Talking to: Luna Kali
Out of all the artists I have interviewed, Luna Kali has, by far, been the richest and most enjoyable conversation. An artist who has recently released a debut EP – True Colours, played in numerous jams and bands and is a really familiar face in the Bristol music scene. The remarkable thing about the Angolan-Cape Verdean artist, beyond her talents, is the vulnerability she showcases. Not just in her music, but as you’re about to find out, in conversation and through her everyday actions.
For someone at the beginning of their artist journey, there’s an outstanding level of self awareness and consequently an ongoing flow of valuable life lessons that come from that. The EP itself is delicate, beautiful and well-rounded, you hear everything Luna possesses in her toolkit of musical talents. Yet still, there’s way more to it, it’s a release you will have to listen through multiple times to understand fully, or perhaps hear from Luna herself…
Firstly congratulations on the release of ‘The Colour I Am’, how has the reception been so far?
It’s been pretty amazing.. especially since it’s been 3 years waiting to release stuff. Ever since I started gigging or even since coming to Bristol, people keep saying “when’s your music coming out?”
I have been waiting and these people have been waiting – both from here [Bristol] and back home in Lisbon. So the reception from everyone has been so nice!
Where did your music journey start? You mention there about Lisbon…
I was born and raised in Lisbon, African parents; mum is from Cape Verde, dad is from Angola. My dad is a musician, a saxophonist. My mum, before she was a nurse, used to be a dancer so there was always music around the house. Like all the time, Mum would never clean without music and she’s a clean freak. I was always dancing around, Dad would always practice and when he had to, he always practiced in my room. He would go from his bedroom to mine and I would stand outside listening or go inside and listen into him practicing. Mum would be singing and dancing around the house.
I was raised Catholic so we would go to church, we had loads of music there and that’s where I started learning. I got curious about singing and playing guitar at school then eventually when I was around 9/10, my mum put me in this fancy conservatory music school. She was like “you clearly love this, do you want to keep doing this?”. I was like “yeah I could do this!”. So I went there and did 8 years of classical music and eventually came here to go for BIMM.
You said there’s been a quite a wait for this project, ‘three years’, has that wait actually been longer?
Yeah, way longer than that, I started writing music at 15. I was writing little tunes and silly things at 12 but actual tunes came around at 15. So it’s been 6 years since that. Throughout this whole time I was asked “when are we going to be able to listen to your stuff?” so this is the first time I can show my family and friends. I finally have stuff and you can listen to me
Your single release gig was at The Galli[maufry], how did that go and what was the choice to have this gig at such a venue?
First of all, it went really well, and I was really happy that we had Amri supporting us. She is a British-Indian artist and she is awesome, both her parents are Indian and she’s lived in many places. It was awesome having her there and the lineup was just POC women which is fucking lush! It’s very rare to see that at gigs so it meant a lot to have her there. She definitely brought the vibes as well.
The reason why I chose to have the release gig at the Galli was for a couple of reasons. One of them is the fact I work there and have been going there for two years now after going to a Family Business jam. That’s where most my friends are and where I made most of my close music friends. It’s where I started developing as a new artist and writing the tunes I am now, so it just made sense.
Also James is a really good friend and when I told him I was making music, he was super happy to have me there as well.
It was so weird, the actual gig, because we had merch… we had a whole new set.. our keys player was playing for the first time with us… my old drummer had his last gig with us… so there were a lot of emotions at that gig.
You speak about a lot of new stuff there, does this feel like a new beginning for yourself as an artist
It really does. I feel like for the longest time I was wondering around; I knew what I was doing but at the same time I didn’t. Whereas this time around, music is out, EP is coming out, now we have a new drummer and keys player. It feels like a new band really. It feels like I’m growing up as an artist. The things I’m talking about now aren’t at all the same things I was writing about 3/4 years ago. The songs sound different… the chord changes.. I feel like I’m way more intentional with the music I am writing now.
Before it was like “oh yeah this sounds nice”, do the same three chords throughout the whole song and chat about a boy I like. Now, I am getting way more upfront about how I feel, a lot of the songs I wrote were really scary to write as I had no idea if people were going to like this. It’s so different from what I usually do. There’s a tune we do in our set where I don’t even play guitar, and I haven’t ever done that. It was written for keys and I could play guitar on it but I don’t really want to. I want to focus more on my vocals and vocal performance, usually I never feel like the songs I write would reflect my singing style, it’s more about “this is a nice song” rather than “this is what I want to sing”.
Let’s go straight into the EP, there’s a lot to cover especially the vulnerability you have shown as an artist, and we’ll get more into that. So ‘The Colour I Am’, I love this track and the ongoing use of colour to depict this crossroads moment you have in a relationship. How did this use of colour come about?
It is kind of funny this is the first song I released. When I was a teenager in Lisbon I went through this deep depression state and it took years and years for me to get out of that episode. Depression kind of stays with you but that was deep. All of my memories and all of my days would look, in my mind, black and white. I don’t know how to explain that, it felt numb, it felt dull, everything was the same and there was no joy. It was this really dark period, when I looked at my life, it was all in black and white.
When I moved to Bristol and I had more freedom to be who I wanted to be (without the pressure of my old friends and family). I could then, not become someone new, but reveal the parts of me that I never felt safe to. One of the main things is, I love doing silly things with my hair, I love wearing colours that don’t necessarily match. I told myself my days from now on would be colourful all the time. This came in different expressions, I would wear really extravagant makeup to a normal ass day at uni because I wanted to, the little butterflies and trinkets I’d wear in my hair, my henna, way too much blush… things like these that for other people may not make sense but to me it does.
So the song… I was dating this guy at the time and we were looking to plan a future with each other and the lyrics say “I want to be able to plan my future with you” but in the picture of what my life looks like, I don’t even know what colour I am or what the full drawing looks like so how the hell can I do that with you?
Then it also comes into my mixed background, living in a world where people treat you differently, or in weird ways you’re celebrated or stomped on just because of the colour you are. I’m still figuring all of that out. Turns out my grandmother (Dad’s mum) was fully Indian, I had no idea. I was navigating that and trying to figure out who I was. In Portugal I was never seen as mixed, I was seen as black. Also I was 19 at the time, thinking how the hell do I live on my own and figure out all this stuff? I was trying to find myself through all of that, he was like let’s plan our lives, I was like “let’s back down, I’m still figuring myself out”
Keeping with this colour theme, ‘Yellow Mellow’, for me, a neo soul groover, slow and steady yet throughout the track it heats up a bit. Cast over that you’ve got this wonderful simmering wordplay on the chorus, bouncing about, you can imagine like water on a hot pan. That combination, collection of talents, how has that come together and how has your journey as an artist brought that together?
As I grew up with my Dad playing Cape Verdean and Angolan music, so that’s what I was hearing at my house. The way they saw it, I was being rebellious by going into pop, hip hop, neo soul and RnB. That’s what I was loving as a teenager. In the eyes of my family, because my Dad is doing it I should learn, as I’m Cape Verdean and Angolan, as a musician it’s my duty to learn these things. In my mind, I was like “I’m a teenager and I like hip hop, leave me alone”.
Funnily enough I wrote this during Covid when I was 16/17, when I was looking at this song as we produced it I was very inspired by the FKJ tune ‘Why Are There Boundaries’ - at that time I was obsessed with FKJ and Masego. [Yellow Mellow] was inspired by that style of productions, where you’re sat in that room listening to them play, like a Tiny Desk concert only for you.
The whole vibe of the song is a Sunday night before work, before everything implodes, we have to start the working week and what is my brain thinking in those moments. But because it was Covid, it was a regular ass Monday night so the lyrics are Sunday vibes on a Monday night, it feels like it’s a weekend the whole week but you still have to work.
The song really talks about what I was feeling at the time. One of the questions I ask is what do you do in the morning? I question - do you want to sit on the couch and do nothing or go outside for a walk just because you need a breather? It feels like a lot of drama when you’re sat alone in your bedroom but if you get outside you’ll see there’s more perspective to your life. At the same time I wasn’t really loving the country I was living in, the environment I was in, the friends I had at the time. I was still figuring out who I was and who I wanted around me.
When it came to production, I couldn’t distinguish myself between the singer and the producer, they were always connected within each other. I could never separate them, when I see myself making music, in my mind I am both. It was never “oh I’ll just pair up with a producer”, from the get go it was all about learning it. Doing this EP was really about teaching myself how to mix, how to produce, how do I now make this the Luna Kali sound and how do I want to put this out?
You talk there about how your songs were already decided, it’s more about your journey and how you’ve picked up the skills along the way, seeing production in a different light, being both [a singer and producer] and being great at both. How long has that process being going for, how long has this EP been in the works?
For so long… let’s start on “The Colour I Am”, you know when you get the memories pop up on your phone? Apparently I started recording the song 2 years ago, the first ever ‘lets try and see what this would sound like’ was two whole years ago. This is when I decided to release the song. When I moved to Bristol I said I was going to do an album, and I spoke about said album for ages. Before that I really wanted to release tunes but I just didn’t know how. Really, I’ve had it in my mind to release this songs for four years now, but nothing’s happened.
The reason why is it just wasn’t the right time, I wanted to do it immediately but everyone was like “no let’s sit down and think about this”. I’d respond with “but I just want to put them out there, I have the songs, I have the recordings, can I not just mix them and release?”. I’d get told to sit down and have a breather. I didn’t really understand why as I was so impatient. Looking back at it, God it was good that I’m only releasing these now.
In my final project of uni I did an EP. That was my dissertation and the whole point of it was to record them, how to be an expert at recording in the sound I wanted to [achieve] and to teach myself how to mix. I did a bit of mixing here and there and it was ok but in my mind I had to take this seriously. Mixing for the first time for something you care about can be so daunting, I’d tell myself theres no way I’m leaving uni without knowing how to mix.
These mixes, these tunes – apart from ‘Lotus Flower’ – I’ve had these mastered since August. Ive played them to my friends, my Mum, my Auntie, my cousins but I didn’t really have an idea what to do with them, I had no idea if I was going to do an EP or keep going with the album (which was the original idea) – do more tracks or just keep to the three.
It was a really long process in figuring out what the Luna Kali brand is, do we do music videos… The music video is coming out and man this video is taking ages! As it’s the first time we’ve done this. We had a couple meetings with a team of four of us, no one had done a video of this scale. I had to save loads of money and fundraise, my family and friends from back home also helped. We had to record it, plan it all, get all the resources we needed, book the venues..
The main part of the video loads of paint is flying around and people are throwing paint balloons to the walls behind me making it look like theyre being thrown at me. So we were thinking how logistically can we do this, how will it look? Even the editing, we didn’t know what to expect, it took ages to figure out what the Luna Kali brand looked like and match the visual to the sound whilst making sure it all makes sense.
I made so many mistakes on the way… I lost so many USB sticks that just disappeared, one got broken, a few lost, my computer almost got wiped out twice. Throughout the years I lost so much music, it would just be gone and I didn’t know what to do. I had to start over loads of times, figure out what tunes I really wanted to do. We did so many recordings of ‘The Colour I Am’, there are 7 versions of the recording as it wasn’t working – it didn’t sound like me. It sounded like I was trying to be so many other people but the journey for us to get there was a long one and a great one at the same time. Once it was done, it was done! We know now, instead of having to search for it, we know now what we want it sound like. That’s kind of why it’s been so long as throughout it there’s been a few bumps on the road.
When and where were you when you felt like it was done? And how did that feel most importantly?
Realistically… last week. The last tune we have on the EP is ‘Lotus Flower’. Keep in mind, I had the other 3 ready in August. In the last year I’ve been telling myself “Luna we need to figure out Lotus Flower, what it sounds like. We have got to restart the process of recording” but throughout this whole time I’d be like “No, im writing loads of new music, I want to focus on that”. So I’m fighting with myself over focusing on the old music and putting it out but also look at all the cool stuff I’m writing.
After ages, I now have a new manager – funnily enough she’s a friend from back home, we went to same high school. She messaged me – her name’s Sarah, she is lovely – and I was telling her “Ive been really struggling to finish the EP, I want to put at least one more song, I want it to be this one but I don’t know what it looks like”.
She sat me down and said “Luna we have to figure it out, let’s put in a date, decide that’s when the EP is going to be out and work backwards. 20th June is when we’re aiming for it to be out. We have got to promote it and send it to distribution – so that’s a month. We have to mix and master, a couple weeks, then record, produce it and do all the versions you want to do. So that’s technically two months away.”
I looked at her, thinking two months, realistically that’s nothing. I have one month to do the song, in my mind that’s way too short as it took me the whole year to do ‘The Colour I Am’. How am I going to do this whole song in a month? Where am I going to record, do I have the money to record, who is going to mix it, am I going to mix it… id love to but I don’t know! Eventually we recorded it in my friend Toby’s bedroom, as he has a pretty nice studio in there. It is literally just vocals and guitars – that’s it.
And it is beautifully raw, as the title suggests you’ve gone for a really delicate vibe with this. Straight away the opening vocal is raw, vulnerable but lyrically very self assuring. Overall this track really amplifies your vocal ability and timing, those abilities and skills, does performing live really help with that?
Oh for sure, so the way we did this whole EP, we performed these songs so many times with so many variables. Especially with ‘Lotus Flower’ I picked up all these versions we had to then make this new one. When I wrote it for the first time in a studio session in collaboration with a producer, he said “I have a studio session, come and write something”. I was one month out of this relationship, I was 19, I was figuring out my feelings, what I wanted and didn’t want. I kept telling myself to keep on going, keep on going. You’re still great and just because a boy said you weren’t, that doesn’t mean you’re not.
The lyrics from ‘Lotus Flower’ came through me finding out that literally lotus flowers only grow from swamps and mud. From all that yucky, grey ickiness comes out a pretty-ass flower and I was like “bitch I love that, I fucking love that”. Eventually I tattooed it on my body, I was obsessed with it and wanted to write a song about it.
Those timings, the syncopation came from workshopping it with the band, through gigging. But when I released it I wanted it to just be me and the guitar. Let’s strip it back, no drums, no backing vocals – because we had a three part harmony in it. Literally we were in the studio, my mate Toby said “play this song” whilst I had my classical guitar that I wrote it with. And I just played it, he was like “cool we’re recording it”.
Part of me was like what, a tune with no bass, no drums, just me and a guitar? At the same time?! I was like “fuck!” but also “don’t cry, don’t cry”, trying to hold my shit together. It is literally what you are listening to, the guitar and vocals were done in one take. There was no comping apart from the bit at the end. The rest was one take, so there’s little bits where words are pronounced how I wanted it to be, but that’s kind of what makes it. That’s’ why I love it. Then I had two days to mix it, before I went off to a festival. Finished mixing it, sent it off and got it two days ago on Saturday.
Honestly that one for me is one of my favourite’s but coming in hot at second place, because of the vibe is ‘Fliphone’. There’s definitely an RnB, Destiny’s Child’s vibe. Amongst the other tracks on the album, it’s more an uplifting one in a way of strutting your stuff. But throughout, you have got this theme of choosing family and life’s activities in your own personal journey over the materialistic side. Is that for you a life mantra or rather an inner self dialogue?
I’d say both. That’s my version of “I’m a bad bitch” song. I love 2000s RnB. India.Arie is my goddess, love Destiny’s Child, love TLC, love all of them and they’re kind of where I get my love for RnB from. But what a lot of these talk about; ‘can you pay my bills’, ‘money money money’, ‘I have this I have that’, look at Missy Elliott; ‘bling, bling’.
But with me, one thing I’ve always said, like let’s say I get rich and famous, it would be so dumb to keep all that money to myself. Houses with gazillion bedrooms – that is so stupid, you do not need that as a human. The amount of people who are starving, don’t have money to pay rent, stuck in wars, don’t have access to education, but for some reason on this planet we are allowing this random ass person to have a tennis court in their backyard…. No ma’am, that is the dumbest thing I’ve seen. The money to maintain a tennis court…. Dumb. Let’s say I do get rich and famous, I do reach success, that success does not entail having loads of money, a mansion, spoiled ass kids, whatever.
All I need are my friends and my family, a nice crib with maybe a garden to do some barbecues and a couple bedrooms. I do not need a flashy car, what’s wrong with vans?! I’d love to know. Everyone shits on them, vans are great, you can go on holiday in them, the amount of money you’d save. So when I say ‘I do not need a Ferrari’, ‘Mum I’m no longer waiting’ for that version of other people’s success because realistically, my version of success is already here. I already have my friends and family supporting me back home, I have good friends that I love to do music with and no matter if this works out or not, I will remain a bad bitch no matter what happens.
Amen. Wow. Overall EP wise you are really looking deep into oneself, what that looks like behind closed doors, out in the open, confronting yourself. My question to you is if we were to sum up this EP in your own words, what would they be?
It’s a journey, because these are tunes I wrote when I was younger, but ‘The Colour I Am’ and ‘Lotus Flower’ are more recent so you see me grow through this EP. So definitely a journey… of love. It’s about loving yourself in different ways and what that may entail and sometimes you get hurt, sometimes it works out. So I would say it’s a journey of love and life.
In terms of your next goals creatively, what’s next on the Luna calendar?
Writing new music, so I’ve been writing loads and what I’ve been incorporating are different genres. I don’t want to think myself as a neo soul/RnB artist. One of my tunes starts with an indie jazzy intro then there’s a jungle drop we do. It makes no sense but when you see it live – trust me – it will. I’m trying to have more Cape Verdean rhythms in my songs. I’ve got a few new tracks I’ve written that have some cool stuff, some Creole, some words in my native language, trying to involve more Portuguese and Creole in what I write.
I’d love to produce more music but want to have more of a producer look at it, use more inspiration from producers I love. I love Quincy Jones and the way that he produced Thriller, I love Finneas in the way that he doesn’t look at songs in the way that they’d be played live, he looks at it as a song to listen to, then translates it to live performances. At the same time, I love Pharell. He just does really catchy choruses, he gets you, you’ll be walking around and hear a song, you wont even know that Pharell wrote it.
I don’t want to think of myself as ‘oh I’m going to do the Luna Kali sound because that’s what I’m used to’, I just want to produce a track because I like it and I want to. We’ve got some cool gigs coming up, we’re playing Shambala, hopefully a gig in Portugal will be confirmed soon so I can play my songs to my friends and family. We’ve got All Out/All Dayer event at the Exchange on the 28/06. So many gigs in the calendar, some I can’t say yet but it’s exciting!
Stream Luna Kali’s debut EP True Colours . Find out more on the artist’s instagram
See Luna live at All Out / All Dayer
Written by Brandon Purmessur
Brandon is a music journalist in Bristol who enjoys writing as well as hosting radio shows and video interviews. Beyond music, he enjoys working with the community and learning about other cultures.
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