Artist Spotlight Interview: Crystal Joilena

Crystal Joilena has released a new experimental rock song “The High Priestess.” The highly emotional track delves into the topics of spiritual awakening, and connecting with your higher self. It explores the secrets and truths behind false representations - things that seem to control the music industry and social media in today’s society.

Hailing from New York, Crystal has carved a place for herself in the music industry on her own terms. Garnering success with both covers of bands like Evanescence and her own original music. She places a lot of her personal stories and emotions into her music resulting in the listener feeling as thought they’ve read a page of her diary.

I had the chance to sit down with Crystal and discuss her music, her experiences as a woman in the music industry and more. Check it out below!

1. Can you tell me how you got started performing and writing music? What drew you to rock/metal music?

When I was younger in the ‘90s, I always had a deep interest in musicals, specifically The Phantom of the Opera and I heavily enjoyed rock operas, how I found my interest in performing when I would perform those songs to my family and I didn’t know whether I wanted to be a female phantom, because I enjoyed the mystery of it and the darker side, or if I wanted to play Christine someday, I’ve always loved Sarah Brightman’s music and she has been the main source of inspiration for me since that age, along with popular female artists in the ‘90s such as Jewel, Garbage and The Cranberries.

I’ve always had a naturally operatic voice since I was five and throughout childhood I wanted to perform on Broadway. During middle school in 2004, I started listening to Avril Lavigne, My Chemical Romance and Bring Me The Horizon, and Evanescence and from there, my interest in rock/metal music began and increased dramatically over time and I knew that my path changed and what I truly wanted was to become a performer of that nature, I just didn’t know how to go about it because I had a very strict and religious family and I wasn’t allowed out of the house, so I wasn’t able to attend concerts during that time. I focused on school until I was in high school and as a teenager my interest reawakened, so I started forming metalcore bands, and trying out as a singer, but nothing truly clicked for me and I kept meeting more men who were musicians, but my interest didn’t align with theirs, I wanted to sing and work on music, and some people, their intentions weren’t pure and they wanted me. I always sought to start an all-women band but that opportunity never showed up. I became a solo artist in 2014. 

2. You have done some notable covers that have gone viral like "Bring Me to Life" by Evanescence. Did you start out focusing on doing cover music or have you always focused more on your own writing and just done covers for fun?

I definitely started out as a cover artist, before I had found a producer all I would really do is cover songs under many different names over the years. I collaborated with DJs in Europe at the very beginning after they took a liking to my voice because I was posting covers on YouTube and SoundCloud and I would search for producers and write to their instrumentals. When I finally found my main producer, Randy Pasquarella in 2014 we used my lyrics and melodies and he would create instrumentals for me and help me a lot! I had a deep interest in turning rock/metal songs into ballads since 2014.

3. What makes you choose a particular song to cover? What made you choose artists like Motionless in White and Evanescence?

If I like a song and I envision it as a cover, I will make it happen. I’ve been a huge Motionless in White fan since their early years and Evanescence has been an inspiration for me since I was younger, people have compared me to Amy Lee a lot throughout my life, I think we naturally have similar tones for sure and it’s a huge compliment.

4. You released your debut album, War On My Soul, in 2021. Can you tell me about the writing and recording process for the album? Did you write the music during the pandemic or did that have an impact on the album at all? 

Yes, it all started in the summer of 2020, this is a long story, so bear with me! At that time, one of my producers, Farhan Tanvir and I were working on my EP “Numb Until Further Notice” and I knew I wanted a heavier song on the EP, to be able to adequately release the anger I was feeling from many different root causes, including the pandemic, so I had one song called “Siren” that I wrote the lyrics and melody of one year prior and we decided to utilize what I wrote and make Siren that heavy song.

When we finished the track, I decided that I already loved it the way it was, but wanted something more on it, and I couldn’t figure out what..something was telling me to message Joakim Karlsson from Bad Omens because I knew he did post-production and I loved his work on other tracks I’ve heard as well, so  I decided I wanted him to mix and master the song as well and within days, Siren was everything I envisioned it to be in my head and I was thrilled, but also saddened that the writing process of that EP was over, and I still wanted to work on more music right away.

A few weeks after that, Joakim sent me a bunch of other tracks he wrote and asked if I was interested in working on more music together I decided then and there that I wanted to collaborate on an album with him, and that’s when the birth of “War On My Soul” happened. The writing process was very lengthy, and it took a lot of texting things back and forth to each other, me deleting lyrics and writing new ones, him rewriting them to word them better, me coming up with some of the verse melodies, him writing all the choruses and sending me the songs sung by him so that I could copy his voice. I am not super great at writing choruses, I feel like mine all tend to sound the same, so it was wonderful to have someone who is great at it. 

I recorded all the songs with my main producer Randy Pasquarella (Pasquarella Recordings) who I’ve been working with since 2014 and have been so comfortable with, also the same producer who records, produces, mixes, and masters all my covers, and he was helping me to not be too hard on myself when I didn’t feel like I delivered enough for what the songs are worth, every time I was frustrated when I didn’t meet my own standards, and no matter how many times anyone told me I did a great job on vocal parts, I didn’t believe them.

The pandemic did have a huge part on the writing process, I wrote all of those lyrics during the Fall of 2020, I am empathetic and intuitive, so I had a lot of feelings throughout that time that I was trying to block out least feel like I was regaining sanity after an insane past 10 years. 

5. You've done several music videos for songs you've recorded like "Holy Misery" and "Bring Me to Life." Can you tell me about the filming process? Do you have a favorite video so far? 

The filming process is always me acting out dreams that I’ve had, especially daydreams (I have ADHD, so I do a lot of that!) I’d like to say they’re me in past lives, me in different universes, everything I’m actually dealing with in this life, and the future. 

6. Historically the music industry, especially rock and metal has been male-dominated. What has your experience been as a female artist? Do you feel like women struggle to build a fanbase more in these genres than others? 

My experience was extremely hard at first, there was a lot I could never admit to people..as a teenager I met so many terrifying energies and narcissists, I was getting taken advantage of by higher-up people, and I was promised things that never saw the light of day, my music and art were being stolen, and because society was conditioned to villainize women, that’s what I appeared to be, the world is a strange place and I’ll never understand it. I do feel like it is harder for a female artist to build a fanbase.

7. You are releasing a new single "High Priestess" on June 2nd. The song is a ballad discussing spiritual awakening. Can you tell me about writing the song and how it came together? You sing it in a higher key using your head voice, did you set out to do that purposefully? 

I wrote this song about being done with dealing with false advertisements and trickery of other individuals, it just feels like lower vibrations trying to drag you under with them, I hate all of that, I hate judgments, I love to live at my own accord and create my own faith as the best version of myself I could possibly be, and then, on the other hand, you are at war with yourself, because it’s your own mind that is judging and deceiving you, this is about doing everything you can to silence those voices and call back your power, I sang the song in a higher key because it represented all the different voices and versions of yourself coming together. 

8. What impact do you think social media and platforms like Instagram have had on your career? Do you feel they've helped or made things more difficult? 

I have never used Instagram as a real career move, besides when I post videos, I’m just posting them, because I like those photos and I want to share them, and now I don’t really share them anymore because I’m off technology less.

9. What can readers expect to see from you next? What else would you like them to know about you?

I usually just take it as it comes. Nothing much else.