Kaya Wilkins AKA Okay Kaya is never one to let her music go stagnant. It’s therefore unsurprising that in her final single before the full drop of her album, she would mix it up entirely.

The single prior to “Psych Ward”, “Asexual Being,” was a throbbing ode to 80’s dance music inflected with new wave synths, an upbeat rumination charged with sexual frustration. However, Okay Kaya strips it back with her brand new single. Relying almost entirely on one repeated guitar riff to make up the body of the song, “Psych Ward” sounds like a jaunty indie-pop banger. As a track, it evokes flashes of Pixies in the ringing electric guitar that swells to hold the song firm. Wilkins vocals, layered and harmonic, possesses a buoyancy that creates a delicious joviality; whilst the song is about a psych ward, it’s surprisingly fun in tone.

The video accompaniment sees a despondent and catatonic looking collection of patients following instructions in various group activities, including “dance”, painting and ping pong. This is interspersed with a playfulness, shown in one shot where a “patient” sticks her tongue out at Wilkins to have her return the gesture.

True to Okay Kaya’s unorthodox nature, the visuals also have shots of the “patients” writhing around in the dark, shot in night mode to give the bodies an ominous luminescence. This is followed by a glaring red and blue light, which turns out to be sourced at a strip club, as Kaya Wilkins swings around a pole under the pulsating lights.

The entire vibe of the song, the dichotomy of the very real experience Wilkins had in a mental health institution paired with the impishly fun tone constructed by the soundscape, creates a tongue in cheek listening experience. Watch the accompanying video, that she co-directed with Adinah Dancygerand, and pre-order the album via Bandcamp below.

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From the watery depths in her last single “Ascend and Try Again” to the heights of a stratovolcano in “Baby Little Tween”, New York via Norway alternative pop singer-songwriter Kaya Wilkins AKA Okay Kaya has explored the expanse of Japan through raw video footage.

“Baby Little Tween” was shot on location in Niseko, Japan, on the vast Mount Yotei, aided by Okay Kaya’s frequent collaborator Adinah Dancyger. However, unlike the intense slow-motion close-ups of Kaya Wilkins naked form that was on display in “Ascend and Try Again”, “Baby Little Tween” places the loftiness of Mount Yotei and Okay Kaya’s decidedly wrapped up figure at the forefront.

Despite the visual differences, the video for “Little Baby Tween” possesses the same rolling sense: a ponderous ebb and flow that comes from the motion of Okay Kaya as she traverses the mountain on skis. The camera work dips in the right places to create a delicious tension; the stillness of Wilkins gaze, when intercut with the moving skiers, is pleasantly jarring.

The video has a short clip at the end titled “There is a River” and features Okay Kaya voicing a stream of consciousness style monologue over shots of a Japanese city at night. This spoken addition feels like a Brett Easton Ellis composition in the way that it has that teenage apathy and a languid nature.

This clip is preceded by Okay Kaya cutting off a portion of her braid that’s attached to – what we can presume – is a visual representation of her “tween” self, in the form of a head shaped cushion entwined with her braid.

From a musical perspective, the track demands attention from the deep and resonating “Ahh”’s overlapping one another at the beginning. The resulting sound holds the same kind of reverence and respect that religious buildings have. It brings to mind the commanding presence of a church choir booming. This opening harmony sounds like a call to directly to the listener to truly be present for the track.

“Baby Little Tween” is overarchingly an interesting exploration of what it’s like to look back on your younger self. With lines such as “surfing in the mids” – referring to mid-’20s or middle-aged – and “doesn’t know shit”, Okay Kaya explores that teenage arrogance of always being right and thinking you know everything about everything. She also covers the realisation that comes as soon as you grow up: no one knows anything and we’re all sort of scrambling along.

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Okay Kaya – “Watch This Liquid Pour Itself” tracklist:

01 “Baby Little Tween”

02 “Ascend And Try Again”

03 “Insert Generic Name”

04 “Overstimulated”

05 “Psych Ward”

06 “Guttural Sounds”

07 “Asexual Wellbeing”

08 “Popcorn Heart”

09 “Mother Nature’s Bitch”

10 “Hallelu Ya Hellelu Me”

11 “Symbiosis”

12 “Givenuptitis”

13 “Helsevesen”

14 “Stonethrow”

15 “Zero Interaction Ramen Bar”

Where do you go musically once you’ve released an exceptionally original and inventive cover of Cher’s hit “Believe”? Well, it seems that Kaya Wilkins aka Okay Kaya knows the answer: you go underwater. Indeed, her new video transforms Scuba diving instructions into a nuanced commentary on anxiety and ways to deal with it.

In her latest single, “Ascend and Try Again”, Okay Kaya turns a real-life experience of practising the art of Scuba diving for a film role into a rumination upon the ups and downs that life throws at you and how to combat these stressors. The track works around a low, pulsating, nearly inaudible synth bass that sandwiches the song, gifting it a weight and gravitas without being overbearing. “Ascend and Try Again” is actually the complete opposite of overbearing; it exists in a space that celebrates the beautiful simplicity of music and is bursting with delicacy. Kaya Wilkins‘s voice dances over the minimalist guitar and bass, brushing all over the track.

By stripping the track down to the bare bones, it gives it a deeply naturalistic feeling, a raw and earthy connection. It’s soothing in an indescribably base way, inherently possessing an aura of the calm before the storm, a great heaving inhalation or a moment of peace before something explosive. “Ascend and Try Again” has an impending energy that’s hard to fully pinpoint, but which take roots in Okay Kaya’s lilting voice.

