The first two verses of “For We” — a new single from songwriter Vanessa Renee Jordan — spell out sacricices the tune’s protagonist made for a lover who just couldn’t do the same.
“I’ll be your forest, I’ll be your weeping willow tree,” Jordan sings. “I’ve lost my will for you. I stood still for you — don’t you forget.”
The Big Apple songwriter and singer says the song was definitely inspired by a terrible break up.
“The truth is I really wrote the song when I was still in love with him. And I wanted so badly to ignore what I knew. I wanted really badly to write a song that would let me kind of pretend like he loved me the way I loved him,” she told CL.
“So I was sitting there in love but really lonely, and it just all came out of me. This idea that so many of us, especially women, will put ourselves through hell for the idea of a ‘we,'” Jordan — who went to Spelman College — added.
“I left him like right after I wrote it, but I’m definitely happy I got the song first.”
“For We” really comes alive at the tail end of the track when Morehouse College band director Chad Hughes taps members of the horn section to lend brass. At first, the horns were synthesized, but Jordan knew she needed them to be real.
“After I sat and listened to the song back and I was like, ‘No, It’s missing something.’ I knew that I needed it to be real. I knew that it needed to be inspired by some real southern shit. So luckily I have so many friends from Morehouse, from the marching band at Morehouse. I made like one call to the band director Chad Hughes, and he was just like, ‘Yea we got you.’ That was it.”
Jordan has plans to spend a few months in London composing with her songwriting partner Ed Graves, but for now she’s shared “For We” with CL listeners. Have a listen below.
This article appears in Feb 8-15, 2018.
