Forrest Frank (of SURFACES)
Last summer, Forrest Frank found himself at a creative crossroads. The Texas native had spent the past three years steadily building momentum with his friend and collaborator Colin Padalecki and their successful duo, SURFACES, who were months away from releasing their third self-produced album, Horizons. But the Houston-born 25-year-old, who’d temporarily put the idea of making solo music on the back burner to keep building on his band’s success, craved the freedom to make music just for himself again, like he’d once done for eight hours daily in his college bedroom, classes and homework be damned. Suddenly sensing that a change of scenery was in order, Forrest gathered a group of friends and headed off to a far-flung cliffside Airbnb on the coast of northern California. They cleared the furniture out, pushed the kitchen table against the home’s floor-to-ceiling, ocean-facing windows, and set up a makeshift studio that’d be their home for the next two weeks. Over the course of the following eight days, Frank and his collaborators crafted Effortless, a breezy, impassioned project that feels fully prescient in its embrace of urgent, joyous, take-a-load-off-and-stay-a-while escapism.
Forrest’s expansive, needle-moving new project is the culmination of the ten years the producer and vocalist has put into honing his craft, from early days recording himself singing in the front seat of his car as he learned how to strengthen his voice, to his years tinkering with beats on his iPhone in his bedroom with no inkling that he’d one day be performing to sold-out rooms, collaborating with Elton John, and playing late night talk shows with a massive hit single under his belt. “I’ve always been a dreamer, but I never actually let those dreams out into the world,” Forrest says. “Making music and putting myself so out there was a huge overcoming of those nerves and fear. To see the music so well-received is mind-boggling. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to fathom that it’s hitting so hard.”
On first listen, Effortless hits with the full force of a cresting wave. It’s equal parts lyrically introspective, musically confident, and thrillingly beat-driven. Bouncy, blissed-out lead single “Never Had” pays tribute to Forrest’s influences in chillwave SoundCloud beat makers like Sam Gellaitry and Monte Booker, and Soulection rapper Smino. Other tracks hearken back to the ‘90s dance legends Quad City DJ’s, whose hits Forrest’s father used to soundtrack family dance parties in their Dallas living room. Later Effortless standouts embody the emotional and spiritual maturity that’s bloomed in Forrest in the years since his first album dropped. “Honestly, I just want my music to feel good,” he says. “I want it to make people feel encouraged, and at peace, to feel the confidence to be themselves the way music gives me the freedom to be my full, weird self.”
Forrest’s place in the music history books wasn’t always this carved in stone. After graduating college, he left Texas and accepted a job at a Seattle pharmaceutical company, but his heart wasn’t in the work, so he quit after a year to pursue music full time. “For so long, music was my secret passion,” he says. “And the way my personality works, I had to see this thing through.” Although he laughs remembering how the band was in debt at the time, within six months, SURFACES’ songs started to take off, connecting with fans around the world who found something singular in the band’s blend of genre-blurring, buoyant production and “no shirt, no shoes, no problem” energy. After only half a year of being back in Texas, Forrest moved out of his parents’ home into his own place, and the rest—sold-out club dates across America, eye-popping streaming success, Justin Bieber and Jessica Alba TikToks set to their songs—has just been history in-the-making.
Forrest says he can trace his unshakable drive back to a chance, pivotal encounter with a college acquaintance. “He found me and said, ‘Dude, whatever you’re doing, keep doing it. It’s absolutely amazing. If you need anything, hit me up. I’m a huge fan. I’m loving every minute of it.’ That changed my life, and I’ve tried to make a big effort to do the same. Anytime anyone leaves a little deposit of a dream with me, I look them in the eyes and say, ‘If you want to be the best person in the world at that, go do it. You can do it. You have everything you need to do it.’”
In 2018, Forrest released his first solo album, Warm, a nine-track record that’s filled with glimpses of lyrical and musical promise fulfilled on Effortless. With SURFACES, Forrest has released three full-length albums to date, and recently collaborated with Sir Elton John on the song “Learn To Fly.” With more SURFACES music on the way (stay tuned...), their hit song “Sunday Best” going platinum and peaking at #19 on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart, and a handful of new solo songs he’s (nearly) finished in quarantine, there’s no stopping the cresting of Forres Frank’s 2020 wave. “If the music I make physically does this to people this soon,” he says with a laugh, “I don’t know how it could ever stop here.”
Last summer, Forrest Frank found himself at a creative crossroads. The Texas native had spent the past three years steadily building momentum with his friend and collaborator Colin Padalecki and their successful duo, SURFACES, who were months away from releasing their third self-produced album, Horizons. But the Houston-born 25-year-old, who’d temporarily put the idea of making solo music on the back burner to keep building on his band’s success, craved the freedom to make music just for himself again, like he’d once done for eight hours daily in his college bedroom, classes and homework be damned. Suddenly sensing that a change of scenery was in order, Forrest gathered a group of friends and headed off to a far-flung cliffside Airbnb on the coast of northern California. They cleared the furniture out, pushed the kitchen table against the home’s floor-to-ceiling, ocean-facing windows, and set up a makeshift studio that’d be their home for the next two weeks. Over the course of the following eight days, Frank and his collaborators crafted Effortless, a breezy, impassioned project that feels fully prescient in its embrace of urgent, joyous, take-a-load-off-and-stay-a-while escapism.
Forrest’s expansive, needle-moving new project is the culmination of the ten years the producer and vocalist has put into honing his craft, from early days recording himself singing in the front seat of his car as he learned how to strengthen his voice, to his years tinkering with beats on his iPhone in his bedroom with no inkling that he’d one day be performing to sold-out rooms, collaborating with Elton John, and playing late night talk shows with a massive hit single under his belt. “I’ve always been a dreamer, but I never actually let those dreams out into the world,” Forrest says. “Making music and putting myself so out there was a huge overcoming of those nerves and fear. To see the music so well-received is mind-boggling. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to fathom that it’s hitting so hard.”
On first listen, Effortless hits with the full force of a cresting wave. It’s equal parts lyrically introspective, musically confident, and thrillingly beat-driven. Bouncy, blissed-out lead single “Never Had” pays tribute to Forrest’s influences in chillwave SoundCloud beat makers like Sam Gellaitry and Monte Booker, and Soulection rapper Smino. Other tracks hearken back to the ‘90s dance legends Quad City DJ’s, whose hits Forrest’s father used to soundtrack family dance parties in their Dallas living room. Later Effortless standouts embody the emotional and spiritual maturity that’s bloomed in Forrest in the years since his first album dropped. “Honestly, I just want my music to feel good,” he says. “I want it to make people feel encouraged, and at peace, to feel the confidence to be themselves the way music gives me the freedom to be my full, weird self.”
Forrest’s place in the music history books wasn’t always this carved in stone. After graduating college, he left Texas and accepted a job at a Seattle pharmaceutical company, but his heart wasn’t in the work, so he quit after a year to pursue music full time. “For so long, music was my secret passion,” he says. “And the way my personality works, I had to see this thing through.” Although he laughs remembering how the band was in debt at the time, within six months, SURFACES’ songs started to take off, connecting with fans around the world who found something singular in the band’s blend of genre-blurring, buoyant production and “no shirt, no shoes, no problem” energy. After only half a year of being back in Texas, Forrest moved out of his parents’ home into his own place, and the rest—sold-out club dates across America, eye-popping streaming success, Justin Bieber and Jessica Alba TikToks set to their songs—has just been history in-the-making.
Forrest says he can trace his unshakable drive back to a chance, pivotal encounter with a college acquaintance. “He found me and said, ‘Dude, whatever you’re doing, keep doing it. It’s absolutely amazing. If you need anything, hit me up. I’m a huge fan. I’m loving every minute of it.’ That changed my life, and I’ve tried to make a big effort to do the same. Anytime anyone leaves a little deposit of a dream with me, I look them in the eyes and say, ‘If you want to be the best person in the world at that, go do it. You can do it. You have everything you need to do it.’”
In 2018, Forrest released his first solo album, Warm, a nine-track record that’s filled with glimpses of lyrical and musical promise fulfilled on Effortless. With SURFACES, Forrest has released three full-length albums to date, and recently collaborated with Sir Elton John on the song “Learn To Fly.” With more SURFACES music on the way (stay tuned...), their hit song “Sunday Best” going platinum and peaking at #19 on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart, and a handful of new solo songs he’s (nearly) finished in quarantine, there’s no stopping the cresting of Forres Frank’s 2020 wave. “If the music I make physically does this to people this soon,” he says with a laugh, “I don’t know how it could ever stop here.”
Asiahn, The Interlude
Heartbreak is, it must be said, part of the fabric of the human condition. But Jersey-born, Carolina-raised multi-hyphenate Asiahn—pronounced “Ahh-zee-yahn”—says it’s about what we do with the time between heartbreak and new love that matters most. “We need a break,” she says. “We need to live. And we need to remember who we are.”
The singer-songwriter—known for penning hits for massive stars like Jennifer Lopez, Pitbull, Drake, Lil Wayne, and Dr. Dre—sat herself down for a long, hard conversation about what’s next after heartbreak. “It’s time to learn about yourself,” Asiahn remembers thinking. “It’s time to remember what you want out of love. And it’s time to explore yourself: your sexual side, your spiritual side, and your mental side. And after you’re done healing, you’ve gotta get out there and actually live life.”
Living life and reconnecting with herself led Asiahn to create her new EP, The Interlude, her third body of work—a project that serves as a “brief pause to breathe” between the second and third installments in her critically adored The Love Train series. Lush with live instrumentation, sensual moments, and “trappy, ethereal vibes” throughout, The Interlude is a tight, five-track EP that introduces new sides of Asiahn’s personality that fans haven’t seen before. “They’ve only gotten to experience me being deep or fun with subjects around love,” she says. “Now I get to show them something entirely new.”
All the songs on The Interlude started from organic, “bomb jam sessions,” Asiahn remembers. Magic started happening once she gathered her creative team for a writers camp in Atlanta. “Once the musicians got their groove, it took me about 15 minutes to write each song,” she says. “Then it was time to record. I co-produced the tracks by picking and choosing which additional live instruments I used. In some instances I told them what to play, or let them vibe out, and I placed the parts where I wanted them”
The Interlude kicks off with a mission statement in “My World,” a song about inviting someone into your space but establishing the rules and setting boundaries that accompany blossoming new relationships. “Gucci Frames” looks back on the people we’ve all left behind, the friends whose toxicity dragged us down, the hangers-on who always want to be there for our highs but never feel like staying for our lows. “Like, no, you weren’t a great friend to me before, so I don’t want you to be a great friend to me now,” Asiahn says, laughing. “This is me saying: I’m so sorry, I can’t see you with my Gucci frames on!”
“Get Away” shows Asiahn’s musicality in its purest form as it tells the story of wanting to escape reality with someone. And create and love in a world that lets you, just be you. “I wanted to be involved in everything in a very Berry Gordy Motown way,” she says. “A lot of people don’t know that I play a lot of instruments, so to be able to lock in the sounds I wanted to hear? Being involved in every step of the process? That’s all so important to me, because at the end of the day, my music is my identity, and I can’t expect anyone else to know what I want to say and how I want to say it. I’m the best person to tell my own stories.”
Heartbreak is, it must be said, part of the fabric of the human condition. But Jersey-born, Carolina-raised multi-hyphenate Asiahn—pronounced “Ahh-zee-yahn”—says it’s about what we do with the time between heartbreak and new love that matters most. “We need a break,” she says. “We need to live. And we need to remember who we are.”
The singer-songwriter—known for penning hits for massive stars like Jennifer Lopez, Pitbull, Drake, Lil Wayne, and Dr. Dre—sat herself down for a long, hard conversation about what’s next after heartbreak. “It’s time to learn about yourself,” Asiahn remembers thinking. “It’s time to remember what you want out of love. And it’s time to explore yourself: your sexual side, your spiritual side, and your mental side. And after you’re done healing, you’ve gotta get out there and actually live life.”
Living life and reconnecting with herself led Asiahn to create her new EP, The Interlude, her third body of work—a project that serves as a “brief pause to breathe” between the second and third installments in her critically adored The Love Train series. Lush with live instrumentation, sensual moments, and “trappy, ethereal vibes” throughout, The Interlude is a tight, five-track EP that introduces new sides of Asiahn’s personality that fans haven’t seen before. “They’ve only gotten to experience me being deep or fun with subjects around love,” she says. “Now I get to show them something entirely new.”
All the songs on The Interlude started from organic, “bomb jam sessions,” Asiahn remembers. Magic started happening once she gathered her creative team for a writers camp in Atlanta. “Once the musicians got their groove, it took me about 15 minutes to write each song,” she says. “Then it was time to record. I co-produced the tracks by picking and choosing which additional live instruments I used. In some instances I told them what to play, or let them vibe out, and I placed the parts where I wanted them”
The Interlude kicks off with a mission statement in “My World,” a song about inviting someone into your space but establishing the rules and setting boundaries that accompany blossoming new relationships. “Gucci Frames” looks back on the people we’ve all left behind, the friends whose toxicity dragged us down, the hangers-on who always want to be there for our highs but never feel like staying for our lows. “Like, no, you weren’t a great friend to me before, so I don’t want you to be a great friend to me now,” Asiahn says, laughing. “This is me saying: I’m so sorry, I can’t see you with my Gucci frames on!”
“Get Away” shows Asiahn’s musicality in its purest form as it tells the story of wanting to escape reality with someone. And create and love in a world that lets you, just be you. “I wanted to be involved in everything in a very Berry Gordy Motown way,” she says. “A lot of people don’t know that I play a lot of instruments, so to be able to lock in the sounds I wanted to hear? Being involved in every step of the process? That’s all so important to me, because at the end of the day, my music is my identity, and I can’t expect anyone else to know what I want to say and how I want to say it. I’m the best person to tell my own stories.”
Sasha Sloan, Only Child
When Sasha Sloan was 10 years old, she wrote her first song. “Pitter Patter,” she says, “is literally the worst song anyone’s ever written in their entire life.” But “Pitter Patter,” which her mother convinced her to perform at a local talent show months later, sparked something in Sasha. “That’s when I really fell in love with writing, because you can’t be mean to a 10-year-old performing an original song,” she says with a laugh. “It gave me the confidence I needed.”
Years later, after leaving her hometown of Boston for Los Angeles to fulfill a songwriting deal, reality sank in. “I was like, ‘Holy shit. I’m 19. I can’t even buy myself a drink. I don’t know a single soul here—and I have no money.’” She buried herself in her work, taking “horrible” sessions for the first few years as she juggled a grab bag of temp jobs, which included stints at the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and an ill-fated three-day gig pasting promotional peel-off stickers onto thousands of Red Bull cans by hand. Those hustling years toughened her up. Thrown into L.A.’s songwriting bootcamp system, she quickly learned what worked for her, and what didn’t. “Every song that got rejected made me a better writer,” she says. “I grew up super fast. I learned how to be alone. And I got to inadvertently figure out what kind of artist I wanted to be by watching other people do it.”
Those early days of trial and error led to Sasha releasing three EPs--sad girl, Loser, and last fall’s Self Portrait—after signing with RCA as an artist. “With those EPs and the songwriting I was doing, I learned that if you don’t know who you are as an artist, you’re gonna get overlooked,” she says. “I learned the value in sticking to my gut and knowing what I want to say and who I want to be. I learned about being patient, and about not trying to be like every other artist on New Music Friday.” As songs like “Dancing With Your Ghost” and “Older” began deeply connecting with millions of listeners globally, she began to believe in herself and trust her gut. Touring those same EPs helped her begin writing her debut album, too: “I wanted to create a world where, when I toured it, I would just have to stand or sway there. When I was writing, I went, ‘Fuck it, I’m done trying to dance, I’m done trying to move. I’m just gonna stand there and sing these songs like Adele does.’”
Sasha calls touring and her EPs the building blocks of Only Child, a stunning and confident debut album that delivers on the promise of her early work. It’s bold, it’s confessional, it’s funny, it’s real, and it’s everything you’d expect from an artist who’s built her career on being the most no-holds-barred songwriter in the game. Only Child paints a cohesive, multifaceted picture of its 25-year-old creator because Only Child is one of the most cohesive pop albums in recent memory, a byproduct of her desire to make a body of work rather than a playlist. “As a kid, when I put a CD in, I listened to the whole album,” she says. “I didn’t listen to a Coldplay song and then a Britney Spears song and then a P!nk song. With this album, I wanted to release music that’s authentic and true to me: a lot of cynicism, very jaded, atheist, and sarcastic. I’ve realized it’s ok to incorporate that all into my music. In the past, there’ve been songs on my EPs that I’ve been 90% sure about. That’s just something I didn’t allow myself to do on this album.”
Standout songs like “High School Me” (written with Nashville songwriter extraordinaire Shane McAnally) and “House With No Mirrors” find Sasha profoundly turning her gaze upon herself, unpacking the insecurities that she admits have ruined countless nights. The album’s evocative title track presupposes what life will one day be like without a sibling to help her as her parents grow older, while Only Child’s closer, “Santa’s Real,” waxes wistfully for childhood fantasies unrealized in the face of the world’s coldest truths. “Every song on this album, I love, and they make me feel something,” she says. “That was my rule of thumb.”
Only Child deals in love both lost and found. “Is It Just Me” (“my first and last Zoom writing session,” she says) unspools a mixture of both lighthearted and polarizing opinions (“People my age make me nauseous”... “I don’t think love lasts forever”), while “Hypochondriac” reflects on reckless, youthful habits she sidelined when she found her match. “Lie” ping pongs from the perspective of an ex-boyfriend to Sasha’s own point-of-view as she unpacks the denial and fallout of their failed relationship. “I don’t believe in fairytale endings,” she says. “I still believe in love. I’m in a very serious committed relationship. But people change. Things change. I think friendship lasts forever. The love part comes and goes.”
On Only Child, Sasha Sloan finally steps into her own as one of music’s most gifted lyricists and a profoundly affecting artist. It’s the type of record most artists never get to make, equal parts arresting and affecting. “This album is a very mature version of me,” Sasha adds. “It’s the most honest I’ve been. And there’s even a twinge of hope in there, which is new for me!”
When Sasha Sloan was 10 years old, she wrote her first song. “Pitter Patter,” she says, “is literally the worst song anyone’s ever written in their entire life.” But “Pitter Patter,” which her mother convinced her to perform at a local talent show months later, sparked something in Sasha. “That’s when I really fell in love with writing, because you can’t be mean to a 10-year-old performing an original song,” she says with a laugh. “It gave me the confidence I needed.”
Years later, after leaving her hometown of Boston for Los Angeles to fulfill a songwriting deal, reality sank in. “I was like, ‘Holy shit. I’m 19. I can’t even buy myself a drink. I don’t know a single soul here—and I have no money.’” She buried herself in her work, taking “horrible” sessions for the first few years as she juggled a grab bag of temp jobs, which included stints at the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and an ill-fated three-day gig pasting promotional peel-off stickers onto thousands of Red Bull cans by hand. Those hustling years toughened her up. Thrown into L.A.’s songwriting bootcamp system, she quickly learned what worked for her, and what didn’t. “Every song that got rejected made me a better writer,” she says. “I grew up super fast. I learned how to be alone. And I got to inadvertently figure out what kind of artist I wanted to be by watching other people do it.”
Those early days of trial and error led to Sasha releasing three EPs--sad girl, Loser, and last fall’s Self Portrait—after signing with RCA as an artist. “With those EPs and the songwriting I was doing, I learned that if you don’t know who you are as an artist, you’re gonna get overlooked,” she says. “I learned the value in sticking to my gut and knowing what I want to say and who I want to be. I learned about being patient, and about not trying to be like every other artist on New Music Friday.” As songs like “Dancing With Your Ghost” and “Older” began deeply connecting with millions of listeners globally, she began to believe in herself and trust her gut. Touring those same EPs helped her begin writing her debut album, too: “I wanted to create a world where, when I toured it, I would just have to stand or sway there. When I was writing, I went, ‘Fuck it, I’m done trying to dance, I’m done trying to move. I’m just gonna stand there and sing these songs like Adele does.’”
Sasha calls touring and her EPs the building blocks of Only Child, a stunning and confident debut album that delivers on the promise of her early work. It’s bold, it’s confessional, it’s funny, it’s real, and it’s everything you’d expect from an artist who’s built her career on being the most no-holds-barred songwriter in the game. Only Child paints a cohesive, multifaceted picture of its 25-year-old creator because Only Child is one of the most cohesive pop albums in recent memory, a byproduct of her desire to make a body of work rather than a playlist. “As a kid, when I put a CD in, I listened to the whole album,” she says. “I didn’t listen to a Coldplay song and then a Britney Spears song and then a P!nk song. With this album, I wanted to release music that’s authentic and true to me: a lot of cynicism, very jaded, atheist, and sarcastic. I’ve realized it’s ok to incorporate that all into my music. In the past, there’ve been songs on my EPs that I’ve been 90% sure about. That’s just something I didn’t allow myself to do on this album.”
Standout songs like “High School Me” (written with Nashville songwriter extraordinaire Shane McAnally) and “House With No Mirrors” find Sasha profoundly turning her gaze upon herself, unpacking the insecurities that she admits have ruined countless nights. The album’s evocative title track presupposes what life will one day be like without a sibling to help her as her parents grow older, while Only Child’s closer, “Santa’s Real,” waxes wistfully for childhood fantasies unrealized in the face of the world’s coldest truths. “Every song on this album, I love, and they make me feel something,” she says. “That was my rule of thumb.”
