Kyleigh Has Almost Everything
a look at Nashville soul singer, Kyleigh, as she releases her new EP
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Kyleigh refuses to be confined to a box.
The Nashville singer is multifaceted, with experience in music production and business though her degree at Belmont, the stage, where she acted in musicals throughout her childhood, and even her uncanny ability to replicate various regional accents.
She refuses to adhere to any particular label, especially musically, and feels as if her sound, her will even, is too ambitious to be confined to one area of expertise. Confidence oozes from a clear-spoken voice that isn’t afraid to soar — moments that are well-timed and weave between somber, pining, and energetic throughout her discography.
As such, leaving behind her former artistic persona, Ca$h K, was vital in her emergence as an artist. The urge, over the past two years or so, grew quickly apparent: “I was actually having an existential issue because I felt so misaligned with my name that I was like, ‘What can I do just to feel like this is me and I can continue to grow no matter what me is?’”
Reinventing her image as Kyleigh, just her name, is more in line with who she wants to express as in her music. “Ca$hK” felt infantile, a moniker dubbed in her teens, had to be shed. The name is akin to some of the more vapid connotations. She’s a “baddie,” all about the money, and might even drop a few bars, where Kyleigh is more reigned in. But the music is the same. The hurdle was more mental than a symbol of her sonic landscape or physical presentation.
Inspired by 90’s R&B greats including, most obviously, Alicia Keys, down to the attire and braids, along with Sade and Erykah Badu, the influence carries over not only into her image, but in her approach as well. A strong, silky voice, best appreciated live, is underscored with minimalist production, allowing her to shine in even the coyest of moments. Where these roots are planted firmly, loose topsoil, spur of the moment influences — from a blue, cloudless sky to rainy days or a run of fun pop music on her personal playlist — occasionally inspire Kyleigh’s creativity in the moment.
These influences create an expansive experience that aim to display the inner workings of the soul singer. But, ultimately, the song and dance is a simple one:
“I want to feel good. I want to dance. […] I like to make the music I like to hear. I feel like that’s kind of the biggest thing that drives me.”
But what does it mean to make R&B music in Nashville, a city almost exclusively known for country music? Similar to its origins in the Chitlin Circuit, where names like Jimi Hendrix, Ella Fitzgerald, and Nat King Cole made waves in their early careers, the genre seems to take place exclusively in small clubs. But Kyleigh is optimistic about its, and her, place in the city:
“Nashville’s kinda having this boom right now of expanding its genres, expanding the kind of music it feels like lifting up, and it feels like R&B is one of those that’s been given a platform.”
But if she had to pick a place to give the genre a home?
“Fuck it, we’re just turning the Beast [Basement East] into R&B only.”
While this rock-heavy venue likely won’t be exclusively R&B anytime soon, the sentiment is that the genre could be the focal point for any given venue and succeed. This confidence and resurgence is lead by a new class of talent including Kyleigh and her roommate, vocal powerhouse Summer Joy, along with alternative-kin Jarren Blair, among others.
You can see that willingness in the rollout for Almost Everything. The color palettes are soft and autumnal, the photos often bouncing between sharp clarity and a blurriness revealing a slight hesitance to fully expose the face behind the mask. Kyleigh has a commitment to authenticity, though, in order to mend her image, to separate that fractured version of herself from the music. But in those moments of hesitation, the ideas are clear and the creative direction intentional.
See the supporting material for lead single, “Easy.” In a “you can’t have your cake and eat it too” moment, Kyleigh creates a “love me” cake, a wicked form of alchemy, underscoring this toxic, avoidant attachment. The love interest remains at an arms length, leaving her to eating, or destroying, the cake on the kitchen floor by her lonesome. But this rejection doesn’t go unpunished.
The sentiments carry over to the “Tell Me” teasers that see her drag a bound man through the woods to an arranged set dressing, prominently featuring the very same love-me cake. She pleads her case before the restrained jury before feeding him the cake. “What happens if I love you? Does that still make me home?” she begs in the emotional height of the song. The last few frames, she sits in his arms against a tree, his head slumped — the cake was poisoned. Freedom at last.
These little vignettes, elaborate illustrations of emotions that we’d normally feel guilty about, bring about this sort of cognizance, an acceptance even, of turmoil and offer a penance: not only is it okay to mire and stew in these situations, briefly anyway, the end of them are both nearer than they appear and in the beholder’s hand.
The breadth of Almost Everything is borne from that very thinking. The project is derived from trauma and tuned to acceptance and positivity.
“Confessions,” perhaps the most telling experience of the whole ordeal, seeks truth through a rediscovered faith. The hard shell of doubt — “And I’m trying to keep a secret for a later date, like I’m scared of what’ll happen if I let it all escape” — dissolves over the course of the track as she lays herself bare. Being able to delve deep within one’s self is a superpower, and Kyleigh does it with style.
The upbeat pulsing of “Run” is addicting as she dances around an old, missed connection as they go, run, their separate ways. The thumping bass, beat clap, and the quirky vocal delivery here is reminiscent of a PinkPantheress club cut.
Rounding out the EP with “Everything,” she covets all the pain presented up to this point. “I’m more than what I’ve been through,” feels like the motif of Almost Everything, leaving with an overwhelming sense of gratitude in spite of it all. Pain is central to the development of the soul and by turning the binary of “almost” into a whole, Kyleigh creates a means of appreciation rather than letting the grief for what could’ve been infest and take over.
This appreciation feels very ingrained in nature — seen in the way the sun falls across the horizon, the dew that accumulates on early morning grass, the cool, crisp fall air — as if it is the default or ideal state of the world in which she lives. “Everything is right, here,” and that’s a beautiful circumstance. Healing is a process, and while it is never truly “finished,” the light that peeks through the darkness makes it all worth it for Kyleigh as she provides the world with the first peek into her soul.
Kyleigh’s new EP, Almost Everything, is out today (Nov. 14). She has a headlining show at The Blue Room at Third Man Records on January 31.