A junior English Writing and Rhetoric major, Jana Horn is also the front woman of Reservations, a band which started out as her solo project in our dorm room during freshman year. She’s come a long way from self-releasing an EP which she recorded solely with the use of her MacBook Pro. In those early days, she recalls, “[she’d] hit [her] fists against the laptop to make a percussion noise.”
These days, Horn (along with bandmates Paul Price and Jason Baczynski) have graduated to a studio and says Reservations is finishing up its yet-to-be-titled debut album. If the success of their self titled 2013 EP is any indication of things to come, the new album (due out sometime this year) will be a hit. Voted “Best New Local Act” by Austin American Statesman’s music team and featured on KUTX FM’s “Austin Music Minute,” Reservations is making a name for itself in the Live Music Capital of the World. When I asked her about how garnering such positive attention feels, she laughed, popped a Cadbury Finger in her mouth, and recalled, “The moment I knew I was doing something right was when I was recognized by someone who had seen our show the night before while I was shopping at the HEB on Riverside.”
Despite her growing local notoriety, Horn remembers where she came from. The middle child of three, she began playing guitar with her older brother, Shawn, when she was sixteen. The two would perform under the moniker The Tailor and Marie in their hometown, Granbury, Texas. Her parents travel to most of the band’s Austin shows and she says they’re “super supportive, even though [her] mom wishes the music wasn’t so ‘depressing.’”
As for her band’s musical influences, Horn cites Sharon Van Etten and The Cranberries, among others and gushes that Leonard Cohen is her “lyrical idol.” Still, it’s near impossible for her to classify Reservations’ music, but she explains they are consistently compared to Mazzy Star.
Though it is a ways off, in ten years’ time, Horn says she hopes to still be playing music. “It’s harder as a woman to play [professionally] as you age, though I see myself pursuing some sense of artistry.” If all else fails, she can most definitely fall back on her education on the hilltop. “I tried to major in Being a Rockstar, but [St. Edward’s University] just [doesn’t] offer it.” she quips. “Eventually,” she continues, “I’d like to be a professor of English. I’d love to teach a fiction workshop.”
Whatever she does with her life, I have no doubt that she will do it with effortless thriftshop style, grace, and a sense of humor.
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