The track’s soft and deeply earthy nature is accentuated by the sweeping shots of the icy landscape: the steamrolling off the water, the mixture of the muted darkness and the flickering from the artificial light pouring out from the bathroom light… The artist relies upon the stunning visual accompaniment to build upon the themes established by the song. The tight camera work reflects this; the sharp cuts to close-ups of Kaya Wilkins’s naked body, her navel, her lips, her fingers running through her hair, all combine to make for an added layer of depth and intimacy. Watch below.

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Amongst a rocky crag, Kaya Wilkins and Stine Omar are seen interchangeably singing straight down the camera lens. This is the video accompaniment and first visual introduction to the debut single from RØR, an experimental electronic pop and bedroom pop on steroids duo formed of Kaya Wilkins of Okay Kaya and Stine Omar of the Berlin-based duo EASTER.

“Buff Sensual” is two minutes of a pulsing beat, fusing elements of euro disco and more lo-fi, experimental dance music. Yet rather than be delivered with the usual frantic energy of the genre, “Buff Sensual” leans heavily into the more relaxed approach that permeates the music of both Okay Kaya and EASTER, giving the song a true sensuality as the title suggests.

Sandwiched between two melodic near spoken verses, is a harmonic chorus consisting of Omar and Wilkins describing their nights” trying something different”, complete with implied hedonism and references to exercises that can also be interpreted as experimental dance moves.

“Buff Sensual” reeks of sultry and sleazy nights dancing in clubs until the early hours. There’s a seductive power to Kaya Wilkins‘ airy pitch and Stine Omar’s deep and resonating tone that lends itself perfectly to a dance bop. With their debut track, RØR have created a low-key dance anthem that will assuredly keep everyone dancing at the “techno gym”. Watch below.

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Thanks TURTLENEK for the discovery. If you dig this track, check our Spotify playlist Edgy Poppers.

Over the past few years, 27-year-old Kaya Wilkins has been diffusing her presence and claiming her own existence transversally, through multiple mediums and professions. Film enthusiasts might have seen her on the successful lesbian thriller “Thelma”, directed by Joachim Trier; fashion experts might know she was Vogue’s “girl of the season” in 2017 after modelling for Balenciaga, Off-White and more; indie music lovers might have heard her sing a poem in Norwegian on the latest album by Aaron Maine‘s “Porches,” while also gossiping about the fact she’s actually Maine‘s girlfriend. Others probably know her as Okay Kaya, and maybe even remember the singles she released a few years ago, when she was considered by several music publications the next big thing in pop music.

Since then, a lot has happened to the music career of Okay Kaya, but one element in particular made her postpone the release of a debut album for years: an invasive management that tried to take advantage of her beauty in slimy, bothersome ways; for example, by suggesting her not to say anything about her love relationships to the producers she would work with. Okay Kaya walked away from it. She took her time, built a small home studio in her Greenpoint apartment in Brooklyn, eventually started her own label Heavy Body Records and has now finally released her first album, “Both.”

“Both” is a record that perfectly reflects the relationship Wilkins has with music. One that started in the small village of Nesoddtangen, near Oslo, where she grew up—the daughter of an Afro-American marine and a Norwegian painter. She got her first guitar when she was 13, though it was only a few years later, when she moved to New York to work as a model, that she started writing songs on a daily basis. Minimal acoustic arpeggios that she would sweeten with her vocals, singing her own thoughts softly and warmly, in a diaristic yet often cryptic manner.

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A certain sonic minimalism permeates “Both,” also thanks to the intimate delicacy that only a home studio can provide. Sometimes her voice is alone, followed only by a gentle guitar picking, like on the opener “Vampire”; elsewhere simple beats, keyboards and synths create a watery surface where her vocals can sail tenderly, occasionally merging with distant boat-whistles-like synths, like on “Tu Me Manques”, a one-minute track sung completely in French. Other than keeping her songs simple and softly skeletal, she also cuts them to the bone in a structural way, leaving them seemingly unfinished, like a musical and lyrical stream of consciousness that has naturally come to an end and does not need artificial addictions or adjustments.

That’s why most of her songs do not reach the three minutes mark. Yet, the ones that do end up being some of the best on the album, and that sorts of prove how the potential of Okay Kaya is much vaster than what Both offers—that she could be even better if she took some more time. “I Die Slow” and “Fake It”, in particular, are two of the most brilliant and emotional tracks: the first is essentially a gentle folk tune built on the union between her warm vocals (at times reminiscent of artists such as Weyes Blood) and atmospheric, organic synths; the second has the features of an emotional dream pop ballad: it features some of the best vocal melodies of the album and some high-pitched vocals in the background that almost give it an EDM-vibe. But instead of accelerating or gaining power, the song coherently remains simple and calm, like the whole album.

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The mix between folk and dream pop is what defines the style of Okay Kaya the most. That, and an utterly honest style in writing lyrics that should not really be confused with witty humour, but that it’s rather a straightforward way (too direct to be taken seriously at times) to talk about delicate themes. Like on the single “IUD”, a song about the usage of contraceptivse and about being in love with someone without wanting to have kids with them. “Would you come with me to get an IUD?/Maybe, if you come with me, I will let you come in me/’Cause, baby, you’re so baby, but I don’t want your baby,” she sings placidly and confidently, so much that it’s almost estranging. But it’s capturing, and it shows what Kaya Wilkins is capable of.

Not all the songs on the album are like “IUD”, though, and especially towards the end of the record there are a little too many fillers, from the odd ’80s dark wave of “Habitual Love” to “Hindsights A Bitch” and “Glitch”, where the Norwegian singer relies a too much on solemn atmospheres that do not add anything to the final product. Yet, Both remains an extremely pleasant work, and more importantly the official introduction that an artist like Okay Kaya absolutely needs. In a music world where everything needs to be immediately accessible to exist, where artists try to release something as soon as they can, no matter the quality, the patience Wilkins showed while waiting for the best moment to release her first record is rare. And nothing short of precious.