Photo by the artist
“All I do these days is sit and stare,” opens indie soul singer-songwriter Jill McCracken on her latest single, “Get It Right,” out today. Her smoky vocals are accompanied by acoustic guitar and hand claps, and soon loops into the chorus of, “How can I get it right? Get it right? Get it right?” It’s a question — or a statement — that most of us are faced with almost daily, but it feels especially prescient in 2020.
McCracken wrote “Get It Right” early in quarantine and kept developing it as spring melted into summer. What started as a love song grew into a single with layered meanings. “I intended this song to be about a relationship,” McCracken says. “When you’ve found this person and this wonderful relationship where you know you want to be with them forever, but you keep getting stuck in the same arguments over and over again.” But the effect of her singing about running laps feels reminiscent of just about any task you try to accomplish in 2020; we’re running in circles and getting nowhere. Nevertheless, there’s an optimism and determination set forth by the chorus of “Get It Right.”
“Get it right” was also McCracken’s mantra while she was home recording for the first time. On this track, she performs everything, from harmonizing with her own vocals, to guitar, bass, and percussion. “I’m notoriously not a person who has a love of learning,” she laughs. “It was very stressful. I missed my band, I missed producer. But YouTube academy is very helpful… I kept pushing myself.” With every additional vocal layer or percussive beat, she became more interested and curious about the process. “It got to the point where I was hunting around the house to find something to use as a bass drum sound.”
She decided to embrace the DIY approach in the single’s music video too. With the aesthetic of a 1970s home video, she comprised what she calls “little diary scraps” of her pandemic bike travels and other intimate moments. Like other good quarantine moments, it’s something best performed (and watched) in jammies.
Listen to “Get It Right” in the music video below: