It was something that stressed me out even months after the end but eventually I reached this cleansed feeling and I was like, I’m so glad you’re history now.
For most people who’ve ever been in love, heartbreaks are soul-crushing. They leave you lost and nostalgic, for Kayla Grace her heartbreak allowed her to become a new person. In our conversation with Kayla, we talk about processing emotions through music, sonic influences, and childhood experiences that shaped her sense of soul-searching.
Hi Kayla, how are you today?
Hiii I’m great thank you hehe. Sitting with my demonic cat currently.
We love your new single, Dumped—tell us about the inspiration behind it?
Dumped was written as an anti valentines day anthem. It came to life when I was scrolling TikTok on my cat’s account and stumbled upon someone I didn’t want to see (I had blocked them on my main account but not on my cats). For me, I like to think of it as a reminder to drop anything that isn’t serving you and to enter your self-love era because it’s the best lol. I wrote it about a really complicated emotional situation that I thankfully escaped. I’m kinda savage when I talk about it now. I think anger is an easier emotion to feel than sadness so I ran with it.
Which artists influence your songwriting and what do you admire specifically about them?
There’s a crazy amount of amazing songwriters that I adore at the moment, Leith Ross, Samia, Soccer Mommy, and Gracie Abrams to name a few. I think the thing they all have in common is the complete authenticity of the lyrics and how you can feel the emotion that was around when they were writing them just by listening. Sometimes my songs get me in trouble but I don’t care because writing is so cathartic for me and the most important thing is for it to be true to how I’m feeling even if it’s scary.
If you could collaborate with one other artist who would it be and why?
If I could collaborate with any artist in the world it would unsurprisingly be The 1975. I feel like they’re like sentimentally significant for me because they’re the reason I first picked up one of my dad’s guitars and felt cool doing it. They are also just simply the best band in the world lol.
When did you know you wanted to pursue music as a career? And was there a defining moment?
I always knew I wanted to do something in music, even when I was 12 and would sing into my blackberry camera and my mum told me I was terrible and should focus on my academic subjects. Eventually, I accepted defeat but then rekindled my love for music when I actually started writing my own songs about the evil people from my school. I was having my first revenge era. I think ever since then I was like yeah sure let me give it a stab. I’m so glad I did
What’s the biggest challenge you’ve faced so far in life?
I don’t know if I can pinpoint the single most difficult challenge in my life but I would probably just say my entire childhood was challenging and traumatic. I grew up in a very toxic household and the aftermath of that affects my everyday life now that I’m technically an adult somehow. I guess just surviving till 16 was my biggest challenge. That sounded dark soz.
Where do you see yourself in five years?
In five years I think I’ll be touring and wearing all the cool outfits I never got as a kid and I’ll have a tutu for every day of the week and a ball pit on the stage for when I feel like having a dip of nostalgia. I think I’ll have put an album out too like the best, saddest, angriest album of all time lol.
If you could have someone play you in a movie about your life, who would it be? And why?
I actually am famously terrible at names in the movie world despite doing an A level in film studies. I couldn’t even name one except Jennifer Lawrence or something. Actually yeah I’m gonna say Jennifer Lawrence anyway because I was embarrassingly obsessed with The Hunger Games at the start of Year 7 and I intentionally made it my personality trait. She’s also great at being angry lol.
Thanks,
Kayla Grace xoxo
