These days, it seems you can’t go online for more than five minutes without seeing a video set to Kaliii’s new song, “Area Codes.” In some, people – usually young women – lip sync the lyrics while miming themselves eating “lobster and pasta,” while in others, the aforementioned delectables are put on pristine display by aspiring and amateur chefs sharing their favorite recipes. And yes, some are very literal, with young women showing off the white boys on their proverbial rosters, oftentimes turning them into the butt of jokes by showing off their (lack of) dance moves.
by AARON WILLIAMS
JULY 25 2023
EDITION 25
JULY 2023
PHOTOGRAPHY BY: Raul Romo
When Fousheé was a child, she decided that she was not cut out for sports when she attended a basketball camp in a skort. The other players laughed at her, but that wasn’t the precise moment that changed her trajectory from “potential athlete” to “destined star singer.” Instead, it was a moment within the training for the game itself. “You have to guard in this little box,” she recalls. “I would always not be in my box. I was confused about the boundaries."
That confusion about boundaries made her bad at basketball — that, and an aversion to running back and forth on every play — but it’s what makes her a fascinating character as a musician. A viral star who was vaulted to fame seemingly by accident thanks to a confluence of technological opportunism, TikTok, and timing, the quirky singer’s eclecticism permeates songs like “Gold Fronts,” “Single AF,” and her trademark song, “Deep End,” as she combines R&B, reggae, rap, folk, and more into a genre-agnostic gumbo of soulful reflections and incisive wit.
Despite her brief detour into athletics, Fousheé always knew that she wanted to be a singer growing up in Bridgewater, New Jersey. Music was in her blood; her mother played in an all-female reggae band in Jamaica and exposed her early in life to an extensive record collection including everything from Brandy to Bob Marley to Celine Dion to Toni Braxton. Drawn naturally to singing and songwriting, Fousheé told Billboard that she wrote her first song when she was just five years old. That inclination led to a short-lived stint on The Voice in 2018.
Via a lengthy Zoom call (that could easily have gone on for hours more), Fousheé reveals an alternate future that could have existed, even if she’s been on her current path since the time most kids were learning how to write their name. “I feel like I would've ended up being a teacher,” she admits. “Half of my family are teachers on my dad's side; my grandmother, my grandfather, my uncle. So more than a good portion of them were teachers… They really wanted me to be a teacher so badly.” However, as is so often the case, life had other plans.
When Fousheé was a child, she decided that she was not cut out for sports when she attended a basketball camp in a skort. The other players laughed at her, but that wasn’t the precise moment that changed her trajectory from “potential athlete” to “destined star singer.” Instead, it was a moment within the training for the game itself. “You have to guard in this little box,” she recalls. “I would always not be in my box. I was confused about the boundaries."
That confusion about boundaries made her bad at basketball — that, and an aversion to running back and forth on every play — but it’s what makes her a fascinating character as a musician. A viral star who was vaulted to fame seemingly by accident thanks to a confluence of technological opportunism, TikTok, and timing, the quirky singer’s eclecticism permeates songs like “Gold Fronts,” “Single AF,” and her trademark song, “Deep End,” as she combines R&B, reggae, rap, folk, and more into a genre-agnostic gumbo of soulful reflections and incisive wit.
Despite her brief detour into athletics, Fousheé always knew that she wanted to be a singer growing up in Bridgewater, New Jersey. Music was in her blood; her mother played in an all-female reggae band in Jamaica and exposed her early in life to an extensive record collection including everything from Brandy to Bob Marley to Celine Dion to Toni Braxton. Drawn naturally to singing and songwriting, Fousheé told Billboard that she wrote her first song when she was just five years old. That inclination led to a short-lived stint on The Voice in 2018.
Via a lengthy Zoom call (that could easily have gone on for hours more), Fousheé reveals an alternate future that could have existed, even if she’s been on her current path since the time most kids were learning how to write their name. “I feel like I would've ended up being a teacher,” she admits. “Half of my family are teachers on my dad's side; my grandmother, my grandfather, my uncle. So more than a good portion of them were teachers… They really wanted me to be a teacher so badly.” However, as is so often the case, life had other plans.
When Fousheé was a child, she decided that she was not cut out for sports when she attended a basketball camp in a skort. The other players laughed at her, but that wasn’t the precise moment that changed her trajectory from “potential athlete” to “destined star singer.” Instead, it was a moment within the training for the game itself. “You have to guard in this little box,” she recalls. “I would always not be in my box. I was confused about the boundaries."
That confusion about boundaries made her bad at basketball — that, and an aversion to running back and forth on every play — but it’s what makes her a fascinating character as a musician. A viral star who was vaulted to fame seemingly by accident thanks to a confluence of technological opportunism, TikTok, and timing, the quirky singer’s eclecticism permeates songs like “Gold Fronts,” “Single AF,” and her trademark song, “Deep End,” as she combines R&B, reggae, rap, folk, and more into a genre-agnostic gumbo of soulful reflections and incisive wit.
Despite her brief detour into athletics, Fousheé always knew that she wanted to be a singer growing up in Bridgewater, New Jersey. Music was in her blood; her mother played in an all-female reggae band in Jamaica and exposed her early in life to an extensive record collection including everything from Brandy to Bob Marley to Celine Dion to Toni Braxton. Drawn naturally to singing and songwriting, Fousheé told Billboard that she wrote her first song when she was just five years old. That inclination led to a short-lived stint on The Voice in 2018.
Via a lengthy Zoom call (that could easily have gone on for hours more), Fousheé reveals an alternate future that could have existed, even if she’s been on her current path since the time most kids were learning how to write their name. “I feel like I would've ended up being a teacher,” she admits. “Half of my family are teachers on my dad's side; my grandmother, my grandfather, my uncle. So more than a good portion of them were teachers… They really wanted me to be a teacher so badly.” However, as is so often the case, life had other plans.
That means that while you’d be forgiven for thinking of her as a rapper, for her, that means producing, singing, and songwriting as crafts that deserve equal consideration. When I remark on the oft-repeated insistence of modern rappers that they’re not just rappers, Tate is able to break down her own singularity in specific terms, not just the broad ones usually employed by wannabe rockstar rappers feeling boxed-in by the constraints of hip-hop.
“I was singing when I was a baby,” she explains. “So that's the first thing that my spirit, my body, my voice knows, is to sing. Then, producing and songwriting are kind of hand-in-hand; honestly, I started producing and I started writing around the same time. I think I started writing first, but when I say ‘producing,’ I mean ‘creating songs.’ Not just making a beat, but arranging a song. When I was in third grade, I started playing piano. Then, I started to write songs after that and rapping is something that kind of grew out of songwriting.”
However, rap has been central to her identity ever since her self-released debut studio album Girls. Released in early 2019, at a time when the newest crop of female rappers was just beginning to receive heightened attention as a side-effect of the success of Cardi B’s “Bodak Yellow,” Girls — the followup to a 2018 EP, Boys — has the distinction of being a rare project that features all women. It also marked the biggest step for Tate’s career, the demarcation point between being an underground, up-and-coming artist and a star in the making. That’s no accident, either.
“Boys, that was all engineered by me,” she recalls. “I did that all at home. Girls was the first project that I put out that was engineered by a professional. It was just a lot put into it, which made it like, let's treat it like what it is. This is something that we really put a lot of time into, a lot of effort as far as even the visuals of the trailer that was made for it. So, I just wanted to give it that space. This was also, I think, the first time I had as many features as I had on that project. I had never been on a project with features like that. It was a moment and we wanted to give that the space that it deserved.”
Using all women as features on the album was intentional, as well. “There were a lot and there still are a lot of women rappers coming up. But at that time, there were so many people beefing left and right, fighting, in competition, and I really wanted to put something out there that was like, ‘Look guys, we can work together and actually, we should work together because we end up making way better stuff together.’ I think a lot of times people feel like ‘There can only be one’ or ‘There can only be this many.’ No guys, we really can all work together. So, I wanted that to be an example. I'm pretty honored. I feel like it was kind of a catalyst for change in what female rap is now, because I don't think there were as many female rap collaborations prior to the album coming out.”
However, rapping with a different set of collaborators introduced many new fans to Tate’s amorphous array of talents, thanks to her placement on Dreamville’s 2019 group compilation Revenge Of The Dreamers II. After receiving an invitation to the storied Atlanta recording sessions for the then-nascent posse cut concept album, Tate found herself one of just five women to make it onto the final tracklist when she proved that she could hang with the boys club on “Don’t Hit Me Right Now,” a sexually-charged track featuring Dreamville mainstays Bas and Cozz with assistance from the scene-stealing California rappers Buddy and Guapdad 4000. While Tate seems honored by the experience, she still wants to receive credit outside of such performances, preferring to defer that spotlight to her sisters in the hip-hop realm.