Only Child deals in love both lost and found. “Is It Just Me” (“my first and last Zoom writing session,” she says) unspools a mixture of both lighthearted and polarizing opinions (“People my age make me nauseous”... “I don’t think love lasts forever”), while “Hypochondriac” reflects on reckless, youthful habits she sidelined when she found her match. “Lie” ping pongs from the perspective of an ex-boyfriend to Sasha’s own point-of-view as she unpacks the denial and fallout of their failed relationship. “I don’t believe in fairytale endings,” she says. “I still believe in love. I’m in a very serious committed relationship. But people change. Things change. I think friendship lasts forever. The love part comes and goes.”
On Only Child, Sasha Sloan finally steps into her own as one of music’s most gifted lyricists and a profoundly affecting artist. It’s the type of record most artists never get to make, equal parts arresting and affecting. “This album is a very mature version of me,” Sasha adds. “It’s the most honest I’ve been. And there’s even a twinge of hope in there, which is new for me!”
Loren Kramar
For as long as he can remember, Loren Kramar has paid the keenest of attention to the smallest of details. As a child, the 35-year-old would watch Michael Jackson concert specials on HBO, snapping Polaroids of the screen at key moments. When the photos printed, he’d intricately mimic the pop legend’s autograph on them to pretend he’d been there, in-person, up-and-close to stardom—even going so far as charging friends $5 per as-request forgery as an eccentric side hustle. Years later, enrolled at New York City’s Cooper Union, Loren’s professors allowed him to focus his classwork on performance. To Loren, that meant getting to know each of his fellow students intimately, crafting monologues about them, performing and recording the works, and DJing the final product for his teachers and his classmates. “One of the through lines in my work has always been my obsession and fixation and fetishizing of intimate relationships,” he says. “I'm interested in the diaristic, the voyeuristic, and the deeply private. That's what makes me tick.”
Those close to Loren call him inquisitive. He’s the type of person who asks questions and listens to the answers; he’s been this way as long as he can recall. “I remember being depressed over my spring break in first grade because I was going to be away from my crush, which was a boy,” he remembers. “I think knowing who I was from a very young age, and knowing that this was something that was not to be shared, made me an extremely critical observer. I became hypersensitive to my own actions and censoring them or modifying them for others. That translated into a fascination with the mechanics of other people.”
Making music came to Loren after he graduated. He’d always known he wanted to perform, but it took a failed attempt at running a magazine (“we basically made negative money,” he says with a laugh) to open his eyes to championing his own artistry instead of anyone else’s. Karaoke-ing his way around New York City—Tina Turner’s “Private Dancer” and Diane Birch’s rendition of Haddaway's “What Is Love” chief among them—Loren started putting pen to paper, on the advice of friends like Francis Starlite. “After all these years of growing up with the piano, and writing a million shit songs, suddenly music made sense to me,” he says.
Demos of early songs like “My Life”—an emotional, no-holds-barred piece of storytelling—caught the ear of record label executives, one of whom asked Loren if he could play it for Kanye West. A whirlwind trip to his hometown of Los Angeles ensued, bringing with it a record production deal and, quickly thereafter, a prominent Apple sync of “My Life” that catapulted the then-unknown artist to the national stage. “We weren't prepared,” he says of the sudden spotlight. “It was so much a cart before the horse moment. It suddenly created these expectations, ones I placed on myself, that I had to come out the gate with a certain level of quality. There was no time for the training wheels.”
Suddenly, music blogs were asking about him, wondering how an unknown, nearly unsigned new artist had cut the line. And it was happening at a time in music when the debate about indie music—what it meant, who had the right to label themselves as such, and most importantly, who didn’t—was raging as artists like Lana Del Rey burst onto the scene. “I don't blame people who were asking, ‘Who the fuck is Loren Kramer?’” he says with a smile. “I was figuring that out myself.”
So he locked himself away to write music and discover what he wanted to say as an artist. Now, he says, he knows the answer. “I want people to feel like I'm telling them something private,” he says. “I realized recently just how important it is to share an experience with somebody. I used to write that off. But now I really live for sitting at a piano with people who can hopefully share some sort of emotional reality that activates us all in these very specific and private ways.”
As a singer and a songwriter, that desire to unpeel our most intimate layers—laying bare the human experience for all to hear—percolates throughout Loren Kramar’s music. Songs like “Cover Girl” and “Let’s Go To My House” take a microscope to things like unrequited love, desire, uncertainty, escapism, and ambition. Others, like “How Am I Supposed to Dream?” and “Flowers,” position Loren’s compelling voice—a powerfully singular instrument that gains its strength in its own measured, purposeful restraint—front and center. They’re the type of songs he’s long dreamed of making. They’re inquisitive, just like he is, and they’ll stick with you long after you hear them.
Now living in Los Angeles full time, Loren says he’s ready for the world to discover the artist he’s discovered within himself over the past five years. “I reached a threshold in New York, where I realized that I didn’t want to think about myself in the context of a competitive community while I made this work,” he says. “I want to think of myself as an individual.” Foremost among his revelations? Loren’s queerness now lives in the forefront of his music, a conscious decision he says was necessitated by years of being forced to hide that truth from the world. “The sort of shut up and sing attitude affected me deeply, he says. “People didn’t want my songs to be overtly gay. I couldn’t use he/him pronouns. It's shameful and infuriating to listen to those voices, but the way that I feel now, after being forced to wait so many years to release my music? I will never let this happen again.”
A visual artist as much as he is a musician, Loren is treating his artistic output like he would a painting or a drawing, he says. “There are ways to do this without the fantasy of the big sugar daddy in the sky who's going to come down and give me the major record deal and set me free,” he says, laughing. “I want it to feel very intentional. If I'm going to fight to get my music out into the world, I’d better be fighting for something that I really give a damn about. That intensity of purpose only makes me more confident in saying I don't give a shit if you think that this is too gay or too long or too obscure. Who gives a fuck?”
“I'm ready to start again, now,” he says after a pause. “I’m ready to start my career the way that I think I would have as a 20-year-old. This time, it’s for me."
For as long as he can remember, Loren Kramar has paid the keenest of attention to the smallest of details. As a child, the 35-year-old would watch Michael Jackson concert specials on HBO, snapping Polaroids of the screen at key moments. When the photos printed, he’d intricately mimic the pop legend’s autograph on them to pretend he’d been there, in-person, up-and-close to stardom—even going so far as charging friends $5 per as-request forgery as an eccentric side hustle. Years later, enrolled at New York City’s Cooper Union, Loren’s professors allowed him to focus his classwork on performance. To Loren, that meant getting to know each of his fellow students intimately, crafting monologues about them, performing and recording the works, and DJing the final product for his teachers and his classmates. “One of the through lines in my work has always been my obsession and fixation and fetishizing of intimate relationships,” he says. “I'm interested in the diaristic, the voyeuristic, and the deeply private. That's what makes me tick.”
