Spotlight On: IAN SWEET

ABOUT this week’s podcast guest + radio hour featured interview:

Today’s guest has been on a SHERO’S journey of losing and finding her confidence, her agency, and joy as a musician. First as a tomboy kid nicknamed Ian, then as the leader of her namesake band, IAN SWEET, singer, songwriter, guitarist Jilian Medford says she can’t recall a time when she wasn’t singing, and would regularly do so for anyone who would listen. Eventually a guitar found its way into her hands, and she immediately started writing songs, but the childhood abandon disappeared and she describes becoming more shy and insular about her creativity. Going to Berklee College of Music was the next step for Jilian and was where she started performing - first as a solo act under the name IAN in 2014, and when a band was formed, the name became IAN SWEET, and their debut Shapeshifter was released in 2016. Immediately receiving critical acclaim, the album was listed at number 33 on Stereogum's list of the "50 best albums of 2016", and IAN SWEET was also listed as one of Stereogum's Best New Bands of the year. Within a couple of years, the band dissolved, and Jilian was back on her own, releasing Crush Crusher in 2018. The pandemic release, Show Me How You Disappear arrived in 2021, her third outing as IAN SWEET and first following a mental health crisis. Now Jilian Medford is back with her most confident, fully realized album to date, Sucker: a triumphant arrival for an artist who has fought her way back to the freedom, joy, and confidence she once had as a child, now embodying the wisdom of all she has endured as a woman. We celebrate the release of Sucker and welcome Jilian Medford aka IAN SWEET as this week’s SHERO in the Spotlight. 

A condensed version of this interview is featured on the SHEROES Radio hour this week. Here’s what else you’ll hear:

New music from Jamila Woods

And we celebrate some SHERO BIRTHDAYS:

• Courtney Barnett (11/3)

• Joni Mitchell’s 80th (11/7)

• Bonnie Raitt (11/8)

• SZA (11/8)

• Pepa of Salt N Pepa (11/9)

Listen to the syndicated public radio SHEROES Radio hour, below: