What’s Next: More Music, Less Hesitation
SAINt JHN, born Carlos St. John Phillips, is a multifaceted music star, songwriter, and creative powerhouse who has taken the global music scene by storm. Hailing from Brooklyn, New York, with strong ties to his Guyanese heritage, he brings a unique blend of hip-hop, R&B, and melodic storytelling to the table. His rise to fame was anything but overnight, however. Before stepping into the spotlight as a solo artist, SAINt JHn spent years writing songs for chart-topping artists like Usher and Kiesza. His breakout single, “Roses,” originally released in 2016, catapulted him to international fame after a 2019 remix by Kazakh producer Imanbek went viral, earning him a Grammy Award and billions of streams worldwide.
What further sets SAINt JHN apart from his peers is his genre-defying sound and magnetic stage presence. His albums, including Collection One and While the World Was Burning, showcase his ability to seamlessly blend gritty street narratives with introspective lyrics and infectious hooks. Beyond music, he has made waves in the fashion world, collaborating with brands like Gucci and establishing himself as a style icon. SAINt JHN’s career is a testament to perseverance, innovation, and authenticity, cementing his status as a global star with a lasting cultural impact. Whether he’s headlining music festivals or collaborating with industry heavyweights such as Lenny Kravitz, Kehlani, and Beyonce, SAINt JHn continues to redefine what it means to be an artist in the modern era.
As he prepares to release his first album in over four years, titled Festival Season, House of Solo sat down with SAINt JHN following his digital cover photoshoot to learn more about the release, why it’s taken so long, and the hefty amount of material he plans to release soon after.
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Festival Season is about to drop. How are you feeling?
I’m excited. I’m ready to see how people react to the music that is put out. Genuinely excited. I want to see how people engage with it. There’ll be a first wave of listening as people who just listen to it at home and in their cars and a place that’s normal for them. And then there’ll be people who discover it in environments that are unfamiliar to them or unexpected. Like imagine being in the gym and you hear something come on in the gym, you’d be like, ‘Oh, I need that.’ Or maybe a live setting where somebody is spinning music and you’re like, ‘What’s that?’ That’s ignorant. I love it. So I wanna see the people who get introduced to it from different mediums and how they react. I got my own creeping suspicions. I know how it’s gonna work, but I’m really excited. I’m ready.
It’s your first studio album in nearly years. Why the long wait?
Well, truthfully, I wanted it to be out a little bit sooner, but I uprooted my life twice. I moved from LA to Miami, and from Miami to Puerto Rico. That happened within the space of like 18 months. And I changed my business structure, so it took some time for me to restructure my art business the way that I wanted and reorganise my life while creating all the music that I wanted. I live out my art in real life. So if my life is in shambles, so is my art. I’d like to be able to be alive to enjoy the things that I’ve created for myself and the people around me, so I prioritise my own personal peace. There wasn’t an opportunity to get it out sooner, but I wanted to. I’m on time. I’m always on time. The good Lord told me so.
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You explained that you’ve never written from this perspective until this album. Why was there a slight shift during the writing process?
Because of what I experienced living in Puerto Rico, hearing music that was so vibrant, so loud, so motion-based. When I say motion, everything made you move. I always created music from the perspective of what made me feel, never what made me move. I never made songs that you could hear in any setting outside of your home that really made you move. You had an emotional response. And I love the emotional capacity and the emotional component, but I want movement. I wanna see people sprint. I wanna see people run. I wanna see people jump. I want action. So I’m going from a romance film to an action movie. And there might be some resistance to that, but you’re just gonna have to let me direct this. And you’re just gonna have to watch the whole thing.
The title is Festival Season. Did you have your live shows to come in mind while making it?
Every time I’ve come off a tour and gone into making music, I learned something new, but I always learned it after I’d been on tour. I wish I’d learned it before going on tour, then I could have implemented what I learned into my art. This time, I had such a significant period to execute the things that I’ve learned in prior years. I’m looking at the next 10 years, and this is a part of it. I live on a stage, and truth, I went from making music in a bedroom to a living room, and now I operate from a stage. That’s my platform. That’s where I communicate my truth. So now I think about where I’m making it from and how I want it to impact. When you make it from your bedroom to another person listening in their bedroom, it feels solitary. It feels one-on-one. It feels like I’m just whispering in someone’s ear, whatever my demons and challenges are. But now I’m operating from a stage, it’s gonna be louder. It’s gonna be a little bit more brash. It’ll be sharper. And there’ll be more than just you and I. Now there’s us. So this festival season is designed with us in mind. I’ve never designed from that perspective before.
You have already been announced for Coachella. Is that going to be the first time playing that festival?
My first time! I’m ready, emotionally and creatively. I’m still putting together what the show is gonna be, I got more work to do, but I’ll be ready. I’ll be on time and I’ll execute. And because this is an enormous platform, I’ve done Lollapalooza and Splash and I’ve done a ton of the festivals like Rolling Loud, but because I haven’t released a full collection in four years, this gets to be a statement. It’s time to make the big statements.
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You’ve described Festival Season as your most extroverted body of work. How so?
It’s louder. I’m not being subtle. It’s not just harmonious, it’s disruptive. Previously, my music has always been harmonious. It’s been really simple to listen to and enjoyable. Now your feathers are gonna be ruffled. Now you’re either gonna hear it and it’s not gonna seamlessly fit into your life unless you live an active life. So for the people who wanna lay back, they’re gonna have to sit up. And the people who are already sitting up, they’re gonna have to stand up. And the people who are already standing up, they’re gonna have to walk fast. And the people who are walking fast, they’re gonna start running. You see the trajectory and emotion. That’s what I want. That’s my desire. Festival Season is designed for you to leave the comforts of wherever you already are. It’s experiential. It’s almost like a musical. I don’t wanna implant this in people’s heads, but it’s theatre to some degree because cinema is recorded. And theatre is live. So Festival Season feels like a pocket performance. When you play from top to bottom, it feels like my live show. I try not to overcomplicate it by giving people the full length and breadth of it, but it’s my setlist. You’re listening to this live performance in your ear that’s designed for you to consume and take it with you. But when you show up and see it in person, it’ll be in four dimensions.
You’re known for your big-name collaborations, from Beyonce and Kehlani to Future and Lenny Kravitz. This album does not feature any collaborations. Was that a cautious decision?
That was intentional. It’s just me. I want to get back where I started. No distractions. It’s just me on that stage. Music is an art sport for me. It’s a creative sport. And basketball, they play five on five, and in football, they play 11 on 11. In music, it’s one in a hundred thousand. I’m okay. I can deal with the pressure. I’ve always dealt with the pressure.
This album is coming in two instalments. The next one is titled Fake Tears From A Pop Star. Fans expected you to drop that project first. Why did you decide to put that release on hold for now?
This needed to be expressed first. They needed to get the full length and breadth, and I needed to come from a disruptive place. I know people are bothered and could feel something. Feel displaced, feel uncomfortable, feel unsettled. That’s how I felt.
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How would you say that project differs from Festival Season?
Extroverted versus introverted. It’s a completion of a human being. We try to think of people in pockets. We put people in small corridors. All of us are mothers and daughters, sons and sisters, husbands, cousins and aunts, lovers and friends, fuck boys and popoffs. We’re all multiple things. None of us are one thing. And whenever someone introduces you to themselves, you tend to take them as whatever they said they were like they can’t be multidimensional. When you listen to Festival Season and Fake Tears From A Pop Star, you get the completion of somebody’s humanity. You get this extroverted version of me and this introverted version of me because they both exist. On stage, I’m gonna give you my whole truth. And when I’m at home, I’m gonna go through my sadness in a solitary way.
Are you planning on releasing both this year?
Absolutely. That’s the point.
I was watching an interview from about four years ago where you admitted you hadn’t found the time to soak in all your success yet. Have you had that moment yet?
At this point, yeah. That’s why I’m so intentional with Festival Season and Fake Tears From A Pop Star not having any features. I think I clouded the purity of my vision. Some of those features are valuable but I can’t undo it. You only get to live one version of the future. Everything else is some shit you speculate on. Regret is distasteful because you made a choice, so I’m living in the choices that I’ve made. But when I look at what I’ve created, I would’ve wanted to be more narrow. Not narrow my creativity, but more narrowly in who I stood next to, and make it more purposeful. Some things were just for fun and other things were forever. I’d prefer to be a little bit more narrow. My choices are gonna reflect that.
SAINt JHN wears Vest Criminal Damage Coat Ami Paris Trousers Ami Paris Leather Hand Cuffs B_dodi Gloves Atsuko Kudo Shoes Gucci Necklaces Stephen Webster Rings from letft to right Capsule Eleven, Thomas Sabo, Stephen Webster, Giovanni Raspini Sunglasses Akila
Do you find it hard to live in the moment with a job that’s always onto the next thing?
Yeah, for sure. Before here [London], I was in Berlin. Before Berlin, I was in Paris. Before Paris, I was in Puerto Rico. And this has all happened over the space of maybe eight days. I can’t tell you what I did yesterday. Every day something impactful has to happen. I live at a high-intensity level of life. The altitude up here is really high. So all I can focus on is what I’m doing next, getting through this moment and heading to the next. I think that’s just the cost of the job. That’s just part of it. Yeah. The moments that I get to live in the moments are the times that I laughed the loudest. Those are my favourite moments.
And lastly, what goals have you set yourself this year?
This year, the goal is to release the collections. I realise I’ve been selfish. I’ve been really selfish. I make music all the time, I just don’t share it. I’ve been listening to nonstop SAINt JHn Collections. I’ve probably made, this is gonna sound crazy when people read this, but I’ve made eight to ten different collections over the four years that you haven’t heard from me. And because I’m so satisfied with it because I know what my work ethic is, even though I hadn’t released it, I’m like, ‘This is great. I’m good.’ But getting clarity and being transparent is telling myself, ‘I made it so I can share it with you.’ So this year, I’m likening myself to my favourite designers who released multiple collections in the same year and keep going. I’ll release at the top of the year. I’ll release in June, I’ll come back in September. The reason why I go to fashion week is because it’s so consistent, so dedicated and so diligent. And if my artistry mirrors their artistry and they deliver, why would I not deliver? Especially if I’m creating the same output. I’m gonna stop being selfish now.