Those close to Loren call him inquisitive. He’s the type of person who asks questions and listens to the answers; he’s been this way as long as he can recall. “I remember being depressed over my spring break in first grade because I was going to be away from my crush, which was a boy,” he remembers. “I think knowing who I was from a very young age, and knowing that this was something that was not to be shared, made me an extremely critical observer. I became hypersensitive to my own actions and censoring them or modifying them for others. That translated into a fascination with the mechanics of other people.”
Making music came to Loren after he graduated. He’d always known he wanted to perform, but it took a failed attempt at running a magazine (“we basically made negative money,” he says with a laugh) to open his eyes to championing his own artistry instead of anyone else’s. Karaoke-ing his way around New York City—Tina Turner’s “Private Dancer” and Diane Birch’s rendition of Haddaway's “What Is Love” chief among them—Loren started putting pen to paper, on the advice of friends like Francis Starlite. “After all these years of growing up with the piano, and writing a million shit songs, suddenly music made sense to me,” he says.
Demos of early songs like “My Life”—an emotional, no-holds-barred piece of storytelling—caught the ear of record label executives, one of whom asked Loren if he could play it for Kanye West. A whirlwind trip to his hometown of Los Angeles ensued, bringing with it a record production deal and, quickly thereafter, a prominent Apple sync of “My Life” that catapulted the then-unknown artist to the national stage. “We weren't prepared,” he says of the sudden spotlight. “It was so much a cart before the horse moment. It suddenly created these expectations, ones I placed on myself, that I had to come out the gate with a certain level of quality. There was no time for the training wheels.”
Suddenly, music blogs were asking about him, wondering how an unknown, nearly unsigned new artist had cut the line. And it was happening at a time in music when the debate about indie music—what it meant, who had the right to label themselves as such, and most importantly, who didn’t—was raging as artists like Lana Del Rey burst onto the scene. “I don't blame people who were asking, ‘Who the fuck is Loren Kramer?’” he says with a smile. “I was figuring that out myself.”
So he locked himself away to write music and discover what he wanted to say as an artist. Now, he says, he knows the answer. “I want people to feel like I'm telling them something private,” he says. “I realized recently just how important it is to share an experience with somebody. I used to write that off. But now I really live for sitting at a piano with people who can hopefully share some sort of emotional reality that activates us all in these very specific and private ways.”
As a singer and a songwriter, that desire to unpeel our most intimate layers—laying bare the human experience for all to hear—percolates throughout Loren Kramar’s music. Songs like “Cover Girl” and “Let’s Go To My House” take a microscope to things like unrequited love, desire, uncertainty, escapism, and ambition. Others, like “How Am I Supposed to Dream?” and “Flowers,” position Loren’s compelling voice—a powerfully singular instrument that gains its strength in its own measured, purposeful restraint—front and center. They’re the type of songs he’s long dreamed of making. They’re inquisitive, just like he is, and they’ll stick with you long after you hear them.
Now living in Los Angeles full time, Loren says he’s ready for the world to discover the artist he’s discovered within himself over the past five years. “I reached a threshold in New York, where I realized that I didn’t want to think about myself in the context of a competitive community while I made this work,” he says. “I want to think of myself as an individual.” Foremost among his revelations? Loren’s queerness now lives in the forefront of his music, a conscious decision he says was necessitated by years of being forced to hide that truth from the world. “The sort of shut up and sing attitude affected me deeply, he says. “People didn’t want my songs to be overtly gay. I couldn’t use he/him pronouns. It's shameful and infuriating to listen to those voices, but the way that I feel now, after being forced to wait so many years to release my music? I will never let this happen again.”
A visual artist as much as he is a musician, Loren is treating his artistic output like he would a painting or a drawing, he says. “There are ways to do this without the fantasy of the big sugar daddy in the sky who's going to come down and give me the major record deal and set me free,” he says, laughing. “I want it to feel very intentional. If I'm going to fight to get my music out into the world, I’d better be fighting for something that I really give a damn about. That intensity of purpose only makes me more confident in saying I don't give a shit if you think that this is too gay or too long or too obscure. Who gives a fuck?”
“I'm ready to start again, now,” he says after a pause. “I’m ready to start my career the way that I think I would have as a 20-year-old. This time, it’s for me."
Philmon Lee
Philmon Lee’s songs are the kind that makes you close your eyes and listen. They wash over you and sink into your pores. They linger long after they’re gone. They’re soulful, all-encompassing snapshots of a life spent hustling in the pursuit of dreams always just at arm’s length. They drip with the passion and hunger of a musician who’s sacrificed blood, sweat, tears, fears, endless nights, and never-ending dedication to tell his story—of trials and tribulations, and of the victories of perseverance—to as many people as will listen.
Philmon Lee grew up swaddled in music as a child in LaGrange, Georgia, mere miles from the Alabama border. His father sang in a gospel quartet until Philmon was 10, at which point he began pursuing rock and roll. “My dad would sing to me every single day,” Philmon remembers. “Being around all that music, I fell in love with the soulfulness of gospel and the grit of rock. That turned me into the musician I am today.”
“My songs are a cultural gumbo,” Philmon says. “There’s a bunch of stuff in there, and it all tastes good. I like to pull concepts from a lot of genres and blend them into one. I like to call it ‘pop soul.’” Citing Steven Tyler, Elvis Presley, Michael Bolton, Joe Cocker, and even Sam Smith, Lewis Capaldi, and Post Malone as influences, Philmon says he always knew he wanted to pursue music as both passion and profession. “When I was 12, we had a little sun room with a computer in it,” he says. “I would sit there and blast Aerosmith songs, trying to hit the ‘Dream On’ high note. One day, I finally hit it and I was like, ‘Oh, I can sing.’”
At 19, as a freshman at Montgomery’s Auburn University, Philmon began sneaking into a campus building that housed a baby grand piano nightly, after dark, to teach himself how to play. He’d chosen business as a major “just to get a degree in something,” he says; after two semesters, he dropped out to pursue a major label deal. “You should’ve seen some of the looks I got when I said I didn’t wanna go back,” he says with a laugh. “But I knew I was doing the right thing.”
That year, Philmon moved to Atlanta to start working on songs with a small local label. “My first night in the studio, I can’t describe how nervous I was,” he says. Other people were playing their songs for the execs. Philmon asked one exec when he could play him his tracks, and was told “soon.” More than 20 minutes passed. “I don’t know what came over me,” he says with a laugh. “I plugged myself into the biggest speakers, I turned them up as much as I could, and I hit play. You could’ve heard it outside the building.”
More than half a year later, Philmon found himself with an arsenal of “polished, presentable songs.” At the time, he was living in Atlanta on an air mattress in the corner of the living room of that label exec’s apartment. “I ain’t never been so broke in my life,” he says. “I was surviving off of chicken sticks and pork rinds from QuikTrip, and whatever my family could spare for gas money. I’m doing every show I possibly can, going all over Atlanta to every hookah bar, to every restaurant, to every open mic, to every DJ’s performance. I’m doing everything.”
He caught his first big break at BonfireATL, a weekly, underground performance experience with a regular crowd numbering in the thousands. The last to perform that night, Philmon says the experience was electrifying, unlike anything else he’d felt before that night. As soon as he let the stage, multiple record labels were there with business cards for him, telling him they wanted to talk. “To me that was a sign,” he says. “Maybe you’ve got something. Maybe you’re doing something right.”
Fast forward to today: Philmon Lee is an Epic Records breakout, who’s soulful and pop-leaning debut songs “Memories” and “Sunflower (I Refuse To Die)” are rich, mature, and emotional tastes of the full story yet to come. “I wish I could tell the younger Philmon he’s not crazy, that it is possible to achieve your dreams,” he says. “There are people in the music industry that are genuine, that do care about you. There are people that will help you out there. All you gotta do is ask.”
“I don’t know what I would do without music,” Philmon adds. “I went through a dark time in my life as a teenager, and I only got comfort and closure when I was sitting down at a piano or playing my guitar and singing. At the end of the day, making money is nice. But I wanna be remembered.”
Philmon Lee’s songs are the kind that makes you close your eyes and listen. They wash over you and sink into your pores. They linger long after they’re gone. They’re soulful, all-encompassing snapshots of a life spent hustling in the pursuit of dreams always just at arm’s length. They drip with the passion and hunger of a musician who’s sacrificed blood, sweat, tears, fears, endless nights, and never-ending dedication to tell his story—of trials and tribulations, and of the victories of perseverance—to as many people as will listen.
Philmon Lee grew up swaddled in music as a child in LaGrange, Georgia, mere miles from the Alabama border. His father sang in a gospel quartet until Philmon was 10, at which point he began pursuing rock and roll. “My dad would sing to me every single day,” Philmon remembers. “Being around all that music, I fell in love with the soulfulness of gospel and the grit of rock. That turned me into the musician I am today.”
“My songs are a cultural gumbo,” Philmon says. “There’s a bunch of stuff in there, and it all tastes good. I like to pull concepts from a lot of genres and blend them into one. I like to call it ‘pop soul.’” Citing Steven Tyler, Elvis Presley, Michael Bolton, Joe Cocker, and even Sam Smith, Lewis Capaldi, and Post Malone as influences, Philmon says he always knew he wanted to pursue music as both passion and profession. “When I was 12, we had a little sun room with a computer in it,” he says. “I would sit there and blast Aerosmith songs, trying to hit the ‘Dream On’ high note. One day, I finally hit it and I was like, ‘Oh, I can sing.’”
At 19, as a freshman at Montgomery’s Auburn University, Philmon began sneaking into a campus building that housed a baby grand piano nightly, after dark, to teach himself how to play. He’d chosen business as a major “just to get a degree in something,” he says; after two semesters, he dropped out to pursue a major label deal. “You should’ve seen some of the looks I got when I said I didn’t wanna go back,” he says with a laugh. “But I knew I was doing the right thing.”
That year, Philmon moved to Atlanta to start working on songs with a small local label. “My first night in the studio, I can’t describe how nervous I was,” he says. Other people were playing their songs for the execs. Philmon asked one exec when he could play him his tracks, and was told “soon.” More than 20 minutes passed. “I don’t know what came over me,” he says with a laugh. “I plugged myself into the biggest speakers, I turned them up as much as I could, and I hit play. You could’ve heard it outside the building.”
More than half a year later, Philmon found himself with an arsenal of “polished, presentable songs.” At the time, he was living in Atlanta on an air mattress in the corner of the living room of that label exec’s apartment. “I ain’t never been so broke in my life,” he says. “I was surviving off of chicken sticks and pork rinds from QuikTrip, and whatever my family could spare for gas money. I’m doing every show I possibly can, going all over Atlanta to every hookah bar, to every restaurant, to every open mic, to every DJ’s performance. I’m doing everything.”
He caught his first big break at BonfireATL, a weekly, underground performance experience with a regular crowd numbering in the thousands. The last to perform that night, Philmon says the experience was electrifying, unlike anything else he’d felt before that night. As soon as he let the stage, multiple record labels were there with business cards for him, telling him they wanted to talk. “To me that was a sign,” he says. “Maybe you’ve got something. Maybe you’re doing something right.”
Fast forward to today: Philmon Lee is an Epic Records breakout, who’s soulful and pop-leaning debut songs “Memories” and “Sunflower (I Refuse To Die)” are rich, mature, and emotional tastes of the full story yet to come. “I wish I could tell the younger Philmon he’s not crazy, that it is possible to achieve your dreams,” he says. “There are people in the music industry that are genuine, that do care about you. There are people that will help you out there. All you gotta do is ask.”
“I don’t know what I would do without music,” Philmon adds. “I went through a dark time in my life as a teenager, and I only got comfort and closure when I was sitting down at a piano or playing my guitar and singing. At the end of the day, making money is nice. But I wanna be remembered.”
Claire Rosinkranz, BeVerly Hills BoYfRiEnd EP
16-year-old California native Claire Rosinkranz has been writing songs since she was 8. Filling notebooks and iPads with lyrics, turns of phrase, and poems, the homeschooled artist would spend hours writing lyrics to songs that didn’t exist yet. Sometimes, she’d help her musician father, Ragnar, with melodies and lyrics for songs he’d been tasked to compose for TV shows and ad jingles. Coming from a family with deep musical roots—her paternal grandmother an Icelandic opera singer who toured Europe, her maternal grandmother making a career out of writing books and songs for children, and parents who had similar melodies running through their blood—Claire was, in every sense of the word, predestined for musical greatness, which is why the overnight success of her recent debut EP comes as no surprise to those who know her best.
Written, recorded, and produced with her dad at their home studio, BeVerly Hills BoYfRiEnd is a four-song project that Claire describes as “alternative-blues-pop,” equally as inspired by early influences (like The Beatles’ Help!, Frank Ocean, and the Jack Johnson songs the family would listen to around the house) as it is by the singer-songwriter’s contemporaries, like Benee, Bruno Major, and Still Woozy. Though only 16, Claire says the discipline and work ethic she learned from years of classical ballet training translated into a desire to be the best at everything she does—including making music, which she decided to pursue full-force several years ago. Early in 2020, leaning into the spare hours quarantine allowed her, Claire combed through songs she’d already written and performed on her Instagram, finding “Tough Guy” in her feed and adding three more to the final track list in the process.
Claire traffics in lo-fi songs with intricate yet totally relatable lyrics about friendship, crushes, family, and feelings. They plumb the depths of the human condition in very short bursts, exposing the songwriter’s remarkable emotional maturity and strong, singular grasp on her sound. Narratively, tracks like “Tough Guy” and “Seriouslaaay” follow Claire’s stories from start to finish while Ragnar’s clean, crisp production buoys his daughter’s crystal-clear vocals. “He totally captures my vision and if I don’t like something, I’m not afraid to say it,” Claire says of her dad. “Because we’re able to communicate so well, the process happens so quickly.”
The “star of the show,” Claire says of her catalogue, is “Backyard Boy,” the final song she wrote for the EP and one that grew legs of its own shortly after release, achieving massive viral success all on its own. “I was getting DMs from people telling me that ‘Backyard Boy’ was doing really well on TikTok,” she remembers. “Then, friends started texting me. Then more people were texting me. So I opened TikTok and I had 300,000 videos under the song and realized, “Oh, this is a thing!”
