Hear Paris Jackson, daughter of Michael Jackson, channel grunge’s glory days on new single, bandaid

Paris Jackson may be best-known to the general public as the daughter of late pop icon Michael Jackson, but she’s also a singer, songwriter, and guitarist in her own right.

She has a full-length album – 2020’s Wilted – and an EP, 2022’s the lost ep, under her belt already, with a handful of recent singles, to boot. 

Those more recent tunes – 2022’s lighthouse (opens in new tab) and just you (opens in new tab) – showed Jackson taking her music in a decidedly more grunge-y direction, an artistic shift the LA native especially leans into on the newest of her singles, bandaid.

Though it definitely has its own flavor, bandaid – which you can hear below – certainly owes a debt to Nirvana, the opening verse especially. 

“This is the type of music I used to dream of making myself when I was 14 discovering Nirvana and Pixies for the first time,” Jackson said of bandaid in a statement (opens in new tab). 

“Lyrically it’s the most raw and vulnerable I’ve ever been in any of my songs. It’s the first track I’ve truly let loose and yelled on in the studio, which you can hear in the third chorus, and I feel like that’s why it had to be the title track for my next record.

“I’m grateful to have also started producing, and Simon Oscroft has been the perfect partner to do that with after having learned everything I know from Andy [Hull] and Rob[ert McDowell, both of Manchester Orchestra] in the studio previously,” she went on.

“I’m also deeply honored by my good friend Anthony Salazar who, when I said, ‘hit those drums harder than Tommy Lee on [Mötley Crüe’s] Wild Side, did just that. I hope there are people out there that get from it what I got from albums like I’m Wide Awake, it’s Morning by Bright Eyes, a record that truly made me feel heard and understood from the inside out.”

Jackson is currently wrapping up a run of tour dates with fellow grunge aficionados Silversun Pickups.

You can check out those dates at Silversun Pickups’ website (opens in new tab), and stream more of Jackson’s music at her Soundcloud page (opens in new tab).

*Read 5 free articles per month without a subscription

Jackson is an Associate Editor at GuitarWorld.com. He’s been writing and editing stories about new gear, technique and guitar-driven music both old and new since 2014, and has also written extensively on the same topics for Guitar Player (opens in new tab). Elsewhere, his album reviews and essays have appeared in Louder (opens in new tab) and Unrecorded (opens in new tab). Though open to music of all kinds, his greatest love has always been indie, and everything that falls under its massive umbrella. To that end, you can find him on Twitter crowing about whatever great new guitar band you need to drop everything to hear right now.