By Georgette Brookes

Jeannine Barry is a German-born UK country artist with a strong sense of who she is and what she wants from her music. With band mates, Marino Donati and Tom Gene, Barry gave the O2 Icon stage a performance that kicked off the Country 2 Country (C2C) festival weekend in style.

The Icon stage sits inside the shopping area, so artists get the additional audience of curious passers-by – and Barry got just that. It’s a tough gig – early in the day on the Friday when the festival is at its quietest – but Jeannine Barry brought in a crowd that soaked up every minute of her brilliant performance.

Performing some of her well-known songs like, ‘Strangers’, and ‘Love Just Hurts – a track that reached number 3 on the iTunes Country charts – her fans were singing all the words back to her. Throw in some unreleased music and some crowd-pleasing covers like, ‘What If I Never Get Over You’ by Lady A and ‘Things a Man Oughta Know’ by Lainey Wilson, Barry and her band delivered a great first performance of the weekend.

Jeannine Barry and I sat down with a cup of tea (which was needed in the freezing cold O2) and were fortunate enough to be joined by bandmate and friend, Marino Donati.

It was great to catch your set just now – how was that for you?

Fantastic! I’ve never played the icon stage before in that location – I’ve played it when it was somewhere else – but I really liked it. I liked the openness, and I liked being able to reach a few more people that were walking by and the sound was amazing, so it was really enjoyable.

I saw on your Instagram that you’d been to NYC and gone to an Irish bar – we did the exact same thing.

(laughing) It was a birthday gift from my boyfriend and he’s Irish and he likes the pub so! He’s been before but it was my first time and I’m not necessarily into the tourist stuff, so I left the planning up to him and I just wanted food – I’m a foodie – so that was the main thing for me. I only like cosy pubs.

Did you do any music over there or just sight-seeing?

No, it was just a trip. I wanted to see some, but we didn’t manage it.

Have you done much music in the states?

I have in the past, I’ve been to Nashville and recorded an EP there – quite a few years ago now – and I was very very connected with Americans and country music but I’ve slowed down a little the last few years. It became more and more popular over here and with C2C it was just obviously more natural for me to do more here. I connected with the people more over here – for example the Texas music takeover that happened in 2017. That was from connections I previously had. They bring over musicians from America – Texas mostly – and they bring their fans so it’s always a guaranteed sell out. It was quite cool to be playing to a full room of Americans every time and I was the only woman. It was a really cool experience.

So the band that you were with today – Marino and Tom – how long have you guys been together and how did you find each other?

J: A long time – seven years now. I was looking for someone on Gumtree. I was gigging all the time and playing C2C, so I wanted and needed a full band. When we met, I needed a bass player at that time, but it’s evolved now into a completely different relationship with music than from when he joined just as a bass player. And Tom – we needed a guitar player.

M: I think I tried to work my way up to do more stuff like I’m a bass player but maybe I could do some harmonies or play acoustic at the next gig you don’t need a bass.

J: Marino and I write, and he plays lead guitar now and I don’t even know what would happen if we were to play a full band now.

We talk about how, although four years ago, artists are still recovering from the impact of Covid. We spoke about how working remotely isn’t the same – you lose the energy from each other and the quick back-and-forth that is needed to connect with bandmates and co-writers to create organic music.

M: Well yeah, it’s been a while now since covid happened – it was such a confusing time. You couldn’t even get a band together and so everyone was just a bit like ‘well how are we going to get through this, how are we going to write songs, how are we going to do what we do?’ We had to write songs remotely…

J: I think we were also extremely hard on ourselves. I think we expected more of us which, looking back now, is unfair of us because like you say, you don’t have that energy back and you don’t have that gig lined up. I think we expected so much from ourselves, like we had all this time why couldn’t we do it? But that’s just not how it works.

J: Before Covid we were working with other musicians and song writers like Robert Leech who writes for the Wandering Hearts for example. There was a time where we were just constantly in other people’s living rooms just writing and working on new music. And we’re still finding our feet with it I’ll be honest like I feel like 2024 is the first year back properly.

M: I think also it was a scary time and people maybe had these knee jerk reactions and took to social media with their lockdown stuff and now people have calmed down and taking time to get back to what they’re doing.

Jeannine’s story isn’t the standard route into country music. Most have a parent or grandparent that listened to ‘The Greats’ or stumbled across an artist that changed their outlook on music but Jeannine’s is different.
Living in Berlin with her sister – a soul/RnB singer – Jeannine was exploring what kind of music she wanted to sing. When her sister started to work with Beyoncé’s old vocal coach, Jeannine took the opportunity to gain some professional insight into her voice.

We both went to audition and he was like ‘ooh, a country singer and a soul singer!’ and I was a bit like…what? So he kind of gave me the label. He said he had never met two sister who could sing but so differently. I wasn’t ready for that at the time, I just wanted some appreciation for my vocals. My sister was always the one that everyone liked. I just wanted my voice to have a chance.

Jeannine speaks so humbly about her journey to finding her style. She makes no apologies for the time it took and the roads she explored – including shaving half her head when she was in her rock chick era, still unwilling to accept the country in her.

It took a lot of crying and a lot of self-searching. I moved to London and worked with a producer to try and find my niche and where I fit. I wrote my own songs and we recorded five songs, just me and a guitar. I just wanted to see what my voice was like and it was a bit country so we recorded an E.P. I think that was 2012 and we just started doing all the country things. There was an event at Bush Hall and that was quite popular – and it just kind of took off from there.

Self-belief is an important part of Jeannine’s story and she was never going to lean into her country side until she believed in it herself.

When you suddenly find it and know who you are, it’s such a no brainer. I was just so resistant to something so different because it was scary to maybe not be the mainstream and not be liked forever.

Once I had made peace with it and celebrated who I was it was like – woah, I like my voice! It was never enough for people to say they liked it. It’s like when someone tells you you’re pretty but you don’t believe it – it will never mean anything.
It was so freeing. It just went from there and I wouldn’t look back. I have such a passion for country music, I love it so much. And working with Marino, it’s like more and more of my dreams are coming true. I’ve always wanted to have harmonies and harmonise with someone and it’s great to have that now.

What’s in store for the rest of 2024 for you?

We’re releasing a new single in the next few weeks. We are planning to play but can’t say much yet. Our main focus is still new music. Our dream is to get another album – a full album that we’ve written together – and I think we need a little bit more time but we’re willing to risk that. That’s the main thing you can expect from us, but we are going to be out and about.

Who are you looking forward to seeing this weekend?

We’re just going to walk around the stages – there’s a lot of names I don’t know so it’s cool to see country music and where it’s going in the UK at the moment.

Do you see what the crowds are responding to?

J: Not really, we don’t change based on the crowds – it won’t change what we’re doing.

M: I think that’s one of the things about the new music – we’re authentic. It’s such an American genre which is why it’s taken a while to take off in the UK. How authentic can you be in the UK? We’re trying to get the music, the sound, the writing and the emotion of it rather than the fake elements.

Chatting to Jeannine and Marino, it’s easy to see why their music is so enjoyable to watch. They have a great understanding and respect for each other, each bringing their own perspective and ideas. We can’t wait to see what their new music sounds like – most certainly taking Jeannine Barry to another height in her career.