Jully explains. "Give me more credit than having a bit more backbone, that you could share anything with me. So 'Mi No Fraid' means I’m not scared basically in the Jamaican dialect, like, Hey, I would rather if it’s romantically, I’d rather you tell me this relationship isn’t working out, then you cheat on me."
Jully Black isn't just back. She is here, she is present and she is more dangerous than ever. And frankly, the Canadian music scene is better for it.
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