INTERVIEW | KING DEE TALKS HIP-HOP AND LATEST TRACK ‘IN MY ZONE’

By Rishma • On What is New

Hail­ing from South West Lon­don, King Dee releases his brand new track ‘In My Zone’. We speak to the tal­en­ted rap­per about the new single, his influ­ences and his exper­i­ences in the Hip-Hop industry.

Grow­ing up in Lon­don, what artists influ­enced you to start a career in music? 

Grow­ing up I was very much into RnB, it was some­thing about the pas­sion behind the music which always drew me in. Artists such as Bey­on­cé & Chris brown. As far as  Uk artist I listen to grow­ing up I would say N‑dubz & Chip­munk were heav­ily influ­en­tial on me. As I star­ted get­ting into music, the main artist was Lil Kim as she brought a sense of dom­in­ance and power in her music, she deman­ded you to listen to what she had to say & she’s had the biggest influ­ence on my music.

Your latest track ‘In My Zone’ is based on a past rela­tion­ship, tell us a bit about the track and how Hip-Hop helps you express your­self dur­ing dif­fi­cult times.
In my zone is a final product of many songs from me try­ing to have the right words to speak on my first and only rela­tion­ship. I needed the right song for people to hear how I felt as I wanted them to visu­al­ize my lyr­ics. HipHop is a per­fect way for me to express myself cre­ativ­ity, I feel it releases energy in myself that needs to be set free into the world.

 Tell us about the concept of the music video, what was the pro­cess like in cre­at­ing it? 

Whenev­er I record music I tend to seclude myself and in terms of being “in my zone” I need to block out any out­side dis­trac­tions and have tun­nel vis­ion. So I decided I would rent a hotel, bring my equip­ment and have the feel that I needed to get away to reflect on the situ­ation & I believe I trans­lated that into the video. Put­ting your­self back in that vul­ner­able state can be dif­fi­cult but I knew it was some­thing that had to be por­trayed so every­one can see & feel the video.

If there is one thing you want listen­ers to take away from your music, what would it be?

I would want my listen­ers to under­stand this is my jour­ney, these are the things that I’ve been through in life & the best way for me to deliv­er it to you is to always be authen­t­ic and TRUTH­FUL. I may hurt someone’s feel­ings but it will hurt me more keep­ing it inside. A rap judge once said Be your­self and say how you feel when you get on the mic because you nev­er know who’s listening.

 You have been open about your sexu­al­ity, and being bisexu­al, how import­ant is it for you to break cer­tain stig­mas with­in the Hip-Hop industry, and have you faced any challenges?

I think it’s very import­ant for me to break Bar­ri­ers that are held by people who don’t wanna see people like me win just because of my sexu­al­ity… if you nev­er saw my videos and just heard my voice you wouldn’t think any dif­fer­ent. I’ve had a pro­du­cer tell me that he mixed my track one time & every­one loved it. The moment he showed them my Ins­tagram every­one star­ted back track­ing and that’s a clear example of my pre­vi­ous point. I would nev­er let any­one stop me from chas­ing my dreams and get­ting to the point in my career where I need to be. You may not like my sexu­al pref­er­ence and that’s okay. Just respect me as an artist.

What was it like per­form­ing at UK Black Pride? Tell us a bit about the exper­i­ence and how you got involved?

Black pride was amaz­ing and a life chan­ging moment for me. Believe it or not that was my first ever per­form­ance. I said to myself if I don’t put myself out there and per­form I’ll just be anoth­er artist that just releases music for noth­ing. So I took a chance and I applied and when I got accep­ted I was over­whelmed with joy. Hav­ing my first per­form­ance on such a huge stage in front of Hun­dreds of people really set the bar for me. This is what I need and I want to do it all the time. I believe I was the first male rap­per to per­form at black pride as well.

What oth­er music have you got com­ing out and when?

I have my very first EP com­ing out in August ! This pro­ject really means a lot to me as it has such a unique amount of sounds that son­ic­ally blend togeth­er so well that shows all sides to me. This is some­thing I’m really excited for the world to hear.

 Where can we fol­low your music?

The best place to find out what’s next with Myself Is to fol­low me on Ins­tagram at Kingdee3, I have a link­tree attached in my bio which gives you access to all my social media pages and music. I’m on all stream­ing plat­forms so all you need to do is type in King Dee.

Listen Here to ‘In My Zone’

Sup­port King Dee on Social Media 

Face­book | Twit­ter | Ins­tagram 

Listen to more of King Dee

Spo­ti­fy | Apple Music

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Rishma

Edit­or / PR Con­sult­ant at No Bounds
Rishma Dhali­w­al has extens­ive exper­i­ence study­ing and work­ing in the music and media industry. Hav­ing writ­ten a thes­is on how Hip Hop acts as a social move­ment, she has spent years research­ing and con­nect­ing with artists who use the art form as a tool for bring­ing a voice to the voiceless.

About Rishma

Rishma Dhaliwal has extensive experience studying and working in the music and media industry. Having written a thesis on how Hip Hop acts as a social movement, she has spent years researching and connecting with artists who use the art form as a tool for bringing a voice to the voiceless.