“I was like, ‘I want my ones and twos, and that’s it,’ ” he says. Instead, it was the unmistakable confidence fueling his showmanship, which finally mirrored the assured and sprightly pulse of his music.Īs someone who came up DJ’ing in Montreal’s experimental hip-hop scene, Kaytranada says he used to judge other DJs for “overdoing it” onstage. Paak the second - all Kaytranada collaborators whose relationships with the producer extend beyond the studio. It wasn’t just that lasers shot out of that head as he danced playfully to hits spanning his discography or how he hyped up the crowd while premiering his remix of Beyoncé’s 2022 disco-funk banger, “CUFF IT.” Nor was it the guest appearances from Kali Uchis and Aminé the first weekend or H.E.R., Tinashe and Anderson. But there was something different about the Kaytranada who DJ’d in front of a giant sculpture of his own head during a prime-time slot at Coachella’s massive Outdoor Theatre. Since he caught the internet’s attention with early SoundCloud remixes of Missy Elliott and TLC, along with a freewheeling, widely memed 2013 Boiler Room set filmed in Montreal that has amassed 19 million YouTube views (Top comment: “This party should have its own Wikipedia page”), Kaytranada’s vibrant dance music has captivated audiences across the world. What has become known as the “Kaytranada sound” - a term he feels sometimes boxes him into the past - lies in the tension between the comfort of nostalgia and the excitement of the future, and has earned him collaborations with artists he aspired to be like growing up, like Pharrell Williams. Kaytranada has jokingly called his music “Black tropical house” and “futuristic disco,” though today, speaking to Billboard, he describes it as “a new era of new jack swing.” And there is a definitive swing that distinguishes his production style, which borrows from elements of the Haitian dance genre compas, including the slightly off drum placements that imprint his otherwise sleek productions with a soulful, human touch. In the process, he also became one of the biggest gay Black artists in a genre of increasingly influential music founded by gay Black artists. Over the course of two albums, 2016’s 99.9% and 2019’s Grammy-winning Bubba, he established himself as a go-to producer and deft collaborator, a singular artist able to adapt his sound to the strengths of everyone from hip-hop stars like Chance the Rapper to experimental R&B singers like Kelela while still maintaining his distinct style: a feel-good blend of dance, R&B, Afrobeats, disco and hip-hop. Prior to his Coachella performance, there was little disputing Kaytranada’s accomplishments behind the scenes, where he had cultivated a reputation as a personally reserved but musically boisterous tastemaker. Kaytranada: Photos From the Billboard Cover Shoot
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |