FEATURE: Spotlight: Kito

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

  

Kito

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AN amazing producer artist, songwriter, and D.J…

Kito is someone that is very much at the forefront right now! Her groundbreaking new track involving an AI replication of Grimes’ voice has caused a lot of discussion and excitement. Kito (Maaike Kito Lebbing), is an Australian multi-talented innovator residing in Los Angeles, California. She debuted in 2009 on Skream's record label, Disfigured Dubz. After Lebbing independently released a 2018 E.P., Haani, she debuted under Astralwerks/Capitol. An amazing producer, Kito has created amazing remixes for Beyoncé's Run the World (Girls) (2011), Broods' Too Proud (2019), and Wafia's Flowers and Superpowers (2019). In addition, she has produced music for Mabel, Jorja Smith, Banks, and Ruel. An acclaimed and hugely respected and admired producer, she was nominated for the Breakthrough Songwriter of the Year (Los Angeles) at the 2020 Global APRA Music Awards. I have grabbed some background from Wikipedia but, in truth, I am keen to get to some interviews. I have put all of Kito’s social media links at the bottom, so do go and follow her. I have written about the imbalance in studios when it comes to female producers and how women often feel unseen or unheard in studios. How the environment can be hostile or inflexible. Kito is definitely a huge influence in terms of the importance and immense talent coming from some brilliant women! She will help to provoke change and conversation; breaking down barriers for women coming through. I will work my way to a recent interview she was involved in regarding AI and her ‘collaboration’ with Grimes.

I am going to go back to last year when it comes to the first interview. Seemingly fuelled and inspired by coffee, a great team, and authenticity (possibly not in that order!), it is exciting seeing this hugely important and inspiring producer and artist come through. She collaborated with BANKS on Sad Girl Music last year. That was one of my favourite songs of the year. I can imagine her working with other enormous artists very soon. I have a list that I could see coming to fruition – as I am sure Kito herself does! The Fade In: talked with the influential Australian. Someone who I think is going to go on to change the industry and really make her mark, it is fascinating reading interviews from a year or two ago. Contrasting that to here and now. What she is currently creating and how important her recent AI work is! I have enormous respect for what she does:

“You have a very outstanding personality that is noticeable both in your music and your look, and we know female artists have always played an important role in raising other girls’ voices and becoming a source of inspiration in many respects. How would you describe the power and/or responsibility of being a female musician nowadays?

Thank you! I find my power in making stuff that I’m excited about. My team is mostly made up of women which I love, plus I also work with so many talented female identifying musicians. I just wanna make good music and make people feel good and hopefully that resonates and inspires others.

How does your creative process usually look like?

Drink lots of coffee then bounce around between different ideas before focusing on one thing and forgetting to eat dinner because I get so engrossed! (I do always eat dinner, just sometimes not until 11pm if I’m really into something I’m working on haha).

When was the most remarkable moment of your career?

I think each time I feel power in my abilities or learn something new. Also the last 2 years have been amazing – finding a great team to work with has changed everything for me (in such a positive way!)

What are your biggest dreams for the future, and what would you like to say to yourself when they come true?

I want to continue making music I’m passionate about, working with artists I love, and one day build my dream studio at the back of my house. I guess I’ll say “you did that” and give myself a pat on the back, and then most likely just continue doing the same ol stuff I’m doing now haha”.

I will see if I can interview Kito one day. I would like to know more about her experiences getting into production and what it was like. How her experiences differ to that of other women in the industry. I want to go back a little further to the start of last year. A few months or so after the release of her E.P., Blossom, Flaunt were eager to spotlight the remarkable Kito:

“Kito is a whole vibe, and it shines through in her music. Here to put on for all the aspiring female producers, songwriters, DJs in the world, the Australian-bred, London-raised, Los Angeles-based recording artist sees her music as an intimate party everyone is invited to, touching the masses on an international scale. From her romantic lyrics to her uptempo production to her catchy hooks, Kito knows a thing or two about hit records.

Last year, Kito received her first Gold record for her song “Bitter” with FLETCHER, which currently hails over 200 million streams and counting. And let’s not forget about her all-star catalog of remixes for the likes of Beyonce to Saweetie & Doja Cat, creating her own lane of futuristic pop.

Fast forward to 2021, Kito unveils her highly-anticipated new EP titled Blossom, reminiscent of a bouquet of flowers and how her mixture of sounds, tones, and emotions are intentionally picked and arranged. Coming into fruition during the COVID-19 lockdown, the 7-track project hails guest appearances from Bea Miller, VanJess, Channel Tres, ZHU, Jeremih and more.

Flaunt caught up with Kito via Zoom, who was posted in Echo Park with her friend’s kitten in her lap. Read below as we discuss her background, being self-taught, being influenced by her friends, the turning point in her music career, the meaning behind Blossom, how she got her features, favorite songs, studio essentials, playing Art Basel, and more!

What was it like being from Australia and growing up in London?

I grew up in a really small town south of Perth in West Australia, really isolated. I got into music through online forums and through friends. I found that community of electronic music when I was pretty young. I also loved collecting records. I then learned to produce, kind of self-taught. It was finding a lot of friends online, sending stuff back and forth and learning in that way.

How did you teach yourself how to produce?

A lot of tutorials. A lot of people, myself included, try to copy something that you hear that you like. At that stage, you’re not very good at being able to mimic something so you end up doing your own thing through good mistakes and trying to copy whatever it is that you’re into. The style of music or even songs, trying to figure out how people made something.

Blossom EP out now, how are you feeling?

I feel great! I feel really happy to tie a bow at the top of that project. That project was mostly done during the pandemic and a lot of time spent on my own at home, so it reflects that musically a little bit. It’s not necessarily club music, but it’s been really fun.

Where did you get the inspiration for the Blossom EP?

I didn’t start the EP like “I’m going to make an EP,” it wasn’t a conceptual idea. It was more so piecing it together from the work I’d already done, then finishing all the songs that tied it together and fit within that project. Also, this EP came from a place of more feminine energy than the past music I’ve made - there are many female collaborations on the EP.

You say the project helps soothe your anxiety. How often are you in front of the computer screen?

I’m in front of the computer way too much. It is important to get outside - it’s as simple as going for a walk, getting coffee, seeing friends... just taking a break so you’re not staring at your screen all day. I’ve learned to find a bit more balance than I used to, especially since during the lockdown we communicated with people on our devices so much more than we were doing before. It’s nice to give my eyes a break from the screens”.

Before getting to the most recent interview with Kito, I want to include an interview from Metal. They highlight how she is a self-taught producer (after watching hours of videos on YouTube) and in a position where she is working alongside some of the biggest artists in the world. Obviously, there is more to her story than that. A natural passion and intuition for crafting and producing the best and most compelling sounds, there is nobody in the industry quite like her. I know many will look up to her and want to follow her lead:

“Right now, you have millions of streams on Spotify and a ton of monthly listeners. What would you say now to that Kito who started producing years ago?

Have fun with it and be less precious. It’s not that serious!

You have collaborated with renowned artists such as Trevor Daniel, Ludacris, Jeremih or Jorja Smith. What other names would you like to work with?

I’d love to work with Pink Pantheress, Princess Nokia, Amaarae, Doja Cat, 070 Shake and so many more.

Sad Girl Music, your latest release with Banks, talks about the sadness of an infidelity from the perspective of the cheater. The track proposes being consistent with our actions but also knowing how to forgive ourselves. Do you usually forgive yourself after making mistakes?

I’m insanely hard on myself – usually when work is involved – and I’m definitely learning to break that pattern as it’s not a healthy one! In the case of infidelity, some remorse is probably a good thing depending on your arrangement (laughs).

By the way, how was this collaboration with Banks born?

Mnek wrote the song, so it was really about finding the right home for it! Banks has been a friend ever since I worked on her song Gimme with Hudson Mohawke, and I just felt like this one was perfect for her. I think she really brought it to life.

Of all your songs, which is your favourite?

I have different favourites for different reasons! My favourites to play in a DJ set are Wild Girl and Recap.

To finish off, do you have any other future projects in mind?

I’m always working on stuff! Whether it’s for my own project, or for other artists’ projects. Last year I did music supervision for a short film called Femme that won a BAFTA and it was such an amazing learning experience. I’d love to further explore music supervision and maybe even scoring at some stage”.