Signing to Republic Records this summer, Claire realized the work and dedication she’d been putting into music for half her life was coming to fruition. In August, she shot the “Backyard Boy” music video but kept things close to the family, as she’s done for years (it’s directed by her uncle, the first AD is her cousin, and close family friends star alongside her onscreen). “I think people are connecting to that song because it’s about a feeling you long for, especially during this time,” she says. “Everyone wants to have this experience but it’s something we can’t have right now because of COVID. But ‘Backyard Boy’ makes you feel like you can.”
Claire has spent the last few years drilling down on her craft by refining her songwriting and learning to play instruments like the ukulele, the piano, and the jazz electric guitar (“that’s the one I absolutely enjoy the most,” she says), which have helped her turn her lyrics into fully imagined soundscapes. “I consider myself a writer first and foremost,” she’s quick to note. “I’m super fortunate to be able to sing all my songs, and I want to sing them, but writing is my favorite part of the entire process.”
As for what’s next for Claire Rosinkranz? “I just want to put so much music out,” she says with a laugh. “It just keeps coming. I want people to hear it. And I want people to hear what I have to say.”
16-year-old California native Claire Rosinkranz has been writing songs since she was 8. Filling notebooks and iPads with lyrics, turns of phrase, and poems, the homeschooled artist would spend hours writing lyrics to songs that didn’t exist yet. Sometimes, she’d help her musician father, Ragnar, with melodies and lyrics for songs he’d been tasked to compose for TV shows and ad jingles. Coming from a family with deep musical roots—her paternal grandmother an Icelandic opera singer who toured Europe, her maternal grandmother making a career out of writing books and songs for children, and parents who had similar melodies running through their blood—Claire was, in every sense of the word, predestined for musical greatness, which is why the overnight success of her recent debut EP comes as no surprise to those who know her best.
Written, recorded, and produced with her dad at their home studio, BeVerly Hills BoYfRiEnd is a four-song project that Claire describes as “alternative-blues-pop,” equally as inspired by early influences (like The Beatles’ Help!, Frank Ocean, and the Jack Johnson songs the family would listen to around the house) as it is by the singer-songwriter’s contemporaries, like Benee, Bruno Major, and Still Woozy. Though only 16, Claire says the discipline and work ethic she learned from years of classical ballet training translated into a desire to be the best at everything she does—including making music, which she decided to pursue full-force several years ago. Early in 2020, leaning into the spare hours quarantine allowed her, Claire combed through songs she’d already written and performed on her Instagram, finding “Tough Guy” in her feed and adding three more to the final track list in the process.
Claire traffics in lo-fi songs with intricate yet totally relatable lyrics about friendship, crushes, family, and feelings. They plumb the depths of the human condition in very short bursts, exposing the songwriter’s remarkable emotional maturity and strong, singular grasp on her sound. Narratively, tracks like “Tough Guy” and “Seriouslaaay” follow Claire’s stories from start to finish while Ragnar’s clean, crisp production buoys his daughter’s crystal-clear vocals. “He totally captures my vision and if I don’t like something, I’m not afraid to say it,” Claire says of her dad. “Because we’re able to communicate so well, the process happens so quickly.”
The “star of the show,” Claire says of her catalogue, is “Backyard Boy,” the final song she wrote for the EP and one that grew legs of its own shortly after release, achieving massive viral success all on its own. “I was getting DMs from people telling me that ‘Backyard Boy’ was doing really well on TikTok,” she remembers. “Then, friends started texting me. Then more people were texting me. So I opened TikTok and I had 300,000 videos under the song and realized, “Oh, this is a thing!”
Signing to Republic Records this summer, Claire realized the work and dedication she’d been putting into music for half her life was coming to fruition. In August, she shot the “Backyard Boy” music video but kept things close to the family, as she’s done for years (it’s directed by her uncle, the first AD is her cousin, and close family friends star alongside her onscreen). “I think people are connecting to that song because it’s about a feeling you long for, especially during this time,” she says. “Everyone wants to have this experience but it’s something we can’t have right now because of COVID. But ‘Backyard Boy’ makes you feel like you can.”
Claire has spent the last few years drilling down on her craft by refining her songwriting and learning to play instruments like the ukulele, the piano, and the jazz electric guitar (“that’s the one I absolutely enjoy the most,” she says), which have helped her turn her lyrics into fully imagined soundscapes. “I consider myself a writer first and foremost,” she’s quick to note. “I’m super fortunate to be able to sing all my songs, and I want to sing them, but writing is my favorite part of the entire process.”
As for what’s next for Claire Rosinkranz? “I just want to put so much music out,” she says with a laugh. “It just keeps coming. I want people to hear it. And I want people to hear what I have to say.”
Kat Cunning
When BBC DJ and tastemaker Annie Mac decides to champion a musician she likes—one she thinks is on the verge of making real change in the industry—she calls you “one to watch,” welcoming you into a pantheon of luminary artists about to break through the stratosphere. Stars like Jessie Ware, Sam Smith, and Justice graced Mac’s hallowed halls before achieving pop superstardom of their own. So when Mac was recently joined by The New York Times and Billboard in anointing queer Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter, star of Netflix’s multi Emmy Award-winning series Trinkets, and dancer Kat Cunning as an artist on the brink of breaking out, it felt like the fates finally aligning to properly celebrate one of the most exciting new artists of our time.
The New York Times has called them “sultry-voiced.” V Magazine notes that they’re “Hollywood's next big thing.” But Refinery 29 sums them up best: “Kat Cunning is part of a new breed of musicians that don't fall strictly under the category of ‘musician.’” Kat brushes that off and modestly says they’re only just getting started. Because to Kat, “just getting started” means training all your life to be a professional dancer and becoming a professional dancer before realizing that you’re also exceptional at singing and acting and becoming those things too. Kat pursues all of their careers—whether that’s bleeding through their shoes during years of ballet training, returning as Sabine for the second season of Trinkets, or carving out a lane for themselves as one of pop music’s most captivating queer artists—with the fullest of forces.
“For both music and acting,” Kat says, “being an individual is championed. I spent so much of my life as part of something larger in dance, so now it feels like my time to tell my story.”
Music instilled itself in Kat at an early age. They first gravitated towards the piano in their daily ballet classes, captivated by classical music’s push and pull. During car rides with their dad from their “smaller, conservative hometown” in Oregon to their performing arts school, they fell in love with the sounds of pop music, blasting ‘80s hits in the car each way. In 2014, in order to keep a dance job that required live vocals, they told the director they could sing. Their gambit paid off. A critic from The New York Times saw the show and spotlighted their voice: “[Kat] brings an exquisite, indie-siren quality to a series of covers.” “Nobody in my life had ever told me I could sing, or that I should,” Kat says. “But it just worked way better for me than dancing, right off the bat, after years of years of investing in dance.”
With several notable cosigns under their belt, Kat began collaborating with game-changing songwriters and producers like Justin Parker (Lana Del Rey, Rihanna, Sia), Sir Nolan (Justin Bieber, Demi Lovato, Selena Gomez), and Swedish House Mafia vocalist John Martin to build a thrilling arsenal of songs that all incorporate, as Kat puts it, “my emotional intentions.” Kat’s hard work paid off when Lava/Republic Records signed them as an artist earlier this year. “There’s a ‘pinch me!’ element to them deciding to make a statement that they believe in me,” they say. “It really feels like, in its own little way, making it.”
