Ones2Watch Home

Photo by Makayla Keasler

It’s been years since beloved indie singer-songwriter Ella Jane has put together a project of music, and for good reason. Between fulfilling a label deal, falling in love for the first time, ending the long-term relationship, and embracing her lesbian identity, there was a plethora of life to be lived in order for Sparkwheel to piece itself together. Inspired by the mechanism on a lighter that strikes the flame, she learned what it’s like to take life by the reins. The one thing that stayed consistent through it all was sitting down at the piano and writing lyrics so timeless and classic they feel like they’ve always existed. Today, she presents seven new tracks to the world, including the Carole King inspired gut-punch “We Were Just Dancing” and highly anticipated soft-pop smash “You’re So Good.” We chatted about Ella’s path to producing her own music, the timeline that allowed these songs to find a home with one another, and of course, her OnesToWatch: 

OnesToWatch: Three of these songs came out last year. Which makes me wonder, when did you start working towards putting them on an EP? 

Ella Jane: It was an unconventional release situation. This whole project spans an entire relationship and so many things happened during that time. I fulfilled my label deal, I parted ways with my manager. When I put out “What Are You Doing Here?” in 2024 and then “Seattle in 2025, I thought everything was gonna come rolling in. But, it just didn’t. I didn't get any funding and it took me a while to figure out my management situation. So I was like, “I'm just gonna keep putting out this music and hopefully things will come together.” I'm happy that things turned out the way they did because there were ways in which these songs all tied together and the new songs that I would write later added a lot that I didn't realize at the time. 

You can never see it in the moment, but you have to trust it’ll all work out.  

When I was putting out the earlier songs, I had no idea that I was going to end my relationship and come out as a lesbian, things that would directly impact the songs that ended up being on the EP. So, in a way, I'm glad that things took a while to come together. 

How did you marry the songs that were written before all those life changes to the ones now? How do you feel they complement each other? 

“10-Blade” and “When I Was Beautiful” were made with my primary collaborator, Mike Irish, who I'd worked with for many years. But, in the middle of the single release process, he moved to Berlin. So, I ended up producing “Seattle” on my own. It was a really cool experience and made me fall in love with production. I tried iterations of that song with a couple different people and ended up being like, “I have to do it myself.” It was a turning point. Although the rest of the tracks I made with a producer that I really love, Kevin Farzad, I feel like they don't sound like they were made by entirely different people. Developing a stronger sense of what I wanted, production-wise, allowed these songs to fit together. 

I love that you were pushed to learn the technical side. We need more female producers!

We do. I was talking to a friend about this not long ago, about how I’ve done hundreds of sessions with strangers and I have literally only worked with 3 female producers. It’s bonkers. 

I love the name of the EP, I never thought about what that part of the lighter is called. [Laughs]

I read it in a book once and have always loved the word. 

How did you decide it would be the title? 

The word sparkwheel was written down in my notes for a really long time. I just love how it feels. 

I’ve noticed, you love words and keeping lists. 

I love words. My notes app is full of words from conversations or books or movies. And because my memory is so bad, something that happens a lot is a word will appear over and over without me realizing it. I used it first in the song “10-Blade,” which is about my first time falling in love and realizing you have to be proactive to make things happen in your life. 

For a song like “We Were Just Dancing,” how much did you produce something so intimate? It feels like we’re just sitting in a room with you and a piano. 

I don't want to say I did very little to the song because a huge part of it is the piano arrangement, but I did take a backseat for the production. It came together really naturally. I actually started it with Jason Vance Harris, then he literally got a call from beabadoobee’s team and they were like, “You have to go to England and do this album tomorrow.” At that point, I had done some sessions with Kevin, my new producer. He mentioned to his manager, “I’m seeing the song that Ella's been posting. I'd really love to produce it. We, once again, got it done in a really short amount of time. He totally got the vision. We brought on Yeemz – who’s amazing if you don’t know her – to play cello. It was the moment that cemented that Kevin and I work very well together. I like when you have similar instincts to someone, but they’re also able to do things that you wouldn't think of.

