Born from deep friendship and loss: Jesse Clegg and Msaki release 'Entropy' collab album

When musicians Msaki (Asanda Lusaseni Mvana) and Jesse Clegg first met in studio, they had no idea their collaboration would turn into a three-year project birthing Entropy.

Both artists are formidable forces in their own right, but together they’ve created something that feels somehow like neither old nor entirely new.

The inception of their connection was creative, Clegg says, with the pair noticing how they both had a deep connection to songwriting and to what music can mean to people and to a culture.

Most importantly, they were both going through deep personal loss at the time and formed an instantaneous friendship through their deep connection.

"I had just lost my partner to cancer, and I had a six-month-old baby; Asanda had just gone through a divorce and she had three kids. We basically just started hanging out, supporting each other and relating to each other on a personal level and having these really deep conversations about life, family, parenting, loss and grief - all those layers."

"I don't think at any point of making this album did we have any intention of creating a project together, it was really just an expression of the season of life that we both found ourselves in. Sometimes the universe brings you somebody that you need to meet in that moment and I think we were that to each other."

Clegg describes Entropy as a very raw album that has deep vulnerability.

"I think we both were almost pregnant with all these complicated feelings... It's a true reflection of where we were; I'm so proud of the fact that we got to document something so real in our lives."

It is a very romantic album, he says: about love and also about losing love and what it means "to sit with the hangover of love".

"The pain you feel after losing that love is directly related to the depth of that love - so there's something to be grateful for as well and we were both trying to straddle this tension between grief and gratitude."

The album was recorded across Cape Town, Johannesburg, Los Angeles and New York, as both artists live "chaotic" lives with constant travel.

All these different stimuli coming at them was useful, he says, in the sense of the input from collaborators who acted as outside observers. 

"We didn't know how the album was going to sound, how our music could work together, so we just let it flow. Every city, every producer and every studio you're in has a different energy and we just let that all mix together."

The result is that they found a new kind of sound, which ultimately doesn't sound like either of them, Clegg says with a smile that is audible.

The EP's lead single, Wayside Lover, includes a collaboration with Sjava:

To listen to Jesse Clegg in conversation with Sara-Jayne Makwala King on CapeTalk's Weekend Breakfast, click on the audio link below: