Kelis Thrives and Teases New Music: ‘The Record Is Almost Done’

It has been a decade since Kelis released an album of new material, but that wait is almost over.

“I’ve been recording my new record for a while now,” the “Milkshake” singer shares from Nairobi, Kenya, a place she has fallen in love with.

“The issue is, when I start, if I don’t maintain the momentum, I become a new person by the time I start again, and then I lose interest in what I had already done,” she tells Rolling Stone AU/NZ. Feeling refreshed and renewed, “I start again. That happened a few times over the past years.”

This time, things are different. The R&B star kept the momentum going, and now she’s “in a space where I’m the closest to being done that I’ve been, which is very good.”

How close? “The record is almost done. I would say I’m like a good 75-80% there.”

The follow-up to 2014’s Food, recorded with Dave Sitek from TV On The Radio, her latest creation was mostly recorded on her farm, a 26-acre spot in Temecula, CA, where she lives with her family.

That experience was “just so comfortable, and it really made me feel like myself,” she explains. “I didn’t feel like I was having to step out of myself to create, which was really good.”

As a creative, “I’m an extremist,” she says with a laugh. “Either I’m traveling as far away as humanly possible or I don’t want to go anywhere, and I want everything to be on the farm.”

In the coming days, she’ll take a break from farm life. Kelis will deliver a keynote presentation at BIGSOUND 2024, the annual music industry conference and showcase extravaganza in Brisbane, Australia.

“It’s a very Kelis record. I don’t know how, but it sounds like me. It’s right in line with who I am, and where I’ve been. I love this record because it feels like the honest progression of who I’ve been this whole time.” She continues, “That’s also sometimes why it takes me so long. I have to step away and live my life. Then I come back and I have something to say.”

Kelis had something to say in 2022 with the release of “Midnight Snacks,” continuing a foodie theme that has woven through her recording career and flourished after she completed training as a Le Cordon Bleu chef.

Those talents took Kelis into the world of celebrity chefs, with multiple television cooking specials across Netflix, Cooking Channel, and Food Network, and the cookbook My Life on a Plate, inspired by her travels.

Kelis has landed seven songs on the Billboard Hot 100, with a career-best No. 3 for 2003’s “Milkshake.” Additionally, five of her albums have charted on the Billboard 200, including a top 10 appearance for 2006’s Kelis Was Here. She has won Brit, Q, and NME Awards, and has been nominated for two Grammys.

A mother to three children, Kelis, 45, feels “really content,” she expresses. “Even in the midst of all the things that have happened. I’m really grateful. I’ve had a really great career, and I’ve enjoyed every second of it. I’m kind of in that next phase of my life right now, and it’s fantastic. I feel really good.”

Don’t expect “a bunch of singles” from her next collection. “You’ve gotta put the thing on and let it play. It’s like kind of that vibe.” If it had to be categorized, imagine “if Wu-Tang and Sade had a baby, that’s kind of where we’re at,” she reveals. “It’s not like how things are right now either, right?”

Source: Rolling Stone AU/NZ