Alan: Could you tell me what your relationship to North Carolina is? I know that you're a local artist, so I'd love to hear more about that.
KHX05: I'm actually Gullah Geechee, so my family is from the Carolinas originally. So that's where my roots really are in West Africa and Central Africa. I'm originally from upstate New York. I moved here when I was around 11 to get away from the city I was in. It just kind of got really rough. So it was just like, we're going to move y'all to the South where your family is. So I've been here since like 2008. I went to school in Kerry Middle School and High School, and after graduating started dancing professionally in the area. So my mentor, she had a studio in Durham and so she gave me free training in ballet and all these styles, and she was like, “Join my company, I love your energy.” And so I was with her for years. And I want to say about 2018, through something like backup dancing for a friend, I got into music. That's the point I met my friend's producer at the time named Maxville from Raleigh. He asked me if I ever thought about doing music or anything like that. I was like, nah. But he was like come to my studio, like, let's just be creative. So I went to a studio close to downtown Raleigh and I remember having a notebook of poetry that I have from high school and he had this beat. And then I kind of read what was in the poetry book, and then before we knew it we had an EP. I think I was with him for like a week, and then that started the KHX05 music journey.
A: That's awesome. I’d love to hear you describe your artist persona and the energy that you bring to your music.
KHX05: So I like to say I create Afro-futurist music. KHX05 is like a system of a world of worlds ultimately. So it's like KHX05, the entity who was just like a being that I created to honestly kind of tap into parts of myself that I wasn't letting out into the world, that I didn't know how to. And like, pieces of myself that had eternal conflict, and just felt very unseen, and so KHX05 came out of that, but also from this book that I was writing in high school. I was really into fantasy and stuff so I had this book that I was writing called A Son of Cruel Worlds. Yeah, it was just about this kid in the middle of the cosmos and these multiple worlds called the cruel worlds. It's pretty much loosely based on my experience being a black trans kid, you know, and living under imperialism and capitalism all these really gross things, so the music really encompasses the story of that and just the world around us, while also making it fantastical and making it a very punk kind of sci-fi.
The sounds are really drawn to jungle and drum and bass. The drum syncopations especially, there's just something about it that feels ancestral when I hear them. Being an African person the drum syncopations like, channel different energies and ancestors. So I've been producing, especially with this project I'm about to release a lot of that. And it's music is also a spiritual part of me; so a big thing for me is that the music I make is also like I'm normally playing with different drum syncopations on purpose because I know they invoke certain energies. I'm learning how to change the frequencies and songs so that I can have them all on a certain thing because music, like words, are like manifestations.
A: Yeah, I totally get what you mean about the way you bring that energy out of people. I mean, your one song “On The Run” is so intense, whenever I'm in the gym I'll just be playing that because it really gets me going. Have you had the opportunity to perform any live shows around the area?
KHX05: Yes, I just played Cat’s Cradle for this event called Dyke Night and it was a night of drag queens and pump bands and I was a special guest artist and that was really good. Especially because that morning the police at UNC came in and arrested students, so you know you have a lot of shit happening with UNC and pigs and stuff so it was good to be able to share space with these folks. And we're like, “We're going to get through this.” Like, there's a real crowd here. But like also, you know, when we come into spaces like that, we channel something that gives us more strength to go out and be like, all right, love what the fuck is actually good. So, yeah, that was a good show. I'm going to be doing some more shows in the summer. I'm going to be in Atlanta and Europe at some point. So I'm excited for more shows.
This is something I really love, just as dance being my first love, like that was the first thing that really got me creative. So being able to have interactions with people while I'm performing is like my favorite things to do.
A: I saw you've done some dance videos online, which like you had that whole big group of people, doing choreo. Can you tell me a little bit about that?
KHX05: Yeah, that was a little choreography video for “On The Run.” So those folks that were dancing, the choreographers, one of them is like someone I grew up dancing with. So there's this dance workshop called NC Underground that happens in Durham and pretty much just a workshop. It was started by Bernadine Fields who is a local choreographer and teacher. She was my second dance mentor. And so pretty much she holds spaces for different choreographers locally and from like the West Coast to come and teach these workshops. And so those folks were folks that I used to, like, just dance with. And so I've always wanted to bring my music to those spaces and just be around my friends who dance. So I was like, you know what? Let's do a choreography video. You know, people know I'm a dancer. Let's show them a little bit of what happens. So I hit up Luna, who's an amazing choreographer and King, who's also another local artist who's pretty genius. And they're like already they're doing great things on the West Coast. They're like on their shit right now and up and coming dancers. So yeah, that was a beautiful experience. I hope to do more choreography in my music videos. They'll definitely come probably later down the line because it's just been giving a lot of just like touring, like doing the shows, balancing life out and whatnot. So I haven't really made time for rehearsals. Like if I want to do choreography, I want to be in the rehearsals, building the energies.
A: You now have a new single out. Could you tell me about what direction you're taking it?
KHX05: So the next single is called “Bring It On.” It's a pop punk jungle hybrid, and pretty much it's a resistance song– it literally birthed out of me struggling with substance abuse and being in this place to where I felt like I wasn't going to be able to beat my addiction or anything like that. Just staying in this really, really down place I was in at the time. And like I was making it big and I made this beat and I was like, you know what, this beat is really aggressive and I'm going like I need to like say something and you know, and I think I remember just being like, “you know what? Fuck it, bring it on.” And I was like, okay, but we're going to run with this. And then also the movie Bring It On– it's ultimately like a 90s classic cheerleader movie. You know, there's a specific scene in it where the guy that likes her gives her this tape. And she placed the tape and she's in her room. And you know, she's like on the bench, oh, this is cute, and then she gets up and starts dancing on the fucking bed. And so it’s inspired by that moment in the movie to where she's just alone and dancing like noise in the room so it's a little bit of this kind of, like, no matter where you are, no matter what situation you're in, you got this and that you know you just kind of got to put on your battle face or your funny face and just like, you know, say I'm gonna dance to this and I'm gonna fight through this. I'm gonna keep pushing. It's also a song that reflects the times of where we are, so I mentioned undocumented folks in a song, I mentioned the black trans experience. Yeah, it is a short song; I think it also has replay value to be able to go back and listen to be like, okay I heard it once. Let me just digest this some more and more and more. Yeah, I’ve performed the song at some spaces, and every time I do people lose their shit, which I love because it means that it's resonating, and one thing I recently have been trying to do as an artist is be more authentic to my experience, especially now that I'm producing. I feel like my first EP was very fantastical, and with this project I wanted it to be very stripped and just true to my experiences and what I actually feel on an everyday basis.
Listen to her new single here: http://nevernormal.us/bringiton