The lyric in “Guard Dog”: The only thing that's gonna fuck this up / Is if you love me like I'm gonna leave. To me, this is a classic lyric. When do you write lyrics like that? Alone or in the studio with your collaborators? 

I get very curmudgeonly about co-writing. For “Guard Dog,” I really loved the bones of what I had but I knew that it wasn't quite right yet. Life experience just started telling me what I wanted, or needed, to write. It was just really true to what was happening in my life, in a relationship with someone who was going through a lot mentally. They were afraid of showing me that they were suffering and I thought, “The only way that you could actually make me leave is if you continue to not be honest with me about what you're going through.” 

That’s such a beautiful sentiment. 

I get overly concerned about being cheesy. Even the melody itself. So, it’s nice to hear you say that it feels classic. 

When do you feel like the music starts to belong to the listener and is out of your hands? On release day? 

I listen to the demos over and over obsessively, but once there’s nothing left for me to obsess over and it comes out, I never touch it again. I posted an early snippet of “We Were Just Dancing” before I had even finished writing the song and got so many comments expressing excitement for the song. The writing process was still deeply just for me and I don't ever write for other people, but it was nice to share the process. 

It’s great to have something that you're excited enough about to share the early stages with the world.

It had been a really long time since I felt that. It was cool. 

Piano is everywhere in this EP. Was that conscious or is just your instrument of choice? 

I've been playing piano since I was four. It’s funny, for years that I've been saying, “The next album's a pop album.” Which, right now is actually kind of true. At this point in my life, I like more synth-pop, new wave music. So when I sit down to write, I expect that to happen and what pops out every single time is a Sarah Bareilles song. [Laughs] My dad plays the jazz piano and I’m literally named after Ella Fitzgerald, so I grew up with piano just being everywhere. No matter what I set out to write, even if I don’t have a lyrical idea, if I'm feeling something and want to get it out of my body, all I'm doing is sitting at the piano. 

“There’s No Sign Of Me (Anywhere)” and “We Were Just Dancing” have that same quality. Were they written close to each other? 

Actually, no. They were 2 years apart. “There’s No Sign Of Me (Anywhere)” is about a friendship breakup. 

The final track, “You’re So Good” is a needed breath of fresh air. Was that the last song you wrote? It’s the perfect bookend. 

I love that it’s last. I knew I either wanted it to be the opener or the closer, because it feels like a thesis. All of these songs, musically and even conceptually, relate to how I process my emotions, the chronic people pleasing thing that comes from a very young part of me that wanted love and didn't know how to get it. That feeling is all over this EP. That was another song that I wrote very quickly. I wrote it on the guitar and it sounded so different.

It feels very carefree.

Thank you. I mean, in classic me fashion, none of the lyrics are actually happy at all. [Laughs] I also tried so many versions of it and I remember standing at my old fridge, which had the best ice by the way, and all of a sudden I was just like, “Oh, this is a pop song.” And I ran over to my computer – this was really when I had just started producing – and started making this heavy synth pop sound. That cracked the code. I am kind of anxious that this song doesn't match any of the others. But, even in my ballads, I like to think that you can just tell I'm a pop writer. Even if I'm trying to write lyrics that pack complexity, I still want them to be digestible melodically and lyrically.

That's how I felt about “There's No Sign Of Me (Anywhere),” I had to pause and think about the lyrics, but they weren’t convoluted. 

I'm excited. I want this one to have a moment. 

Who are your OnesToWatch? 

One of them is my friend, Magdalene. She just put out a song called “Sexual Relations with a Wall Street Banker.” She's gonna be a big, big pop star. She was raised on early Gaga and Justin Timberlake. On a completely different note, Dove Ellis. I saw his show at Hollywood Forever a couple weeks ago. He's so Irish that I didn’t know what he was saying at any point in time. [Laughs] He has the most insane voice. 

Listen to Sparkwheel below: