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Kilo Kish is someone you may have already heard, but you probably just didn’t realise it. Lakisha Robinson has featured on recent tracks by big leaguers such as Gorillaz and Childish Gambino. Her favourite collaborator is the innovative rapper Vince Staples and the two have appearing on one another’s tracks for years now.
Robinson, aka Kilo Kish, is an artist who won’t be pigeon-holed; she creates music, multi-media art and performance art. Her live shows made to accompany the 2016 debut album Reflections in Real Time pushed narcissism to extremes, where Robinson handed out self-made fan-zines of herself whilst ruminating on her life via songs which had titles such as ‘Age + Self Esteem: A Funhouse Mirror’.
Mothe is Robinson’s first collection of songs since Reflections in Real Time and there is a stronger emphasis on the music itself and how the singer-songwriter has begun to evolve into the image she has picked out for herself. Over six tracks Robinson takes from different genres that all originate from electronic pop, and the lyrics are less about the internal workings of Kilo Kish and instead are more open and outward-looking.
And make no mistake, Robinson is also having a lot of fun this time around with three of the six tracks being certified bangers that could rattle and pound any bedroom disco or club floor. For starters, though, album opener ‘San Pedro’ is a dramatic and gloomy synth-pop throwback with low-slung and chiming guitars built around the refrain of ‘death, taxes and love’. It’s unexpected and solidly built, and works perfectly as an introduction to Robinson’s newly filtered colours.
‘Here’s my postcard from the mountain top’ is the opening line of the electro snapping ‘Void’ that literally accelerates as it progresses creating images of Robinson racing to some fantastic treasure that sits buried at the bottom.
‘Like Honey’ jolts and pauses, machine made and majestic, with Robinson’s airy and human vocals lushly hovering above the droids. The lasers come out on ‘Elegance’ which fades in with a Daft Punk, filtered-house majesty immediately before the cowbells and bass slam down and the whole thing becomes a glorious, escapist riot.
‘Alive’ takes it down a notch and is a swooning cloud of dream-pop; and the closing, episodic ‘Prayer’ takes Robinson back to her art pop roots.
Kilo Kash is wildly alive on Mothe and this her most confident and exciting record so far, make sure you don’t sleep on her.
