Kelly Kiara On Taking Back Power and Her Debut EP, Hopeless Romantic

Kelly Kiara - Hopeless Romantic

Kelly Kiara - Hopeless Romantic

Kelly Kiara was scrolling through her voice memos in Whatsapp when she found an old voicemail from a friend. ”If I’m going to buy a new pair of heels,” the message echoed. “I’m going to buy a new pair of heels, but I’m not going to buy a new pair of heels to impress people.” In all its bitter glory, the message represented was female empowerment. It was the friend that’s always there for when you’re at your most broken. It’s what women have to do to have each other’s backs through heartbreak, and it was also one of the first pieces of inspiration that led Kelly Kiara to pour her hypnotic, unfiltered artistic energy into her debut mixtape, “Hopeless Romantic.”

Now fearless, passionate, and more driven than ever, the Leeds-based singer-songwriter wasn’t always the R&B pop star audiences know today. There was a time in Kiara’s life where music wasn’t her endgame. Before her hit single, "Set Me Up" brought a new fierceness to British pop music, Kiara was working as a recruiter, her dreams of having a musical career long gone until a night of simple video recording led her to become a viral sensation.

Kelly Kiara - Hopeless Romantic

Kelly Kiara - Hopeless Romantic

When Kiara penned an original response to Justin Bieber’s “Love Yourself,” which she titled “Fuck Yourself,” over 30 million Youtube watchers worldwide got the a first look at her aptitude for sultry, raw lyrical takes on heartbreak. In unfiltered realness, which is everything that defines Kiara’s sound now, it was clear that writing music gave a spark to the artist’s life. Once she realized there were people actually listening, music became more than just a hobby, and there was no going back. 

Kiara left her recruiting job and gave herself time to tap into her creative side. What followed was a publishing deal with Universal that led her to write hit singles for artists like Mabel and Gorgon City which proved her versatility for song storytelling. To date, Kelly Kiara has made a name for herself as a recording artist, songwriter, and creative visionary, and her newly released mixtape, Hopeless Romantic, shows exactly how. 

"Everything that I do I want to keep as authentic and in touch as my reality as possible,” Kiara tells Amplify Her Voice. “I'm a relatively private person but I think it's music and my art that gives people a chance to know me without laying everything out on the table and telling everyone everything about what happens in my life.”

Inspired by 90s influences fused with a hypnotizing R&B sound, Kiara’s debut mixtape, Hopeless Romantic, is nothing short of the perfect storybook introduction for audiences to meet the artist for the first time. The record follows the singer-songwriter's journey through heartbreak, anger, and healing, and the discovery of newfound confidence. Sometimes bruised, sometimes sad, but always raw and often empowering, Hopeless Romantic laces R&B music with mesmerizing pop melodies. Featuring her hit singles, “Down 4 U” and “Pretty Girl Style,” the mixtape is a look into how the artist has sacrificed, broke, and rebuilt herself up to make what is an exhilarating and inspiring record.

For Kiara, everything is a story, and every story starts somewhere. Opening up about childhood moments that led to her love for music, how she navigates being the only woman in a creative circle, and proving the importance of female empowerment, Kelly Kiara spoke with Amplify Her Voice about exactly how Hopeless Romantic came to be.

The back story for you always starts with you writing “Fuck Yourself,” and having it go viral, but I know from talking to you that you have a relationship with music that goes further back than that. What was your childhood or even your teenage years like when it comes to what influenced you musically?

My first introduction to music was my mum singing Disney songs to me, or we would sing along to Annie. My mum used to make me sing "Tomorrow,” and I think it was my mom really who encouraged me because I think she saw that music excited me. As I got into my teens, I started listening to more R&B and that drove me in the direction that I've come to today.

When you were that young, did you know that you always wanted to do music professionally in some way?

Yes, it was! I say that with hesitation though because I don't ever remember thinking I'd get to the point where I am now. I just remember thinking that I would make it somehow but I didn't know how to really. There was no blueprint, especially coming from a small town and wanting to make music on a big scale. There was nobody really that had done it before me so it was hard to imagine getting myself to the place where I am now, but I always knew I wanted to sing. I always knew that I wanted to be like the artists I was listening to, but I didn't focus on the end goal.

You started writing songs for other artists. Were there times where you found yourself being the only woman in the room?

I definitely have been in creative environments where I was the only woman on multiple occasions, and the only times where I've been in an environment where it's all-female is when it's been purposely created to be all-female so it's almost like it was orchestrated. It’s not a natural thing to be in a studio with three girls, but I think in terms of the creative process, neither feels different just because it's about me feeling comfortable in the environment, regardless of who is in the room. As a songwriter, it's important to remain fluid, and kind of easy and free-flowing so that creative energy can be reciprocated rather than feeling blocked.

If you come into the room with the emotion that you're in with men or with women, it kind of blocks creativeness. I just try to go with the flow, and if the flow in the room that day is masculine, then it's masculine. If it's feminine, it's feminine but that's doesn't always depend on the gender. I try not to focus too much on who is in the room, but more on the energy of the people and what the energy is feeling like that day and kind of go about it. 

What about when you're not being a songwriter? Have you encountered any challenges as a woman performing in music?

I've been lucky to always have been in sessions with respectful people whether it's male or female, so I've had quite lucky experiences but I have been in meetings with all males which tends to be more ego-drive than the sessions are so I have had the experience of feeling like the only woman in the room, but I use that to my advantage and I use my femininity in the same way that a man would use his masculinity. I don't mind contrasting because I don't feel like I need to meet a man on his level to be respected. I just bring who I am authentically and filter out anything that's misogynist, rude, or inappropriate which sometimes it can be. 

Sadly, the music industry isn’t always about the music, but oftentimes, more about how women look. Do you think your journey with self-love and confidence has ever faltered because of that?

I think my journey with self-love started when I was very young. I've always had a great support system around me. My mum and dad have always been supportive of the way that I look and made sure I was healthy. I was brought up in a household where food is a celebration and everybody eats together and a lot of my acceptance in self-love and how I look was from that environment. I had always felt happy and confident, so when I got into my teens, that confidence kind of helped me through.

I'd say when I was in high school and people like Paris Hilton were the "in-look," a bit of my confidence shifted in regards to my weight which is quite natural for any girl going through puberty. I don't think there's a single girl who wouldn't say they experienced that! I was always kind of curvy though and I think I struggled with being labeled as "the bigger one" or "the curvy one" and with those terms. Because I grew up with my mum and my dad not putting terms on my body and telling me what I was or what I wasn't. It just was not focused on at all, so then when you get to high school where everyone was focused on how they look, it did make me feel different. I started to wear baggy clothing, but as I had left school and got more into the real world with the real world and people of all different backgrounds and different cultures, I started to appreciate my similarities and differences within the wider world.

Kelly Kiara - Hopeless Romantic

Kelly Kiara - Hopeless Romantic

As I've gotten older, my self-love and acceptance come from who I am on the inside, what my character is, my loyalty to people, and all the things I love about myself that have nothing to do with the way I look on the outside. I pride myself more on that rather than the way that I look which helps me with a lot of my confidence because my confidence doesn't come from the way that I look. It comes from knowing who I am inside.

You said that you sacrificed a lot to make this record, so I wanted to ask you if you went through heartbreak to make Hopeless Romantic, and how did you get yourself through that pain in order to make the music that you did? 

Yes, I definitely went through heartbreak during the making of Hopeless Romantic, and I think that's why I love this EP so much. It's my first body of work to gift to people that want to listen and that's what makes it really precious to me, but also super precious because it is also completely authentic moments from my life that are now turned into music. so it is really special and I have sacrificed a lot to put all my energy into the song, rather than put my energy into overthinking or crying or all the things that you go when you break up with somebody, and it's just having to find a way to focus that energy for me. I tend to be hard on myself and when I find that I'm being hard on myself, I try to allow myself to feel all the things that I'm feeling. Whether that's me not wanting to work for the day, or just crying in bed, or wanting to be proactive, I just allow myself to be whatever it is on the day, and that's how I kind of get over how I'm feeling because sometimes pretending like you're not feeling something just prolongs the journey. I classify it more like a journey rather than an activity to be done and forcing myself to write about something that maybe I'm not ready to write about at that moment. I just try to take it easy!

Do you have any advice for women who want to be in music?

Yes! My advice would be - Don't just study one aspect of music because what I've found is that the people I've met that are successful in the music industry regardless of their role, they tend to know a lot about all aspects of music, rather than just one. So surround yourself with people who do what you want to do. Surround yourself with people who know the things you want to know, and absorb as much information from everything as possible and I think after a while, that will help you figure out your own track in what you want to do and who you want to become in music.


Hopeless Romantic is available for streaming now on all platforms.


Learn more about Kelly Kiara
Website | Instagram | Twitter | YouTube | Spotify

Follow

Contact
hello@amplifyhervoice.org