The Journey to Make Hearts Perfect Again
Written by Raymond M. Clark • Friday, February 1, 2019
I have never been in this place before. I cruise down a busy highway in South Park, Los Angeles, and in all honesty, I’m genuinely kind of nervous. Blatantly doing my research, South Central is not a safe place to reside, especially due to many high crime rates and shootings that almost always occur across from your living room window… Which is a whole different story that I’d rather not cover.
Because what brings me to South Central is the semi-trio KLeAR KaTZ, an R&B band out of all things in between. This is also their first time in LA. They recently had a photoshoot for the fashion brand Puppy Product. On top of that, the band’s lead runner David “dayb” Braxdy is brewing the band’s next project today.
KLeAR KaTZ is not your ordinary band. They are what you call a “virtual band.” These bands made quite the impact in history, which they have varied in selection musically such as Gorillaz. It broke the mold of what it meant to be as an artist, going beyond the norms of production and animation, colliding as one beautiful masterpiece that us listeners can enjoy. They give character - literally - to their own music, and you can simply go where you want to go and be who you want to be.
Gorillaz isn’t the first one that made being a virtual band revolutionary. Let’s take it back to the 70s, with Josie And The Pussycats (1970) Theme Song - YouTube , or the heartwarming and pitched Alvin and The Chipmunks, even the dubious, villainous Captain Murphy, a complete solo artist created by Flying Lotus in disguise.
KLeAR KaTZ consists of two real members behind the scenes. Both are cousins, both are music producers, and one of them are the illustrator.
David Braxdy, Cooper Tecnologik, and Hailey Kende are seen huddled together by the sidewalk on my right once I pull up to the side of the street. They are visiting the first BROCKHAMPTON Factory, where they also took a couple photo shoots in the middle of the block beside the house for their sneaker collaboration. Luckily enough, they took some pics for Nice Life as well.
It’s fairly warm for winter weather, I gotta keep in mind that we’re still in LA. I look up and notice a couple of thin and wispy clouds, not so many. Almost all the homes surrounding us have some sort of gate as an enclosure. Each house has its own unique set of color: white, orange, purple, mint, you name it. From the distance where I came, you can make out a church, which can be easily mistaken for a two-story home. Two stalky green and pointy trees sit right beside the church. That part of the block helped me indicate that I was in the right spot.
The band takes a break from shooting. I catch Cooper with a homemade orange soda float and David with a blueish-green slushie in his hand. Hailey is on her phone. They all perch on the edge of the sidewalk, and I join to sit with them…
How is LA?
C: We just got here. It’s taking a bit to get used to.
D: I already hate it! But I love it too, I don’t know!
H: LA is fun.
What brings you here?
D: By the start of the year I wanted to make shoes, and that’s a first for me. So we made a dealership with Puppy and they brought us out here to LA to shoot for the sneakers.
And this is all happening while you’re working on music.
D: Yes. They were very open with letting me use my own ideas for the photo shoots. Going to the BROCKHAMPTON Factory was a must-see for me. Puppy’s got some chill people, I rock with them heavy.
Is there something about LA that is infused into your music? Does it inspire your new stuff in any sort of way?
C: I can’t say we’ve taken anything from Cali. Dibs could only be in the south for so long, that’s pretty much all he knows. Indy is all I know. If something is authentic to you, I don’t think you would want to replicate something else, you know?
I get you. Authenticity is what makes you, you.
D: Exactly.
Shot by Edward Mercado. 2018.
Going solo is just not my vibe. Well, at least for right now I feel that way.
Hailey is a very interesting member.
H: Thank you!
When it comes to being a KLeAR KaTZ affiliate, what is Hailey’s role in the band?
D: Hailey is our vocalist. I would say she’s like our background singer, and she goes in and out of appearances so she never really sticks true to the affiliate thing.
I heard that you don’t establish her as a “real member.”
D: No, I don’t. But she’s family. With her it’s about the chemistry we all have as a band, and it’s what makes us KLeAR KaTZ. But we don’t add her as a feature in our song titles because there’s no need to. She’s kind of like family to me and Cooper.
Doesn’t that make her part of your band? What about solo music, if she has any material on her own?
H: Going solo is just not my vibe. Well, at least for right now I feel that way.
D: I like to think she’s not part of the band, and I just leave it at that. It’s a personal kind of relationship that we hold that no one else understands.
H: Yeah, and I’m fine with it.
Hailey says this with a confident grin pasted on her face.
Speaking of the band, would you mind me asking how Amber is doing?
D: For those who don’t know, Amber is my younger sister. She was a former member in the band before we even knew how to record music. Her name is in the title of our Hatena Blog, but you barely see her on it anymore, and we live two completely different lives in terms of personality, but we used to get along when we were kids.
Have you kept in touch with her?
Right now she’s starring in a web comic called The Development. She plays this young girl who was possessed by a supernatural spirit as a child, and she finds a way to purify herself with the help of her friends. That’s the summary so far, but I heard it’s still being worked on. It’s some freaky sci-fi, religious stuff. Have you ever seen Constantine? And have you ever seen Chronicle? It’s kinda like that... I hope she’s doing okay.
So you’re in LA, it’s been a super long trip, you’re hungry, and you need a food joint somewhere nearby. You guys had lunch?
D, C, H: Yeah.
Have you been to In-N-Out lately?
D: Yo, I have always wanted to go to In-N-Out Burger. I’ve been putting Cooper on for weeks!
Is it your go-to restaurant here?
D: I wouldn’t say that! it’s kind of basic compared to other places but I’ve just never been there before. I’m probably missing out on some of the real underrated joints. And I kinda miss Zaxby’s. Zaxby’s still has a place in my heart.
C: I watched this one YouTube video that compared which burger was the best. I forget if it was In-N-Out vs. a homemade or if it was a different fast food burger. I’ll look it up.
Sounds good!
D: Jack in the Box is ass.
What makes you say that?
D: I mean, everything from their appetizers to their sandwiches tastes like sandpaper, I don’t see how people still eat there. Their fries are the only exception.
That’s debatable.
D: Do you know the last time I ate at a Jack In A Box? I was on the road coming home from Houston and it’s been years. Years.
If it’s been that long, maybe you should give it another shot.
D: I guess…
C: Dude, I’m already homesick. I want some ice cream now, damn!
D: Remember Coney Island? When we met at your place in 2011? It opened on that same year, I think.
C: Oh yeah, the apartments!
D: Settlers Run!
C: Yeah! It was better when you and Hailey came.
Shot by Edward Mercado. Los Angeles, California.
What is Coney Island?
D: So Coney Island is this creamery somewhere out in Danville, Indiana. Hailey had posted this one pic on Instagram when she was younger and it was from that place. Since then, I was hooked.
Was Coney Island a type of place where you guys would hang?
D: I guess you could say that. It’s like Bruster’s but ten times better… Speaking of ice cream, Cooper’s dad used to work for this company called Schwan’s, this food delivery service, and at home he would have this giant freezer full of ice cream cups and ice cream sandwiches, so many that you could choose from… But we could never take them alone, we’d have ‘em for dessert every once or twice a week.
C: Still better than chasing the ice cream truck though.
Cover design by Edward Mercado.
So you guys released “the tales of our hearts,” which is a mixtape that dates back to October of last year. And with David coming to drop another set of brand new music, it’s hard to keep up with what is official and what is not. Is the new project an album?
D: Yes, indeed it is an album. I wanted to close the loop of this “hearts” trilogy that we have been owning for a while. I named it “HEART ANTHEMS, OR SONGS TO FALL APART TO.”
I figured the best way to make music is to never talk about your music.
Give me a brief summary of what this “hearts” thing is.
D: The hearts thing started back in the summer, half a year ago. When Cooper gave me that exclusive EP opportunity, he told me the name of his album. I stopped and wondered, “what if the next KaTZ albums had “Heart” in the title?” I planned for this to be a trilogy, so it’s expected that we close the loop soon.
“Closing the loop?” You’re using that phrase quite frequently, must be your motto!
David chuckles.
Shot by David Braxdy.
I’ve seen that you dropped a lot of singles lately. The band’s SoundCloud and YouTube account were surprisingly active during early January.
D: I dropped singles because I wanted to. I needed that feeling of activity, being active, letting everyone know that the band was still here, to prove that we were still working on new things. But at the same time I had to stop and think about what I was doing to our brand. Maybe I am releasing too much, maybe I am working too profoundly. I need to learn to keep the band’s material at a low profile before it’s too late.
Sounds like you had many of these problems in the past.
D: It’s a habit! I figured the best way to make music is to never talk about your music. Because the worst that can happen is your fanbase figuring out what your next album will sound like. What the mood will be, how it will impact the majority, their opinion about you as a person. It takes time for some people to drop anything they are at least proud of. I learned that you gotta think of this when you prepare for the next record, but still try not to get it over your head either. No one says you can’t have fun.
