There is a quiet confidence to Jake Isaac that feels increasingly rare. While much of modern music races to keep pace with algorithms, attention spans and endless online noise, Isaac is moving in the opposite direction. He speaks slowly, thoughtfully, choosing each word with the same care that has come to define his songwriting. Success, for him, has never been about shouting the loudest. It has always been about saying something worth listening to.
His previous album, BENJAMIN, was an intimate exploration of identity, fatherhood, faith and belonging, a record that invited listeners into the most personal corners of his life. But as he begins a new chapter with When The World’s On Fire, his gaze has shifted. The questions are no longer solely about who he is. They are about who we are becoming.
It is impossible to ignore the world surrounding this conversation. Political division, technological disruption, the rise of artificial intelligence and a growing sense of human disconnection all hang quietly in the background. Yet Isaac refuses to respond with cynicism. Instead, he offers something increasingly uncommon: tenderness. Where others amplify outrage, he searches for empathy. Where fear dominates the headlines, he speaks about hope, community and the simple act of choosing one another.
Throughout our conversation, faith emerges not as dogma but as a framework for understanding humanity. Family remains his compass, while music becomes less a vehicle for self-expression than an act of service. He speaks passionately about protecting creativity from becoming another victim of algorithms, arguing that the true power of a song lies not in its performance metrics but in the lived experience behind it. In an age where AI can imitate almost anything, he believes authentic human connection has become our most valuable currency.
Perhaps that is what makes Jake Isaac such a compelling artist today. He is not interested in offering easy answers or writing protest songs that simply add to the noise. Instead, he wants his music to become what he calls a “spiritual antidote”—songs that acknowledge darkness without surrendering to it, reminding listeners that hope is not the absence of struggle but the decision to keep loving through it.
As When The World’s On Fire arrives, Jake Isaac isn’t simply releasing another single. He’s offering a quiet invitation to pause, reconnect and remember what makes us human.
Jake, BENJAMIN felt like a record about looking inward and understanding yourself more deeply. With “When The World’s On Fire”, you seem to be looking outward at the world around you. Has something shifted in what you feel your responsibility is as a songwriter?
I think so, yeah. BENJAMIN was definitely a record where I was looking inward. It was me trying to understand where I’d come from, my family, my faith, fatherhood, identity, all of that stuff.
But I think naturally, once you’ve done some of that work internally, you start lifting your head up and looking around, and honestly, I just couldn’t ignore what I was feeling.
I’ve always believed songs can do more than simply document where we are. They can help us imagine where we could be. So, with this new music, I’ve definitely felt more of a responsibility to ask, “What am I putting into the world?”
I don’t necessarily want to tell people what to think. I’m not sure that’s my job, but I do want to make music that reminds us of what it means to be human, particularly at a time when that feels increasingly important.
You’ve described your recent writing as almost a “spiritual antidote” to what feels like a challenging moment in history. When did you begin feeling that simply documenting your own life wasn’t enough, and that you wanted the music to offer something back?
I don’t know if there was one specific moment. It was probably more of a gradual realisation.
I love songwriting as a way of processing life, and I think I’ll always do that. But at some point, I started asking myself, “Once I’ve processed this thing, what am I actually giving to somebody else?”
Because songs have done that for me. I’ve had records meet me in moments where I needed hope, perspective, comfort, faith, sometimes just somebody else articulating what I couldn’t articulate myself.
So I started thinking about this idea of music being almost a spiritual antidote. Not pretending everything’s alright, because clearly it isn’t, but creating something that can enter into the reality of where we are and still carry hope. That has become really important to me.
There’s an interesting contradiction in “When The World’s On Fire”: the title sounds apocalyptic, yet the song itself is ultimately hopeful. Why did you want to respond to uncertainty with tenderness rather than anger?
Because I think we’ve got enough shouting. Ha!
There’s obviously a place for anger. Anger can be righteous, and it can reveal that something matters deeply to us. But I think underneath a lot of anger is actually fear, grief, disappointment, loneliness, all these much more vulnerable emotions, and I wanted to get underneath the noise.
The title “When The World’s On Fire” is deliberately dramatic because sometimes that’s genuinely what life feels like. You look around and think, “What on earth is happening?” But my instinct in that moment isn’t to add more fire. It’s to find the person I love, hold them a little closer and remember what actually matters.
There’s something quietly rebellious about tenderness at the moment. Choosing love, choosing community, choosing hope. I think those things are far more powerful than we sometimes give them credit for.
You’ve said it would be foolish not to acknowledge the “temperature of the world” right now. When you look at the world in 2026, what genuinely concerns you most?
Disconnection.
There are obviously huge things happening geopolitically, economically and technologically, and I don’t want to minimise any of those. But underneath so much of it, I think I’m concerned about our ability to genuinely see one another.
We’ve become very good at reducing people to positions, opinions, profiles, demographics, avatars. And once somebody becomes an idea rather than a human being, it’s much easier to dismiss them. I worry about how quickly we can lose empathy.
Because I think most people, when you actually sit across a table from them, share food with them, hear about their kids, their fears, their hopes, suddenly the categories become much less useful.
I think we desperately need to recover the art of seeing the human being in front of us.
You specifically talk about championing human contact and human emotion “in the time of AI”. As someone whose music is rooted in lived experience and human connection, what worries you about the direction technology is taking creativity, and do you think we risk becoming more connected digitally but less connected emotionally?
Technology itself doesn’t scare me. Humans have always invented tools, and some of those tools have unlocked incredible creativity. What concerns me is when convenience starts replacing connection.
AI can imitate so many of the external characteristics of creativity now, and that’s only going to increase. But for me, the beautiful thing about music has never just been whether something sounds good. It’s knowing that another human being lived something, felt something and somehow turned that experience into a song.
There’s something sacred about that exchange and, yeah, I think there’s absolutely a danger that we become incredibly connected digitally while becoming increasingly disconnected emotionally.
That’s why I’m probably more interested than ever in rooms. Gigs. Dinner tables. Studios. Actual faces. Actual conversations. I think human contact is going to become increasingly precious.
One of the central ideas in the song is that individualism can only take us so far and ultimately we need one another. Has there been a moment in your own life when you realised that trying to carry everything alone simply wasn’t working?
Loads of times! Ha! I’m naturally quite driven. If there’s a problem, my instinct is usually, “Cool, let’s fix it.” And that can be useful until you realise there are certain things in life you simply cannot muscle your way through.
Marriage has taught me that. Fatherhood has definitely taught me that, and faith has probably taught me that more than anything.
There have been seasons where I’ve realised that independence can look like strength while actually being quite isolating. I don’t think we’re designed to carry everything ourselves.
There’s a humility involved in saying, “I need you.” Whether that’s to God, your wife, your family, your mates, your community. And strangely, I’ve found there’s much more strength there than there ever was in pretending I could do everything alone.
You grew up around faith, gospel and a father whose life has been deeply connected to community and service. As you’ve grown older, have you come to understand your father and the values you inherited from him differently?
Massively. When you’re young, your parents are just your parents. You don’t necessarily understand the cost attached to the choices they’ve made.
As I’ve got older, particularly becoming a husband and a father, I’ve understood my dad differently.
I’ve realised that so much of what I inherited wasn’t necessarily taught to me through sermons. I watched it. I watched service. I watched generosity. I watched faithfulness. I watched somebody keep showing up for me and others, and I understand the cost of that much more now.
There are obviously things I’ve had to discover for myself and ways I’ve had to make my faith my own. But I’m increasingly grateful for the shoulders I’m standing on.
BENJAMIN saw you become much more open about your spirituality, family and identity. Once you make a record that reveals that much of yourself, is it possible to go back to writing from behind a wall?
I don’t think I can. Which is slightly inconvenient! Ha!
Because once you’ve experienced the freedom of actually telling the truth in your music, it’s difficult to go back to hiding behind clever songwriting.
That’s not to say every song needs to be autobiographical or incredibly vulnerable. I love imagination. I love storytelling. I love just writing a tune. But BENJAMIN probably taught me that the closer I get to what’s genuinely true for me, the more chance the song has of connecting with something true in somebody else.
So, yeah, I think the wall’s probably got a fairly big hole in it now.
Earlier in your career, you worked in record-label marketing, so you’ve experienced an industry where numbers can dictate creative decisions. In an industry now dominated by algorithms, virality and short-form attention, is it harder than ever to resist chasing numbers and protect what actually matters to you creatively?
Yeah, massively. And I understand it from both sides because I’ve literally sat on the other side of the desk.
Numbers are useful. Data can tell you things. I’m not anti any of that. The danger is when the numbers stop informing you and start leading you, because then suddenly you’re not making the song you believe in; you’re making the song you think might perform.
You’re thinking about the first seven seconds before you’ve even thought about whether the chorus means anything, and that’s a pretty miserable place to create from.
I’m increasingly trying to ask myself, “Would I still be proud of this if nobody heard it?” Because, weirdly, I think when you make something from that place, you’ve actually got a better chance of making something people genuinely connect with.
What does success actually look like to Jake Isaac today when you remove streams, followers, chart positions and industry validation from the equation?
Peace. Honestly, that’s probably the simplest answer.
Can I make music I believe in? Can I love my wife and kids well? Can I be present? Can I remain curious and excited about creating? Can I go to sleep knowing that I haven’t had to become somebody else in order to sustain a career?
Of course, I want the records to travel. I’m ambitious. I’d be lying if I pretended I didn’t care whether anybody listened! Ha!
But I don’t want success publicly at the expense of failure privately.
So these days, success looks much more holistic to me. It’s not just, “How big did the thing become?” It’s, “Who did I become while building it?”
Aaron Childs feels particularly well matched to this record. You share musical family backgrounds, soul influences and an admiration for Bill Withers. Beyond those musical connections, what did you recognise in Aaron that made you trust him with a song carrying such a personal message?
There was just a humanity to Aaron that I really connected with. Obviously, musically, it makes loads of sense. There’s the shared love of soul music, the musical family backgrounds, Bill Withers, all of that.
But more than that, Aaron understands restraint.
This song didn’t need somebody to come in and prove how incredible they were. It needed somebody who understood the heart of it and could inhabit that space.
There’s a generosity in the way Aaron makes music. He listens. And I think that’s actually quite a rare quality.
When somebody understands that the song is the most important person in the room, you trust them very quickly.
Aaron described the song as having a “quiet urgency”. That feels almost countercultural at a time when everything is fighting for our attention. Do you still believe music can profoundly affect somebody without shouting at them?
Absolutely, maybe more than ever. We’re surrounded by things screaming for our attention. Bigger headline. Faster edit. Louder opinion. More content.
So I think quietness has actually become quite powerful. Some of the records that have affected me most deeply haven’t demanded anything from me. They’ve almost whispered something and then left me alone with it.
Bill Withers was incredible at that. There wasn’t loads of decoration. There was truth, groove, humanity and space. I think people are hungry for that.
“When The World’s On Fire” was written and produced entirely by you. Does having complete creative control make you feel freer, or does it actually make you more ruthless with yourself because there’s nobody else to hide behind?
Both! It’s incredibly freeing because I can follow an instinct without having to explain it to anybody.
But, yeah, there’s nowhere to hide.
If the lyric isn’t good enough, that’s me. If the production isn’t working, that’s me. If I’ve overcooked it, also me! Ha!
You’ve already experienced milestones many artists spend their careers chasing, from Glastonbury to being championed by Elton John and collaborating with remarkable musicians. At this stage of your career, has longevity become more interesting to you than ambition?
Definitely. I’m still ambitious. There are still rooms I’d love to play and people I’d love to make music with. I don’t think ambition is necessarily a bad thing, but longevity fascinates me now.
I look at artists who’ve made meaningful work across decades, and I’m far more interested in that than having one enormous moment.
I’ve been incredibly fortunate. Glastonbury, Elton supporting the music, travelling the world, making records with ridiculous musicians. Younger Jake would probably lose his mind at some of the things that have happened.
But I don’t feel finished.
The song ultimately asks us to hold onto one another when everything around us feels uncertain. When the world really does feel like it’s on fire, what keeps Jake Isaac hopeful?
Jesus.
That’s probably the most honest answer I can give.
Not religion as an escape from what’s happening in the world, but genuinely the person of Jesus and the way He teaches me to see people, suffering, hope, love and eternity.
And then my family. My wife. My kids. My community. Sitting around a table with people I love. Hearing somebody laugh. Watching my children discover something for the first time. Being in a room full of people eating together. Those things remind me that darkness is never the whole story.
Hope for me isn’t pretending the world isn’t on fire. It’s believing that even when it is, love is still worth choosing. Faith is still worth holding onto. People are still worth fighting for.
Photo credits: CHARLIE THORNTON