Though Kat doesn’t write lyrics before their sessions, “it all comes down to using your voice,” they say. “I never even considered how badly I was missing that in my life. With music, I can very clearly express my own individuality. Words are the only other love of my life.” Most of Kat’s songs, including streaming hits like “King of Shadow” and “Birds,” begin as poems set to simple instrumentals—“most of them are ballads,” they say, laughing—before they work with producers to “honor the lyrics” as they build tracks from the ground up. “It’s a hard line of integrity to toe,” they say. “But I’m learning to get over my snobbery about my own career. It’s challenging in the best way.”
Their upcoming music is “cool and arty” but “it also transcends the mainstream and involves everybody.” They credit opening for LP on tour “and seeing 2,000 fans singing back every word” as the momentum to stamp their singular, queer perspective (they identify as non-binary) on every song. They call Rihanna, BANKS, Kim Petras and Sam Smith “guiding lights” as far as uncompromising pop careers go. Sweeping new songs like “Supernova,” “Beautiful Boys” and “Planetarium” take preconceived notions about vulnerability and intimacy and turn them on their heads, emphasizing instead the strength that comes from honesty and openness. “In real life, I’m assertive, I’m confident, and I’m good at drawing boundaries,” they say. “But my music comes to me like I’m Romeo at the base of the balcony, and Juliet is ignoring me. Maybe that’s a metaphor for me not feeling heard or seen for much of my life. But it’s also the reality of a lot of my love stories.”
And while their music career is on the cusp of exploding, their acting career is taking off too. After breaking out with a role on HBO’s James Franco drama, The Deuce, they’re set to return to the small screen this year with the upcoming sophomore season of the award-winning Trinkets (which will also feature some of their new music). And even a global pandemic can’t stop their drive. Though they’re happy to take the time to discuss their career, they sandwich it between writing sessions for their next single and taping an audition for a project they can’t yet discuss. “Acting can be such a relief for music in the way I can disappear from talking about myself all the time,” Kat says. “And music can be such a relief from acting in that I get to say exactly what I want and I’m not trying to be what a casting director is looking for. They balance each other out—and they both keep me sane.”
"Prepare to be mesmerized,” NYLON says of Kat. We say: prepare to bear witness to the rise of one of Hollywood’s most talented multi-hyphenates.
When BBC DJ and tastemaker Annie Mac decides to champion a musician she likes—one she thinks is on the verge of making real change in the industry—she calls you “one to watch,” welcoming you into a pantheon of luminary artists about to break through the stratosphere. Stars like Jessie Ware, Sam Smith, and Justice graced Mac’s hallowed halls before achieving pop superstardom of their own. So when Mac was recently joined by The New York Times and Billboard in anointing queer Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter, star of Netflix’s multi Emmy Award-winning series Trinkets, and dancer Kat Cunning as an artist on the brink of breaking out, it felt like the fates finally aligning to properly celebrate one of the most exciting new artists of our time.
The New York Times has called them “sultry-voiced.” V Magazine notes that they’re “Hollywood's next big thing.” But Refinery 29 sums them up best: “Kat Cunning is part of a new breed of musicians that don't fall strictly under the category of ‘musician.’” Kat brushes that off and modestly says they’re only just getting started. Because to Kat, “just getting started” means training all your life to be a professional dancer and becoming a professional dancer before realizing that you’re also exceptional at singing and acting and becoming those things too. Kat pursues all of their careers—whether that’s bleeding through their shoes during years of ballet training, returning as Sabine for the second season of Trinkets, or carving out a lane for themselves as one of pop music’s most captivating queer artists—with the fullest of forces.
“For both music and acting,” Kat says, “being an individual is championed. I spent so much of my life as part of something larger in dance, so now it feels like my time to tell my story.”
Music instilled itself in Kat at an early age. They first gravitated towards the piano in their daily ballet classes, captivated by classical music’s push and pull. During car rides with their dad from their “smaller, conservative hometown” in Oregon to their performing arts school, they fell in love with the sounds of pop music, blasting ‘80s hits in the car each way. In 2014, in order to keep a dance job that required live vocals, they told the director they could sing. Their gambit paid off. A critic from The New York Times saw the show and spotlighted their voice: “[Kat] brings an exquisite, indie-siren quality to a series of covers.” “Nobody in my life had ever told me I could sing, or that I should,” Kat says. “But it just worked way better for me than dancing, right off the bat, after years of years of investing in dance.”
With several notable cosigns under their belt, Kat began collaborating with game-changing songwriters and producers like Justin Parker (Lana Del Rey, Rihanna, Sia), Sir Nolan (Justin Bieber, Demi Lovato, Selena Gomez), and Swedish House Mafia vocalist John Martin to build a thrilling arsenal of songs that all incorporate, as Kat puts it, “my emotional intentions.” Kat’s hard work paid off when Lava/Republic Records signed them as an artist earlier this year. “There’s a ‘pinch me!’ element to them deciding to make a statement that they believe in me,” they say. “It really feels like, in its own little way, making it.”
Though Kat doesn’t write lyrics before their sessions, “it all comes down to using your voice,” they say. “I never even considered how badly I was missing that in my life. With music, I can very clearly express my own individuality. Words are the only other love of my life.” Most of Kat’s songs, including streaming hits like “King of Shadow” and “Birds,” begin as poems set to simple instrumentals—“most of them are ballads,” they say, laughing—before they work with producers to “honor the lyrics” as they build tracks from the ground up. “It’s a hard line of integrity to toe,” they say. “But I’m learning to get over my snobbery about my own career. It’s challenging in the best way.”
Their upcoming music is “cool and arty” but “it also transcends the mainstream and involves everybody.” They credit opening for LP on tour “and seeing 2,000 fans singing back every word” as the momentum to stamp their singular, queer perspective (they identify as non-binary) on every song. They call Rihanna, BANKS, Kim Petras and Sam Smith “guiding lights” as far as uncompromising pop careers go. Sweeping new songs like “Supernova,” “Beautiful Boys” and “Planetarium” take preconceived notions about vulnerability and intimacy and turn them on their heads, emphasizing instead the strength that comes from honesty and openness. “In real life, I’m assertive, I’m confident, and I’m good at drawing boundaries,” they say. “But my music comes to me like I’m Romeo at the base of the balcony, and Juliet is ignoring me. Maybe that’s a metaphor for me not feeling heard or seen for much of my life. But it’s also the reality of a lot of my love stories.”
And while their music career is on the cusp of exploding, their acting career is taking off too. After breaking out with a role on HBO’s James Franco drama, The Deuce, they’re set to return to the small screen this year with the upcoming sophomore season of the award-winning Trinkets (which will also feature some of their new music). And even a global pandemic can’t stop their drive. Though they’re happy to take the time to discuss their career, they sandwich it between writing sessions for their next single and taping an audition for a project they can’t yet discuss. “Acting can be such a relief for music in the way I can disappear from talking about myself all the time,” Kat says. “And music can be such a relief from acting in that I get to say exactly what I want and I’m not trying to be what a casting director is looking for. They balance each other out—and they both keep me sane.”
"Prepare to be mesmerized,” NYLON says of Kat. We say: prepare to bear witness to the rise of one of Hollywood’s most talented multi-hyphenates.