C: Ah, found it. It was about In-N-Out vs. Shake Shack from this series called The Burger Show.
Great, I’ll watch it after we’re through. David, what music artists have influenced you lately?
D: Roy Blair and Bruno Mars. I’ve been listening to Cat Heaven, and by the last song I said “this is what I want the album to sound like.” I’ve been a fan of Bruno since Cooper and I lived together as kids, since, like, 2011. There’s literally a Bruno Mars poster hanging up my wall at home.
Shot by Edward Mercado. Atlanta, Georgia.
I remember you explaining how Cooper put you on Joji around the same time you worked on his EP.
D: Just like Joji, I didn’t give Blair enough of my attention until now. It’s a relief and I didn’t know what I was missing out on. With every record, I want to keep making atmospheres like Roy’s and Bruno’s. There’s other artists I like too but these are just the ones I can think of at the moment.
What album do you like from Bruno Mars?
D: Jukebox, and Doo-Wops & Hooligans.
C: For some reason, I loved The Lazy Song as a kid. I had the whole Doo-Wops album on my iPod.
D: I almost had us make a rock album because of songs like Bruno’s last year… In all honesty Bruno Mars shaped a part of my childhood. I was living with my dad in the early 2010s and I would always hear his songs on the Top-40 stations when they were good, haha!
C: Yeah, Bruno definitely left some kind of mark on us emotionally.
Shot by Edward Mercado. Los Angeles, California.
“I think it is coming to a point where the boys got it on their own.”
As listeners, we’re getting mixed signals about Hailey. She is that extra push for the group as you’ve said, but it’s common that some people criticize her voice.
D: We did get that a couple times.
H: That will never change. It will always be there, whether I like it or not. Yes, I’ve been getting a lot of that bashing lately. It makes me feel self-conscious about my voice and how I should project it, or thinking about if I’m doing something wrong by protruding myself to the group in general. There’s a way that I avoid it, and it’s that I try not to think about it too much because those thoughts get in the way of my creative process. I think it is coming to a point where the boys got it on their own. So yeah.
Whew, that’s a lot to take in. I wish for the best of luck to you, Hailey. Keep doing what you’re doing.
H: Thank you, I appreciate it.
“This will be way different than the last.”
Now David, you announced on Instagram that Heart Anthems was going to be made entirely in Atlanta. How is the album different from “tales of our hearts?”
D: Because I’m back home. I don’t have a filter when I’m back home, I have more freedom at home than when I’m at Cooper’s - no offense - but it’s just… I don’t know how to explain it, it’s like a different world that I feel accustomed to, since I was born and raised there from the start. Instead of just me and Hailey on every damn song, I’m dying for this to be a real album. I am super dependent on Cooper this time around. This will be way different than the last.
What makes producing the album in Atlanta separate the process of making the mixtape in Pittsboro?
When I was held hostage at Cooper’s in Indiana, there was limits. I couldn’t make what I really wanted to make, but it still came out pretty tight in the long run.
David Braxdy, 2018.
Here is a photo about more than six months ago, when David visited Cooper’s home, and resided to record “tales.”
D: Almost none of the beats on the mixtape are ours, of course. But I was under a time limit, and it was during a lengthy vacation. So I did what I did and Hailey was on my side. “Tales” shifted and molded my relationship with Hailey as a friend… There are countless amounts of artists that will really help me with what I want to achieve with this album. It literally says it in the title: “HEART ANTHEMS.” This album is going to be a bunch of songs form the heart that you can have no shame of listening to. You can sing them alone, you can sing them to your best friend, your lover, your ex, whatever, or just flat out jam to it. I want it to be KLeAR KaTZ’s second breakthrough… This is the most serious album that I’ve ever worked on.
I’m pretty excited for what the band has to offer. KLeAR KaTZ has been under the radar for quite some time now, and an album for the time being will let them break out of their shell. We’re hoping that Cooper makes at least a few appearances, and I assume that we should expect Hailey to have less features. But who am I to know? It definitely looks like the young duo-slash-trio knows what they want. Just a month has passed into 2019, and coming into a new year means KLeAR KaTZ has plenty of time on their hands.
Shot by Edward Mercado. Los Angeles, California.
Follow and Listen to KLeAR KaTZ here:
https://www.instagram.com/klearkatz/
https://soundcloud.com/klearkatz/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2lMOa3OT5ij8h9YUrVGEEw
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