Track of the week. Hailing from South-East London is acclaimed singer, songwriter and producer Kai Kwasi. Already a critic’s favourite, this rising artist creates a captivating sound that fuses essences of R&B, grime and soul with dark pop.
New single ‘Jugular’ was co-written alongside Dom Valentino, and presents listeners with a gorgeously arresting and atmospheric piece of music.
“‘Jugular’ is one of the first tracks I wrote outside of my own bedroom – making music had been a really insular practice up until then. I was itching to work with other musicians, but had to get over this kinda barrier of learning to write and perform in front of people, which is kinda like learning to be vulnerable out loud. I was at Dom Valentino’s old bedroom studio in Brockley and he made it feel really easy to get out of my head and take the session in whichever direction I wanted. This was the winter after Lockdown, a lot going on internally and externally sometimes you kinda get numb to it. It starts off quite heavy and dark and I wanted to lose some of that cynicism by the end. I think pessimism is symptomatic of things being shit, it’s a feeling that’s easy to arrive at and hard to shake off. Sometimes I need a person or a practice to drag me out of that and at that time music became that for me. I think the second verse is a reflection of that.”
To date, Kwasi has garnered praise from tastemakers as noted as The Line of Best Fit, Sunday Times Culture and NME, while also achieving airplay from national stations like BBC Radio 1 and 6Music.
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