Cold Touch might seem like an apt title for a song that uses AI. This is Kito using an AI version of Grimes – getting her vocal pattern and sound – and putting it on a new song. Grimes was very interested and happy to have this done. It expands the debate about AI and how it is used in music. I feel that other artists will follow Kito regarding using existing artists’ voice in the form of AI-generated sounds. It will change how we perceive music. The Face discussed Cold Touch with Kito, and they were curious about the software used to get this remarkable and almost life-like vocal sound:

“Have you heard? Grimes has a new song out. Cold Touch, a collaboration with the Los Angeles-based Australian producer Kito, is an icy, propulsive dance track, a two-minute blast of energy that pairs big-tent EDM and hazed out d’n’b with Grimes’ signature ethereal vocals. But Kito’s collaborator is credited as GrimesAI, which is a different entity to the human born Claire Boucher.

If you heard Cold Touch in a club or on the radio, you’d recognise the voice as Grimes’ instantly. But actually, the vocals were provided by Scottish vocalist Nina Nesbitt, then fed through Grimes’ new AI platform Elf.Tech, which allows anyone to input their own vocals and download a new version of the track, redone as Grimes.

Grimes unveiled Elf.Tech a few weeks ago and, since then, innumerable musicians have been posting their own songs featuring Grimes’ vocals on social media. The technology, which is similar to Holly Herndon’s Holly+ vocal deepfake, was trained using raw audio of Grimes’ voice. On the day Elf.Tech launched, Grimes proclaimed: ​“Grimes is now open source and self-replicating.” She’s said she will split royalties 50/​50 with any successful AI generated song that uses her voice.

When you first heard about Elf.Tech, what was your reaction?

I think it felt very predictable that Grimes would embrace the experimentation of using AI for creative expression. I’m a fan of Grimes, so the idea of trying to make something that would sound like a Grimes/​Kito collaboration was really exciting to me.

What was it like working with the software?

I was in London a couple of weeks ago and I did a session with two people that are good friends of mine and amazing writers – Nina Nesbitt and Fred Ball. I pitched the idea to them to try and write a Kito/​Grimes song using Elf.Tech. So we wrote it together and it’s Nina’s voice that was then transformed into Grimes.

It’s kind of funny, because obviously AI is new for everyone and everyone’s a little confused about what involvement AI has in a song. There’s talk about lyrics being written, but obviously for something like this [Grimes has] trained her AI platform to know her voice. I think it did a pretty good job and it helped that Nina sang the way she thought Grimes would sing it. I think it’s probably harder if you have a really deep voice or something – it might not catch it.

Did Grimes have any tips on how to make it sound more like her?

She did give me some pointers [after she heard Cold Touch] on how she processes her voice. But we talked about lots of different things we could do – we were being very indecisive about, like, should we work on this further and then fully collaborate on it? Or is it a thing of the moment that we put out and this is Kito’s version, and then we work together on a Grimes version – which, I would hope that we do do that. It’s a funny conversation to have because it’s new for both of us.

A lot of people are a bit iffy about AI in music. What was your first impression of AI’s impact on the industry and how do you feel about it now?

I think it’s a bit scary because, for everyone witnessing it – how fast everything moves and the amount of versions of songs popping up without artists’ consent – it feels like it’s threatening our livelihood. I do think it’ll be a mess for a lot of artists! So much is attached to a voice – a story and an identity. Taking a very recognisable voice that we’ve grown to love and recognise, and having someone else take control of that is scary. Grimes was embracing [AI] and wanting to be part of this experiment. I would never put something up copying another artist’s voice unless they were embracing AI, because I do think there’s a bit of a danger to doing that. I would tread carefully in that respect, for sure.

[But] I actually think [AI] is going to be a tool for us. I don’t think it’s going to be a hindrance for creativity at all. I think it’s probably changed the way I’m gonna work on music this year, just because it was so creatively freeing for me to do something off the cuff and release it so quickly after making it. That in itself feels quite inspiring for me”.

Undoubtably one of the most remarkable producers in the business, she is a brilliant and compelling artist and producer who is going to have a very busy and long future! I can see her working alongside other major artists, whether that is producing for them or pairing with them on various tracks. If you have not heard of Kito, then go and check out her work and follow her. She is someone who is pioneering and astonishing. I think that she is one of the most compelling and interesting producers…

IN the industry.

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Follow Kito

Sam Liddicott