Name: Kanga
Nationality: American
Occupation: Producer, songwriter, vocalist
Current release: Kanga's new album Under Glass is out now on Artoffact.

If you enjoyed this interview with Kanga, visit her official website. She is also on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. For an even deeper dive into her thoughts and concepts, read our earlier Kanga interview.



In many respects, there is a red line leading straight from your debut album to the new material. Still, looking back, You and I Will Never Die, with its anthemic melodies and less emphasis on distortion in the sound design, feels a bit like a turning point. How do you look back on it today?

Each album is essentially a snapshot of my life at that point. I’ve always tried to be really authentic to that instead of trying to recreate the same album over and over again. As a listener, I have always found that really boring.

The artists I connect to and that have had the biggest impact on me tend to meander through styles and genres. This has always felt more authentic to me. It’s maybe not the most commercially intelligent way to go about making music because sometimes it doesn’t lead to feeding a wider audience the same vibe they’re used to.

But I suppose the process of this project has been more about creating a storyline where listeners can tune into whatever era of KANGA touches them. I’ve noticed that my more casual listeners tend to like the more heavy and impersonal songs whereas those that consider themselves “fans” generally resonate with the more intimate tracks. You and I was really my attempt to move towards connecting with a tighter and more invested fanbase and I think that’s what ultimately happened.

But I think you are right, however, to point out the line that crosses through each of my releases. I think it follows my process of becoming more vulnerable and less risk averse.

Self Titled was my stepping into the scene, …



Eternal Daughter EP was me creating something from start to finish on my own, …



You and I was me fully delving into uncomfortable vulnerability.



And now Under Glass is my development into a more powerful and less victimized mindset during the creation process.

I've followed your music for a while. Still, the sound of the new pieces came as quite a surprise to me. Tell me about the motivations, inspirations and decisions which lead you to these songs and your approach to writing them, Please.

I feel that my previous releases were all products of very chaotic and insecure times in my life. And although I am very proud of how they turned out, and even how they allowed me to heal from those times, it was really important for me to make an album that explored different perspectives.

In essence, this album came out of a ‘healthier’ headspace. I didn’t feel like I had anything to prove or anyone to cuss out, for that matter, so I wanted to see what would happen if I just sat down and wrote. And each time that happened, something different came out. I had no preconceived intention of style for any of these tracks so everything that came out was just a pure expression of creativity.

Someone pointed out that the title Under Glass could reference something like a scientist, looking at my own thoughts under petri glass under a microscope. I hadn’t thought about it like that before but I think it’s an apt analogy.

On your previous albums, the key words seemed to be “intensity” and “exploration.” On Under Glass, the focus appears to be a bit more on “detail” and “songwriting.” How would you yourself describe the creative development and possible shifts in what interests and excites you?

I think that’s a great way of describing the sonic vibe.

As I said prior, I think the attention to detail and songwriting was something that I didn’t really have the bandwidth for during my previous releases. I felt like those albums were a lot of me showcasing myself as a producer, but with everything, there’s only so much one person could do.

Since I worked in collaboration on this record it allowed me to relinquish the responsibility of agonizing over everything and gave me the freedom to really hone in on elements of music making that I didn’t have the bandwidth to really focus on before. It was really important for me to actually SING, and be more deliberate with that as a focal point with these songs.

I really wanted to hear my own voice in a new environment, and that’s why I think this album will potentially appeal more to listeners who are more inclined to songwriting and storytelling music.

Most of the material on the pre-released tracks are essentially love songs – a very typical pop song topic. And yet, few things in life can be as dark and deep as love because it touches our very foundation as human beings. What was it like to open up this much in the lyrics?

Well, to be blunt about it, Under Glass was the first album I’ve ever written where I wasn’t actively “in love” during the process. My mind was so obsessively cluttered with love and heartbreak for so long that now I feel like I had some breathing room to think about other things.

Don’t get me wrong, I think love and heartbreak is an endless well of creative inspiration, but I needed to see if I could be creative without that as the sole driving force. I was actually sort of concerned going into the writing of this record because I was scared that I might have lost “it”- the source of my creativity, and I didn’t know if I could step it up without that driving factor.

I feel like my creative breakthrough was being able to tap into a pure form of creativity that was just sort of in the moment free association.

Ironically, the song ‘Dark Lullaby’ is about being there and comforting someone else who is in pain. I can’t escape my tendency towards dark emotional overtones but I felt it was actually pretty liberating to write a dark sad song where I wasn’t the main character.



For this album, you worked with Josh Franks and David Adrounie aka Wavey Davey. What are your thoughts on collaborating with outside producers and how do the original songs produced in your studio compare to the finished pieces?

This was the first time I have ever worked in collaboration with the production side of things and honestly, it really allowed me to open up to focussing on other elements of track writing (like I had mentioned earlier).

Essentially the flow of this record was that I would sit down and produce a two minute song and record some demo vocals - usually a verse, pre-chorus, and chorus. I’d get it to a place where I could be like yeah, this is a good idea and this is still a KANGA track. Then I’d pass it off to Dave and Josh and they’d really flesh it out, replace some of the sounds, add melodies, new instruments, essentially taking a demo to a fully fleshed out instrumental.

There are a couple tracks that were all Dave demos though, ‘Under Glass’, ‘Romance’, and ‘Magnolia’. I think our production process gave him that inspiration to write those instrumentals but have them still be very true to my own style, while also showing his creative brilliance as well.



For many songwriters and producers, the cost of working in an external studio can seem an obstacle. What do you remember about the recording process and how did going into a different physical space with different tools at your disposal changed the music?

Well, this was my first official “studio album”. This was the first time I physically walked into a studio and was recorded. It was great because even in the recording process I had two other pairs of ears to give feedback and direction. It actually allowed me to feel more free in experimenting vocally because I could hear myself on a clean system and get help with places I had trouble with.

I didn’t have this for my other two records, so obviously I don’t think it takes a professional studio and a high budget to make a good album, but it did allow the record to feel less like I was just talking to myself, which as a solo artist, tends to be the case. At least if you’re in a band you have more brains to develop ideas with.

Solo artists can fall into the trap of just staying in their own heads, which is great too. But I really wanted to have more of a collaborative flow this time around.

Specifically with regards to the drum programming, I'd be curious how things worked for Under Glass – the beats do sound very different from previous releases. What were some of your considerations, perhaps even outside inspirations, from other tracks or artists?

This is actually a great observation because I really left a lot of the drum creations up to Dave and Josh. I would make a beat that had a vibe and a rhythm but I wouldn’t agonize over it so that I could free up my mental space. I basically just wrote some drum parts and told them, “have at it”.

I think that’s a specific instance of a cool thing that can develop when you relinquish some control and let other people have fun with the music.

To me, the title track is the highlight of the album – it has an otherworldly quality to it thanks to the lyrics and the vocal harmonies, yet the sequencer propulsion gives it an undeniable physical energy. From earliest ideas to the finished song, how did that come together?

That track is definitely the highlight of our collaborative efforts.

Dave produced the track and sent it over to me and I was like, “This is beautiful but it needs to cook.” That track wouldn’t have worked without a painstaking writing process. It was cool because I was like, “ok I don’t have to worry about the instrumental, it’s already great. But since my job is now solely how do I bring this all together, I really have to sit on this.”

It took several attempts but when the vocals came together it was a unanimous, “this is it”.