Kelela Mizanekristos Quotes
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I like smart rappers who aren't necessarily trying to be deeper than you, like Danny Brown.
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I'm just trying to soundtrack your real life. I'm just trying to give you a place to feel safe in all the parts of your experience.
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I would say Tracy Chapman was the first time I obsessed over an entire record. I knew every song; I knew the exact amount of seconds between each song. That's the level of obsession that I had.
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A black woman's handbook in this industry is, 'Whoa.' The chapter on 'Don't go there.' The chapter on 'How to say that nicely,' how to express that you don't like something so that you don't lose the opportunity - which is what we're doing all day long.
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Often, I write to feel better and to heal - to cope with things that I'm dealing with. I'm either writing to get out of a feeling or to get into the feeling, to feel it more. Usually it's the perfect remedy, but if it isn't, I focus on other parts of what I'm making that don't involve writing. If neither are working, I simply forfeit the day.
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I'd like to change what people expect. I want to evoke something that's not nameable, for people to go, 'Huh?'
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'Seat at the Table' has expressed real adversity, struggle, and also triumph and joy.
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When I started making songs, some of them read as mixtape-y, and some of them read as album-y.
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I just want to shed light, illuminate and turn the spotlight over to all of the black people who have been being futuristic and innovative since instruments were plugged into a wall. With computers, machines, and music, black people have been contributing to that a great deal for a long time.
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No one is making extraordinary things alone. They might be alone in their bedroom while they're recording or writing, but they didn't actually conjure that thing out of nothing - without influence - without assistance - without anything.
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Sounding like I have agency in a song is important to me. I want to feel empowered by the music.
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Even on my most angry song, I'm also still saying, 'Thank you for helping me to learn.' I've always wanted to give voice to that complexity in our experience.
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To me, the best writing points to something literal or common but is also nuanced: The moment when somebody is telling you they love you while simultaneously disappointing you. Everybody's experienced that.
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I've grown up feeling very American but being constantly bothered by people - there's internalized racism and feeling weird about being second-generation.
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We don't want it to be obscure music. We're not trying to be indie. We want to be popular.
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I am not carefree. I'm just not. I experience an immense amount of joy, a crazy amount of joy through sadness and so much struggle. There's something problematic about 'carefree black girl.'
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I'm interested in bridging and filling in space that hasn't already been filled, so when it comes to making music, I've just always wanted to be able to reference things that producers in the big pop major label context do, without compromising the entire sound of the record.
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When I was little, my parents would have these gatherings, and it was a common thing for me and my cousins to have to put on, like, shows.
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Fog and one blue light is all I need in life at the club. Just a dark room and loud music. I'm into that.
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I would say there is a zone of R&B that hadn't been quite innovative.
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I'm pushing back against the white, misogynistic, heterosexual establishment in the music industry. Like, literally, in all its forms.
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I really do like Solange, sincerely. I'm down for her, and I trust her judgment.
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My first reaction to being pigeonholed or pushed into certain confines is to be like, 'No, I'm the opposite,' you know? Like, don't put me in a stereotypical black-girl category, because I'm not like that; I'm doing this thing over here.
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A lot of people of color in the music industry are still more interested in embracing things that are considered white canon, and looking radical. Like when people point to punk in the indie world: If you point to the history of punk as what you see as your legacy, that's more prized and praised.