Issey Cross- a name currently being championed widely across our radio airwaves and Spotify playlists, a voice that lives completely rent-free in our heads. After collaborating with Wilkinson on the globally adored ‘Used to This’, her track ‘Bittersweet Goodbye’ in 2023 soon catapulted her into the commercial spotlight, gaining huge traction from national radio stations, the UK charts, artists like Teisto, major labels and everyone in-between. Don’t get it twisted though: Issey is a perfect example of the well-known quote ‘It takes 10 years to become an overnight success’. The D&B-meets-pop sensation grafted hard as a songwriter, finessing her craft and staying true to her sound for many years. The result? Issey now reaps the rewards of her resilience as she flourishes endlessly with her own independent artistry.
A prominent voice in one of drum & bass’ biggest peaks, her new track ‘Energy in My Town’ represents this historical time for the genre, whilst looking back on those carefree moments of summer in the city. Fresh off the back of her gig performing at the Women’s FA Cup Final, we jumped on Zoom to find out more…
Issey! ‘Energy in My Town’ was just unleashed into the wild… this is about your hometown right?
I actually grew up in Kent, but when I was there I didn’t really have a close friend circle. This song for me is about moving to London and having friends around me, going out, enjoying ourselves. Since I’ve been in London the music scene and culture has been thriving. Drum & bass is so big here right now! Energy in my Town sort of encompasses that energy.
You had a very busy year last year with ‘Bittersweet Goodbye’. You used a pretty iconic sample! How did it feel when it was so well received?
It was a relief. It’s such a big sample. Even when you post videos on TikTok sampling older tracks, people can be like ‘You should’ve left it how it was’. Richard Ashcroft shared it on Twitter. That was crazy because I thought he would hate it. I’d actually written the track a year before and I really wanted to release it. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to because of the sample. Originally we were just going to put it on Soundcloud and then after it started circulating, my label spoke to Richard Ashcroft’s team and he was up for it. So that was good. The sample feels nostalgic even if you don’t remember the song itself, you remember that sample.
If you’ve got the original artist’s approval – nothing else really matters! What comes with a track that gets that much traction?
Everything really. It was crazy. When I put out the song, I was really clear that I wanted it to be a slow release, get everything in place, get the artwork right, get all the other bits sorted before going ahead with the release. I wanted to do it gradually, but then we started posting on Tik Tok and I did the Homebass rave and it started to do well very, very quickly. I’d never done any interviews at that point and I was being asked to go on Capital and other big radio stations. I was like: I don’t even know how to talk in this interview! Everything happened so fast. It was a lot of pressure because I didn’t know what was going to come out next. Obviously because it’s such a big sample too, I felt it was hard to follow it up.
Talk about being thrown in the deep end! Do you react well in those situations?
Yeah, I do. I love being busy, I didn’t have any time to think about it, it was quite exciting. I’ve been doing music for years so it was nice to have something happening! Online it looks like you’ve just started music today, but actually, a lot of artists have been grafting hard for years.
What challenges have you faced in your career so far that will help people see the more realistic, less glamorous, more challenging side of the industry?
I feel like I’ve had a few! I started making music when I was quite young, so I had a few different managers when I was younger and I feel like when you start doing music and you know nothing about it, it’s quite easy to get messed around. I had a few managers that didn’t really work out. I signed to Island a week before the first lockdown and put some music out with them. I just felt like I was making music that they liked, it wasn’t what I wanted to be making. So, I got dropped from the label. After that, I was like ‘Oh my god what am I doing?!’. I kept writing on dance projects for other people and somehow, I ended up meeting my label now and now I’m actually putting out stuff that I like. Now I’m doing what I always wanted to do! At the time, all of the challenging things I’ve been through felt really bad but it’s made me know more about what I want to do and it’s made me more confident.
Being dropped from a label early on in your career must have been quite the challenge. What helped you push past that experience?
I think because I’ve always loved writing I thought ‘I’ll just be a writer’. I feel with writing you can still do music but you don’t have a lot of the other pressures. But then I’ve always wanted to sing and perform, that was the part that was missing.
How did you transition from being a writer into being an artist?
I did a writing session with this guy called Brad and Wilkinson and in that session, we wrote ‘Used to This’. I came out of the session and to be honest, at first, I didn’t think much of the song, but the more I listened to it, the more I started to love it. I always listened to drum & bass, but I’d never written any so it was new for me. A few months went by and I was still just writing for other people, my manager told me that Wilkinson had been playing the track at festivals and it was going to come out. Then I got sent all these videos of him playing it across the UK. When that song came out, it sort of changed everything for me. I started getting sessions for my own stuff again. Labels were interested… my old label included! Then I wrote ‘Oh My’ and more people were interested. It all sort of happened very naturally.
Is there a particular message you want to put out to the world with your music and who you are as an artist?
I want to be really honest about things I’ve gone through or things I’m going through, especially in my new music. I love writing sad songs that you can rave to!
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