K. Flay Interview: SXSW 2010

Twenty-four year old Kristine Flaherty, a Stanford graduate with a degree in psychology and sociology, packs a punch in the music world as a hip-hop artist called K. Flay. Her girl-next-door face isn't run of the mill in her genre, but she insists her academic background and her rap career tie together well because "there's a lot of crazy people in the music world." She's the edge of the blade, a live beat throwing, rapping one-woman show, inside of a Harry Potter fan that insists plain Cheerios are the only way to roll. Get inside the mind of K. Flay before she hits SXSW.

How did you get into doing music?

I got into doing music in college, at the beginning of my sophomore year. I got some audio equipment and started making beats and recording songs just on my own in the studio on campus. A friend of mine who was doing music got me a show on campus and from that point on I just sort of fell into it, I guess. People asked me to do stuff, and obviously I was doing school, but after I graduated I just sorta kept the train going.

Describe your sound in your own words.

My sound is kind of a mix between hip-hop and indie rock sensibilities. There's definitely songs that lean towards a more rap/hip-hop vibe, but there are a lot of songs that are more kind of singer/songwriter stuff. I try to fuse electronic elements with organic elements by mixing live guitar with programmed drums and things of that nature, and really just try to make the sound a diverse one, but one that has a coherent sense to it.


What sets you apart from other artists?

For me, it's that I'm doing all aspects of things. So, in my live show I'm making beats live, I'm playing guitar, I'm singing, I'm rapping; it's kind of like a one-woman show sort of thing. So, I think that that's sort of something that helps to make -- especially the live set -- kind of a fun experience for audiences.

What are your musical influences?

I grew up listening to a lot of funk and soul, and classic rock stuff, you know, on vinyl, as a young kid. As I got older I got more into two strains of artists-- a lot of really strong female vocalists like Lauryn Hill, Fiona Apple, Liz Phair, people like that. Then on the flipside of that, in terms of the hip-hop stuff, I've always been drawn to people who are doing a little bit off-the-beaten-path kind of stuff. I like a lot of UK hip-hop and I'm a huge Dizzee Rascal fan and that sort of thing.

How did you come upon the name K. Flay?

My real name is Kristine Flaherty and that's what people called me in college, I used to play basketball. So once I started making music I was kinda like well, everyone already knows me as this, so it'll be an easy transition.

What's your worst bad habit?

I've got a lot of those! My worst bad habit is not sleeping enough. I have this very bad habit of staying up past a certain point, and then once I'm past that point there's no point in going to sleep, so I end up not sleeping and I think my body is angry with me.

Who was your first celebrity crush?

Oh my Lord, okay, let's think about this. My first celebrity crush was probably Gavin Rossdale, now that I'm thinking about it. Do you remember that cover of Rolling Stone he was on, probably like '93 or something? A family friend of ours was a couple years older than me and she was madly in love with Gavin Rossdale and I idolized her because she was like 4 years older and really cool, and she had a crush on him, so I obviously had to as well.

What's your musical guilty pleasure?

[laughs] I guess this relates to my apartment, my roommates and I all have this guilty pleasure, I don't know if this really counts but you know that Whitney Houston song "How Will I Know?", that song has been played in my apartment probably close to 500 times in the last month. I don't know if that's guilty, maybe that's just a pleasure, because she's awesome. But dude, the music video is guilty for sure. Have you seen that video? You've got to check it out. The thing you have to look out for is this dancer, it's like, the most ridiculous video ever, but there's this dancer that's dressed half like a bride and half as a groom-- it's totally weird, it's totally trippy, it's so strange-- so that is the guilty pleasure, that video.

Beatles or Stones?

Beatles for their music, Stones for their swagger. I have a special place for both.

What's your favorite midnight snack?

Definitely Cheerios with soy milk. I actually may go have a bowl. But regular, no honey nut business.

What's the craziest thing you've seen or experienced while on tour?

I'm not sure if this is the craziest, but it's something that happened recently, so it's kinda funny. A guy we were on tour with was dropping this girl we were hanging out with at her hotel or something. He'd given this crazy homeless dude money earlier in the night, and the dude came back up to him and was like, 'dude, I need some more', and my friend said, 'dude I actually have no more money, I have no more cash, I'm sorry, man.' So he dropped this girl off in the lobby and he got back and the homeless dude had thrown a brick through our van out of rage or something! Everyone was crazy, it was really late at night, like 5:30 A.M, and we had to get it fixed, all this crazy stuff. We were in Cleveland, downtown Cleveland...don't be there at 5:30 AM.

How do you want your music to impact people?

For me. there's two parts to that: on the one hand, for my female listeners out there, one of the things that's important to me is to represent someone who's doing something that's a little bit different and is doing something that -- you know, when you ask people if they can think of a female producer, people have a hard time doing that because there aren't a lot of super prominent well-known female producers. That's a big thing for me, establishing myself in that respect and standing as someone who is a performer, but who is also behind the scenes in control of what's going on. I'm 24, so my music, I hope, encapsulates this stage of life for me and I think for a lot of people in their early-to-mid 20s just gone to that time of reckoning, not being a kid anymore, not an adult...shoot, I sound like Britney Spears right now. Not like Britney Spears -- not a girl, not a woman-- not that one. But you know, kind of that space, and kind of helping to represent that experience for people.

If you were going to be shipped to a desert island, what 3 things would you take with you?

Okay, I would take the largest pad of paper I could take, the most amount of paper I could take. I'm not sure how much I'm allowed, but that. I would take a Costco Bic pen collection, and then I would take the boxed Harry Potter series. Don't even get me started on that.


Amanda Hensel is a contributor from Seed.com. Learn how you can contribute here.