Kelela Mizanekristos Quotes
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The assumption is simply that I hit on all the things I've hit on so far by accident, that my talent is just this raw thing that pours out of me, and then white people feel like they have to come in and contain it, refine it, and bring it to the place where it can been released.
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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 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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When I started making songs, some of them read as mixtape-y, and some of them read as album-y.
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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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The whole thing about 'progressive R&B' blows my mind. Black music has always been progressive.
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I want to speak in the tradition of rhythm and blues and soul music, but also push how it's dressed and how it's delivered to the audience. And hopefully that gets embraced by as many people as possible, but the goal isn't necessarily to speak to everyone. The goal is to get it out as exact as it is in my head.
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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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I'm pushing back against the white, misogynistic, heterosexual establishment in the music industry. Like, literally, in all its forms.
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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'm just tryna be honest about all the things that I dig in my music. It's not just this over here, it's also that over there.
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It definitely feels different to perform to people who know your music. Because people's feedback is not just, 'Oh my God, that was amazing. Who are you?'
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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.
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I'm coming from the zone of Faith Evans, but with weird production.
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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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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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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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I'm very into familiar things, popular things. I'm into things that no one seems to know about or be into. I'm trying to draw a line between those two things and make it clear... that it all makes sense to me. That it's not disparate. That it's all one thing inside me.
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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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When I called 'Cut 4 Me' a mixtape, I was thinking about a few elements: One is used instrumentals. The project is more centered around introducing you to an artist; it's not meant to be seminal. It's 'Hi,' 'Hello,' a thing that you first hear.
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I would love to do an album of standards!
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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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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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The most rewarding thing for someone like me is for someone else to find solace through my music.