KVN Gets Expressive About Music, Emotions and Childhood moments [Interview]

While sitting by the window of his bedroom alongside his playful black cat, soulful singer KVN aka Keep Vibes Near, most definitely lived up to his name as the conversation consisted of reminiscent moments, laughter, and pure vibes. The Romford born artist has slowly crept onto everyone’s radar especially since receiving support from the likes of Jamz Supernova, RinseFM and Reprezent Radio. KVN love’s solo session’s in the studio, however he is not shy from collaborating with a variety of people as he has already worked with producers like Nikhil Beats, as well as artists like Safiyyah and Berwyn.

However, as a child it was the performing arts side of the things that really interested the musician, as he was eager to showcase his talents as a dancer, ‘When I was younger, I often put on X Factor style shows with my siblings, we’d range from being actors, dancer’s and contestants.’. From being a dancer at an early age to finally becoming a musician during his adult life, KVN has proved his love for self expression from his earliest days.

Did you always want to become a musician?

Initially I didn’t want to become a musician, I wanted to become a dancer, my older brother was a dancer and he really inspired me. Performing arts was my entry into music as I was constantly surrounded by it at the dance classes I attended with my brother. During this time, I would meet a variety of people including those who were in a variety of industries from fashion to music. When I was younger, I often put on X Factor style shows with my brother and sister, we’d range from being actors, dancers, and contestants. My brother is a good actor and would put on loads of different voices, we’d also pretend to be the judges and would fight over who’d be Simon Cowell. As I got older, I started to sing for fun, which resulted in more and more people telling how good my singing voice was, once it got to my head, I decided to take it more seriously.

What was the inspiration behind your name?

For me to make my debut as a singer, I had to come up with a name that really stood out from the rest, initially I abbreviated my birth name to KVN, however there was a Spanish artist who had already taken that name. Influenced by the likes of OFWGKTA aka Odd Future and Tyler the Creator, I decided to give my name a whole new meaning by turning it into an acronym, as soon as I came up with Keep Vibes Near, that’s when it stuck.

Who are your musical influences?

My siblings and I would fight over the computer just so we could download songs on Limewire, I’d often see what my brother was listening to and got a lot of my inspiration from him. Along with the talent competition’s KVN would create with his siblings, it was the eclectic selection of sounds that his older brother would play that influenced the music he makes today. As well as being a dancer my older Brother was a student of music, he would listen to anything from Fall Out Boy to Lil Wayne. My parents would play a variety of music too from Lauryn Hill to Stevie Wonder, that wide interest in music really stemmed down to me.

Fast forwarding to the present day, I credit Daniel Caesar and Frank Ocean as two artists that truly inspired me, as someone who enjoys writing, I really resonated with their lyricism. Growing up and exploring my own musical taste, it was influential witnessing the success of artists such as Frank Ocean, Sampha and Jacob Bank’s. Seeing Black artists peaking in their career without needing to sound like Chris Brown was so nice to see and affirmed that I could succeed with my own unique sound.

What was it like growing up in a Nigerian household and did it influence your taste in music?

My parents would play a lot of Fela Kuti and traditional Lagbaja music around the house, however it was wasn’t just sounds from back home that were played, as my Dad is a huge fan of Celine Dion, and my Mum is loves Lauryn Hill, so she’d often be played around the house too. Although my Dad is back and forth between Nigeria and the UK, he often puts me onto a lot of sounds from Nigeria as well as country music too.

How did the collaboration for ‘Days Like this’ with Safiyah come together?

Initially I started working with East London producer Nikhil Beats during the lockdown where we first started working on the track. After the lockdown finished, we linked up and Nikhil suggested Safiyah would be the perfect person to jump on the track as he thought our voices would blend perfectly. Safiyah and I linked up at Nikhil’s where the track naturally came together, this led to us making quite a few tracks which can hopefully be heard somehow together. In general, the vault is deep, I have so much unreleased music especially with Nikhi who is just so talented, I can’t wait for my fans to hear it all.

Can you explain your upcoming coming titled ‘Late Night Link’ featuring Harvey White and Luke RV?

Harvey White is G and pretty much one of my best friends, we’ve collaborated on quite a few tracks together. Prior to the track being created I bumped into Harvey and Luke at a Manga Saint Hilare show, where we all started to comment on how much we love each other’s music, after that we took it to the studio and Harvey started making these fire beats, during the production process I kept repeating the lyrics ‘I’m trying to find a ride or die’. With this track we also wanted to switch up my sound to something a little more up-tempo as I’m well known for my chilled sounds.

You are good at expressing your emotions through your music, is this something can comes easy to you?

I guess it’s a process of experience and reflection, writing lyrics for me feels like therapy and it’s funny because there are times when I write certain things and later down the line, they end up coming true. Expression is very important to me and for some men it is quite hard for them to convey how they feel, even a lot of my male friends struggle to express themselves, on the other hand there are few friends who find comfort in talking out their emotions. When I am in conversation with my friends, I honestly feel like we have such a strong bond that can’t be matched and as I said earlier the more we speak, the more it feels like therapy. Throughout the years I have really admired artists like Pharrell and Tyler the Creator who are quite expressive with their emotions. I'd hopefully like to become the voice of my generation who young black men can look up to. Depression is a real issue within a lot of men, and I think we need not tackle it whether that’s through music or conversation.

You’ve collaborated with quite a few people, who is next on your list?

There are a few obvious artists that I would like to collaborate with which include Andre 3000, Frank Ocean, Daniel Ceaser and Tyler the Creator of course, however if I could collaborate with anyone would be this American singer called Orion Sun, when I first listened to her music it was one of the first project I had listened to in long time that I could actually resonate with, through her sonnets and word play.

What is next for KVN?

I’ve been recording like a crazy man over the past two years, I’ve collated stuff that I love into little chapters and transformed them into concepts, so expect a lot of new music and so much to share, this year should be fun!

KVN’s latest track ‘Late Night Drive’ featuring Brighton based Hip Hop duo, Frankie Stew and Harvey Gunn is out now, where Harvey provides a soothing production, alongside KVN soulful sound and Frankie’s chilled lyricism as they describe the perfect Late-Night Drive. Here’s how KVN described the single, “ It’s one of those songs that stuck out as special as soon as I had the idea. Late-night drive with bae just hits the imagery perfectly really and I think when everyone hears this song it will just make you wanna go for a little cruise.”