'It has to be good music': Jon Vinyl on keeping his artistry authentic

Toronto R&B singer Jon Vinyl has been making impassioned, romantic slow jams since 2017. Four years after dropping his first single, he released his debut album, Lost in You, which earned a Juno nomination for traditional R&B/soul recording of the year. It also included the love song "Chrome Hearts," which has racked up more than 14 million streams on Spotify to date. 

Following that project, Vinyl has had a year of firsts: he headlined his first solo tour and performed a sold-out show at Toronto's TD Music Hall. And now, he's gearing up for the release of his new album, Heartbreak Hill, with early singles that include breakup ballad "Wasted" and "Let This Go," a horn-tinged soul track.

Ahead of dropping Heartbreak Hill, Vinyl joined The Block's Angeline Tetteh-Wayoe in the studio for an interview discussing his early inspirations, recording music at home and authenticity on social media.

Let's get a little nostalgic, then. Take me back to that time when it was getting started for you.

Yeah, so essentially, we were just in the basement, you know.

Your parents' basement.

My parents' basement. We were just in the basement. We were just making a lot of music in high school. Next thing you know, I was making music for five years and I decided that I had that song, "Nostalgia," so I was like, "This is the one. This is what needs to come out. The world needs to hear this." I got with my manager, we linked up, we did a little release and it did what it was supposed to do and it got some traction. 

Most of the time when I talk to R&B singers, a lot of them say it's the church. But we talked about you in the basement and you said you have been making music for a really, really long time. But what is your musical lineage like? Did you take piano lessons? How did it all come to be? [Did] it just come from a place of listening to music, then singing music? Because ... for me, I learned how to sing from listening to records. 

I think I just really loved music. Back when we lived in Toronto, we were always [listening] on those laundry days just kicking it. And every single time my mom would just be playing so many old-school songs, back in the day.

Like what?

She'd play a lot of Pink, Boyz II Men, Mariah Carey.

I love that you say Pink, all these old artists.

It was ... really great music at the time and we were listening to things like BET Now and we would just have so much music in the house, just randomly playing. She was really a lover of music. And I think that's why it kind of made me love it.

Shout out to Mama.

Shout out to Mama Vinyl.

Speaking of vinyl, I love vinyl. I'm such a collector of it. I remember when I got my first piece of vinyl, my dad teaching me how to put the needle on the record. 

It's a process.

It is. Don't put your fingers on it!

I know.

Oh the crackle, it's a beautiful thing. Is that why you chose the name Jon Vinyl?

No, honestly ... at the time it just made so much sense. A lot of people would say that I had that, you know, old-school kind of feel. And with the music I was making at the time, it was just super reminiscent of that time. I felt like ... I was paying homage to it. But I will say, my brother, he definitely hit me with it. He said, "Hey, man, you should be Jon Vinyl." And I said, "That sounds beautiful." And yeah, that was kind of the inception of the name, too.

Jon Vinyl, so when you got started, you released a whole bunch of singles before you released your first album, Lost in You. Is the way in which people consume music in this day and age, streaming obviously, does that influence the way in which you choose to roll out your music?

Yeah. We live in a social media era right now, so I feel like anybody can put songs out, right? But I think first and foremost, it has to be good music. And then on top of that, I think you really have to do a lot on social media to push yourself out there in terms of video content and all of that and everything else.

Well, so what [are] some tips? If you could give someone some tips. It's one thing to make a song, it's one thing to upload it to whatever streaming service, but it's another thing to drive people toward it. 

Yeah, I think just be yourself on social media. I know that sounds super corny and classic to say that, but I think it is true. I mean ... you've met so many people in your life and they all have a unique personality and character and that's what you sell on social media, like that's who you should be. And maybe if it's an exaggerated version of that, it's OK.

Let's listen to some more music. This song is from your last project, Palisade. You know, I talked about that [EP] quite a few times, and I was always interested in the title, Palisade.

Palisade. So originally, we were just in the basement. I was trying to think of something that was a little bit enticing and you would hear and go, "Hmm." And ...  I Googled it and it was essentially an old fence. So in my mind, being an artist ... I said to myself, "OK, well, you know, this basement, I'm fenced in every single day working on music, trying my best to create over and over. And this is my fence. This is where I stay in between." And so that was the idea of Palisade and that's where all the songs came from, me being fenced in into a studio, just working, making music. 

This interview has been edited for clarity and length. To hear the full interview, listen to The Block on CBC Music.