Video premiere: Jen Awad, ‘On the Low’

Staff Editor on September 12th, 2019

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Jen Awad is well known for being brassy, a heart-crushing badass and one of L.A.’s most compelling soul divas. It’s a persona she’s cultivated over the past couple of years, building a reputation as a terrific live performer, belting out a setlist of catchy singles in front of her ripping band. Deep down, she is a jester, and a deeply fashionable one. She boasts and cajoles, but does so with such vulnerability that her bleeding heart soaks right through her haute couture.

It’s that bleeding heart that dominates the second single “On the Low,” off her latest EP, “Jewel of the Nile,” (a cheeky reference to her Egyptian roots). The track breaks some new ground for Awad, spotlighting her sultry ability to torch sing. The video is classic film noir, inspired by the 1946 movie “Gilda,” where Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford exchanged the unspoken passions of a loving hatred in a steamy post WWII Buenos Aires. In Awad’s version, she’s the lounge singer vying for the attention of the handsome devil (Nicholas Baker) she desires, only to be tortured by another femme fatale, Rebecca Knox (“Orange is the New Black”).

The Sam Miller-directed video is a departure from Awad’s previous film adaptations, which are hilarious, colorful and bold. Awad explained her motivations, “I wanted to take things into more of a serious direction, I wanted to make a video that wasn’t too kitsch, I wanted to do something that was aesthetically moving and simple.”

“Jewel of the Nile,” released in May, is the follow-up to last year’s “Love Is Dead” EP.

||| Watch: The video for “On the Low”