“I wasn't even invited as a rapper or an artist,” she makes sure to clarify. “I was invited as a songwriter. So when I ended up actually making it on a project and even actually making it on a song, I was like, "Oh, snap. Okay. That's cool." But yeah, I definitely think
But there's a process, and so I want to take time. And I was just grateful to be there.”
It’s that, yes, but the success of the song is also something that Kaliii herself manifested. Since the last time she and I spoke around the release of her debut EP Toxic Chocolate, she’s enjoyed some tremendous accomplishments, touring with early benefactor (and previous Uproxx cover star) Latto, securing a spot on the 2022 XXL Freshman Class, and performing “Area Codes” during the 2023 BET Awards on the Amplified stage. Interestingly, the latter role was previously occupied by Latto, who went on to break out last year with her hit “Big Energy.” Kaliii has found herself on the cusp of the same sort of breakthrough, especially with her next EP, Toxic Girls Need Love Too, on the way.
Of the new project’s title, she says, “It's a play off of my last EP called Toxic Chocolate. And I feel like in Toxic Chocolate, that was my real Toxic Girl era. Me going through it with men, and just finding myself. And Toxic Girls Need Love Too, is me... I had my toxic phase, obviously, then I got in a relationship. I fell in love by accident, and then it didn't really work out, but instead of me going back to my toxic ways, I asked myself what do I want for me, and what do I want for my music and my career? And I just wanted to be outside with the girls.”
She’s certainly been outside – in fact, she seems to be everywhere since appearing on that XXL cover, which she describes as “one of my main goals when I was coming into the industry.” Prior to the selection, she says she feels she was still finding her sound, but that after being featured, she locked in. “After XXL it was like, ‘Oh, it's go time. You've got this. You know what you want, you know who Kaliii is, you know what Kaliii sounds like, you know what you want to represent and you know where you want to go in life,’” she says. Since then, “it's been up like crazy.”
Indeed it has. While her previous single, “MMM MMM,” was another TikTok standout, it’s clear that its viral popularity was just a precursor to the dominance of “Area Codes.”
Born in 2000 in Roswell, Georgia, Kaliya Ashley Ross recorded her first songs in a studio built for her by her Panamanian mother’s ex-husband, who was a music producer. Growing up listening to him make beats, she took notes watching stars like Aaliyah and Missy Elliott, starting to write her own songs with his help. She speaks fondly of this time – if not of her first mentor – and explains just how his tutelage helped her refine her voice early.
“When I was first learning how to record,” she recalls, “he turned the closet into the studio, the booth where the mic is, and he had all the foam sticking to the wall.” Kaliii says that he gave her advice on how to make her lyrics connect, not just with the wit of her words but also with the impact of her voice. “ I just remember recording and him being like, ‘Be more animated. Show me who you are through the track. People need to feel you through the track. You can't just talk and say whatever. It doesn't matter what you're saying, it's how you say it.’” The lesson stuck with her, and she credits it with being one of the key factors that makes her music resonate with audiences to this day.
“That's why a lot of girls tell me, ‘You make me feel like a bad bitch’ all the time,’” she muses. “And that's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to make sure the girls feel that way. Because sometimes, I have my days where I’m down and then I listen to my music, and it's like, ‘Girl, you need to listen to yourself.’”
It wasn’t a straight shot to get here from there, though. Throughout high school, Kaliii was more interested in a soccer career than a rap one. She had dreams of making the US Women’s National Team and playing in the World Cup, but the commitments and pressure associated with pursuing those goals eventually wore down her love for the game. She recalls her parents being “really strict about” meeting those requirements of greatness and stressing the importance of achievement over having fun, as youth sports parents sometimes do. This is usually the death knell for kids’ dreams of sports stardom and Kaliii was no exception.
Plus, soccer just isn’t as popular with kids in the US as other activities. “As a teenager, nobody wants to come to your soccer game,” she notes sadly. “They want to be outside.” Combined with the “tough love” she received from her parents and coaches, she says it all became “too much.” “It's not that I was falling out of love with it,” she insists. “There was just too much going on. I felt really sheltered. I felt like I couldn't be outside without soccer. My weekends were consumed with that.” So, at 18, she quit, refocusing on her music. She didn’t forget the lessons she learned about teamwork and cooperation, though. She credits her time in team sports with teaching her the sort of consideration and confidence to both take advice and stand up for herself as she maneuvers through the often cutthroat recording industry.
“Soccer is a team sport and you have to be working with your teammates to win,” she says. “I feel like that's everyday life, like me collaborating with other female rappers, working with my peers. That's how you create hits anyway: Working with other people, being able to collab with different producers and different writers. When you're playing soccer, you have to listen to the coach and you have to listen to people and your team. I have my team at Atlantic, my manager, everybody. I listen to them and their opinions and what they have to say. We're in this game together, and they know where they want to take me and I know where I want to go. So putting our heads together, there's nothing we can't win.”
It’s why she was adamant about amplifying the success of “Area Codes” when she saw that it had the potential to take off. After dropping a snippet on her TikTok, she notes with some amusement, “People were actually threatening me to drop ‘Area Codes.’ So I was telling my team, ‘When are we dropping ‘Area Codes?’’ We cannot miss this wave. ‘Area Codes.’ ‘Area Codes.’ ‘Area Codes.’ I know what I'm talking about. This is insane. We have to drop ‘Area Codes.’’” Talk about calling your shot.
Kaliii’s manager, CJ, takes the opportunity to chime in here, echoing the egalitarian sentiment behind the artist’s credit-sharing praise. “Kaliii's my daughter from another mother,” she jokes. “I've known her since she was in grade school. So I always have her best interest at heart, and her desire was to pursue her career and take it seriously. She said she wanted to go to the top and it is my job to make sure she gets there – and she's arrived.”
The young rapper’s awareness of how to work with others, of knowing when to pass and when to shoot, and of being able to collaborate toward a set goal certainly came into play as “Area Codes” began to take off. Where many young artists would immediately pivot to the next thing, hoping to capitalize on the attention and prove that they could do more, Kaliii instead doubled down on the promotion of the song with a half dozen remixes, all featuring other burgeoning artists from different cities. Each remix was christened with the area code of the respective artists who appeared, from Brooklyn’s Kenzo B (718) to Sexyy Red (314) to Luh Tyler (850). Kaliii’s strategy was simple: “I wanted to really tap into different fan bases and different area codes.”
Elaborating on the artist selections she made, she says, “Female rappers are really taking over right now. So, I wanted to see how different females would get on ‘Area Codes.’ And maybe I haven't been to that place, so it was a way for me to go there and see. Kenzo B is from New York. I went there to New York, she made me try a chopped cheese [the famed bodega sandwich that’s become a New York City emblem online], and she showed me where she's from and she came crazy on the track.” And while she admits she made the remix with Luh Tyler “just to get a male perspective,” her mission to champion other women the way she was treated early in her career is the element that truly made the “Area Codes” cycle click.
And according to Kaliii, she’ll have turned down the toxicity on the upcoming project as a result of the personal growth she’s experienced since her last one.
However, she warns, “I'm not saying that I'm 100% not toxic. I definitely still have my toxic tendencies, but my mission is to be 100% healed and not be toxic. Because when I take it there, it's like, yeah, I'm really up there.” But for now, she says she’s “grown,” asserting that “I know what I want to stand for now, and what I want my brand to be. And I really want girls to look at me and be like, ‘She's so confident and she has this effortless beauty and confidence.’ I just want to be everybody's homegirl.”
“So that's what this tape represents for me,” she continues. “I wanted to be more vulnerable and show girls that I go through things, just like y'all go through things. I've cried over men before. I've done the back and forth. But instead of blaming that relationship and going back to my toxic ways, I kind of want to grow from it and become the best version of me. So Toxic Girls Need Love Too is basically me showing that, being more vulnerable, finding my sound, and finding who Kaliii is, to build the best me.”
So, who is Kaliii? There’s the Toxic Chocolate alter ego, for sure. But there’s also a little girl who played with Barbies, who took the ultimate lesson from the messaging that the brand has espoused since the beginning. Whether that’s a champion soccer player or the biggest rising star in rap, Kaliii is taking that message that “you can be anything” to heart. She also picks up the torch to carry it forward. She’s speaking to all sides of herself when she says:
“Even the most confident females have bad days, honestly. We all have bad days and we all are trying to put the pieces together and figure everything out. Don't take everything so serious. Just have fun. It's your life, and nobody can take anything away from you.”
Barbie would be proud.
Writer: Aaron Williams (@aaronsmarter)
Stylist: Jennifer Udechukwu (@jenniferudechukwu)
MUA: Kevin Luong (@kvn.luong)
Hair: Briana Roberts (@brianalatrease)
Publicist: Ariana White (@arestarr)
Photographer: Raul Romo (@raulromo)
Photo Assistant: Natalie Thomas (@nataliethomasphotography)
Digital Design: Carlos Sotelo Olivas (@barlosx)
Creative Director: Philip Cosores (@philipcosores)
Kaliii is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
However, according to the 22-year-old Atlanta rapper who performs the song, the track’s signature flex is more fabrication than fact. When she was asked by the boisterous hosts of New York radio’s The Breakfast Club whether she really does have a blue-eyed bae on call, she admitted that the line is “manifesting” one – if only for the attendant benefits of sumptuous Italian cuisine. Still, the trademark lyric – and the thumping beat, boastful attitude, and caption-worthy hook – have become an indelible part of the online experience in 2023, and “Area Codes” has been included amongst the presumptive songs of the summer conversation for the duration of its existence.
Contrary to popular belief, the song is not inspired or informed in any
way by the original 2001 Ludacris single “Area Codes.” Despite
that song's popularity, it came out before Kaliii could be reasonably expected to recognize numbers, let alone their significance to telephone operation. Fans have been flabbergasted to learn she’d never heard the song before writing her own – or at least, she doesn’t remember hearing it – but over the course of an hour on Zoom, I came to trust the veracity of her account. She’s not the type to take undue credit or put on airs. If anything, there’s still a youthful freshness to her outlook that belies the jaded boasts in her latest hit.
When she makes optimistic statements like “I feel like ‘Area Codes’ is the song of the year, forget the summer,” it’s hard not to contract just a little of her contagious confidence. ”I'm taking over,” she says. “Everybody is so tapped in. I literally have all the white boys tapped into ‘Area Codes.’ All the girls are tapped in.” There’s no naivety in her reasoning for why the song has connected either; the uncommonly perceptive Zoomer has an innate understanding of the draw it has and the widespread enthusiasm internet users have had for repurposing it. As of publication, “Area Codes” has peaked at No. 33 on the Billboard Hot 100, making it Kaliii’s first song to appear on the chart.
“It's the flow that I had on the song,” she explains. “People want to memorize the lyrics super fast. I literally have over a million TikTok videos. It's crazy. So I feel like ‘Area Codes’ is the song of the year, honestly. And it's like if you don't have hoes now, you probably had hoes then. Or, if you sing it enough, it's a manifestation song.”
Now that the promotion for “Area Codes” has wrapped up, Kaliii is turning her attention to another eye-catching musical venture, contributing a verse to the Barbie soundtrack single “Barbie Dreams” by K-pop girl group FIFTY FIFTY. A thumping house jam, the song represents a departure for Kaliii, who normally favors sparse, trap-centric hip-hop beats. It also exposes her to a broader audience; whether they are ravenous (and notoriously loyal) K-pop fans or just checking on the soundtrack for a movie that has had the internet in a state of frenzied anticipation for months. It’s the perfect look to display Kaliii’s range and garner even more ears ripe for conversion into fans of the Atlanta rapper.
Atlantic Records’ West Coast President, Kevin Weaver, who produced the Barbie soundtrack in addition to those for numerous other blockbusters like Birds Of Prey, Furious 7, The Greatest Showman, and Suicide Squad, said of Kaliii’s inclusion, “When we were putting together the soundtrack, Kaliii’s name really stood out to us. She’s having a huge and well-deserved moment right now and we knew she would bring a unique and fresh energy to the album. Kaliii and FIFTY FIFTY nailed their collaboration which fits perfectly within the world of Barbie.”
The moment represents the fulfillment of another childhood dream of Kaliii’s – and really, of almost any woman in the world. You can relate if you too grew up immersed in the pristine pink, plastic world of the most recognizable fictional feminist ever. “Everybody loves Barbie,” Kaliii gushes. “Never would I have thought I would've been on the Barbie movie soundtrack. That's insane. And working with FIFTY FIFTY, that's also insane, because it's a completely different direction. I'm really excited to see what people think about that. Because I really wanted to tap into pop and being different.”
Naturally, she has fond memories of the Barbie doll and is keenly looking forward to the movie, especially since, “I know Issa Rae's in there. I'm really excited about that. She's hilarious. So I just know it's going to be hilarious too.” Her take on the ongoing Barbie-mania is equally funny, but just as sharply insightful as the film itself appears to be in its trailers. “It's not for the little girls right now. It's for everybody that's super grown, and it's like, ‘Oh my God, I need this for healing.’"
She even got to be a Barbie for a bit in the photoshoot for this cover story. It’s all part of her next phase, in which she plans to dig down and determine for herself just who Kaliii really is. She’s not stopping at “Barbie Dreams,” either. A song from the upcoming EP, Toxic Girls Need Love Too, called “K Toven,” has her extra excited. Utilizing an interpolation of Ludwig van Beethoven’s composition “Für Elise,” the song is described as an exploration of the resurgence of the Jersey Club sound – another new direction for her to pursue. (The song is out now.)
“I feel like I've grown as a musician by trying different things,” she says of her newfound willingness to experiment. “Just getting out of my comfort zone and trying to be a better artist with different sounds, different beats, collaborating more with more artists and more producers, and not putting myself in a box.” That resistance to sticking to just one lane is perhaps why she’s perfect for a song for a movie about a character who quite literally breaks out of boxes all the time.
These days, it seems you can’t go online for more than five minutes without seeing a video set to Kaliii’s new song, “Area Codes.” In some, people – usually young women – lip sync the lyrics while miming themselves eating “lobster and pasta,” while in others, the aforementioned delectables are put on pristine display by aspiring and amateur chefs sharing their favorite recipes. And yes, some are very literal, with young women showing off the white boys on their proverbial rosters, oftentimes turning them into the butt of jokes by showing off their (lack of) dance moves.
“It's the flow that I had on the song,” she explains. “People want to memorize the lyrics super fast. I literally have over a million TikTok videos. It's crazy. So I feel like ‘Area Codes’ is the song of the year, honestly. And it's like if you don't have hoes now, you probably had hoes then. Or, if you sing it enough, it's a manifestation song.”
It’s that, yes, but the success of the song is also something that Kaliii herself manifested. Since the last time she and I spoke around the release of her debut EP Toxic Chocolate, she’s enjoyed some tremendous accomplishments, touring with early benefactor (and previous Uproxx cover star) Latto, securing a spot on the 2022 XXL Freshman Class, and performing “Area Codes” during the 2023 BET Awards on the Amplified stage. Interestingly, the latter role was previously occupied by Latto, who went on to break out last year with her hit “Big Energy.” Kaliii has found herself on the cusp of the same sort of breakthrough, especially with her next EP, Toxic Girls Need Love Too, on the way.
Of the new project’s title, she says, “It's a play off of my last EP called Toxic Chocolate. And I feel like in Toxic Chocolate, that was my real Toxic Girl era. Me going through it with men, and just finding myself. And Toxic Girls Need Love Too, is me... I had my toxic phase, obviously, then I got in a relationship. I fell in love by accident, and then it didn't really work out, but instead of me going back to my toxic ways, I asked myself what do I want for me, and what do I want for my music and my career? And I just wanted to be outside with the girls.”
It wasn’t a straight shot to get here from there, though. Throughout high school, Kaliii was more interested in a soccer career than a rap one. She had dreams of making the US Women’s National Team and playing in the World Cup, but the commitments and pressure associated with pursuing those goals eventually wore down her love for the game. She recalls her parents being “really strict about” meeting those requirements of greatness and stressing the importance of achievement over having fun, as youth sports parents sometimes do. This is usually the death knell for kids’ dreams of sports stardom and Kaliii was no exception.
Plus, soccer just isn’t as popular with kids in the US as other activities. “As a teenager, nobody wants to come to your soccer game,” she notes sadly. “They want to be outside.” Combined with the “tough love” she received from her parents and coaches, she says it all became “too much.” “It's not that I was falling out of love with it,” she insists. “There was just too much going on. I felt really sheltered. I felt like I couldn't be outside without soccer. My weekends were consumed with that.” So, at 18, she quit, refocusing on her music. She didn’t forget the lessons she learned about teamwork and cooperation, though. She credits her time in team sports with teaching her the sort of consideration and confidence to both take advice and stand up for herself as she maneuvers through the often cutthroat recording industry.
“Soccer is a team sport and you have to be working with your teammates to win,” she says. “I feel like that's everyday life, like me collaborating with other female rappers, working with my peers. That's how you create hits anyway: Working with other people, being able to collab with different producers and different writers. When you're playing soccer, you have to listen to the coach and you have to listen to people and your team. I have my team at Atlantic, my manager, everybody. I listen to them and their opinions and what they have to say. We're in this game together, and they know where they want to take me and I know where I want to go. So putting our heads together, there's nothing we can't win.”
Now that the promotion for “Area Codes” has wrapped up, Kaliii is turning her attention to another eye-catching musical venture, contributing a verse to the Barbie soundtrack single “Barbie Dreams” by K-pop girl group FIFTY FIFTY. A thumping house jam, the song represents a departure for Kaliii, who normally favors sparse, trap-centric hip-hop beats. It also exposes her to a broader audience; whether they are ravenous (and notoriously loyal) K-pop fans or just checking on the soundtrack for a movie that has had the internet in a state of frenzied anticipation for months. It’s the perfect look to display Kaliii’s range and garner even more ears ripe for conversion into fans of the Atlanta rapper.
Naturally, she has fond memories of the Barbie doll and is keenly looking forward to the movie, especially since, “I know Issa Rae's in there. I'm really excited about that. She's hilarious. So I just know it's going to be hilarious too.” Her take on the ongoing Barbie-mania is equally funny, but just as sharply insightful as the film itself appears to be in its trailers. “It's not for the little girls right now. It's for everybody that's super grown, and it's like, ‘Oh my God, I need this for healing.’"
She even got to be a Barbie for a bit in the photoshoot for this cover story. It’s all part of her next phase, in which she plans to dig down and determine for herself just who Kaliii really is. She’s not stopping at “Barbie Dreams,” either. A song from the upcoming EP, Toxic Girls Need Love Too, called “K Toven,” has her extra excited. Utilizing an interpolation of Ludwig van Beethoven’s composition “Für Elise,” the song is described as an exploration of the resurgence of the Jersey Club sound – another new direction for her to pursue. (The song is out now.)
“I feel like I've grown as a musician by trying different things,” she says of her newfound willingness to experiment. “Just getting out of my comfort zone and trying to be a better artist with different sounds, different beats, collaborating more with more artists and more producers, and not putting myself in a box.” That resistance to sticking to just one lane is perhaps why she’s perfect for a song for a movie about a character who quite literally breaks out of boxes all the time.
I asked myself what do I want for me, and what do I want for my music and my career? And I just wanted to be outside with the girls.
I asked myself what do I want for me, and what do I want for my music and my career? And I just wanted to be outside with the girls.
That's why a lot of girls tell me, You make me feel like a bad bitch all the time,
That's why a lot of girls tell me, You make me feel like a bad bitch all the time,
We're in this game together, and they know where they want to take me and I know where I want to go. So putting our heads together, there's nothing we can't win.
We're in this game together, and they know where they want to take me and I know where I want to go. So putting our heads together, there's nothing we can't win.
Never would I have thought I would've been on the Barbie movie soundtrack. That's insane.
Never would I have thought I would've been on the Barbie movie soundtrack. That's insane.
Don't take everything so serious. Just have fun. It's your life, and nobody can take anything away from you.
Don't take everything so serious. Just have fun. It's your life, and nobody can take anything away from you.
I asked myself what do I want for me, and what do I want for my music and my career? And I just wanted to be outside with the girls.
Kaliii is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Don't take everything so serious. Just have fun. It's your life, and nobody can take anything away from you.
Never would I have thought I would've been on the Barbie movie soundtrack. That's insane.
We're in this game together, and they know where they want to take me and I know where I want to go. So putting our heads together, there's nothing we can't win.
That's why a lot of girls tell me, You make me feel like a bad bitch all the time,
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Kaliii is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Writer: Aaron Williams (@aaronsmarter)
Stylist: Jennifer Udechukwu (@jenniferudechukwu)
MUA: Kevin Luong (@kvn.luong)
Hair: Briana Roberts (@brianalatrease)
Publicist: Ariana White (@arestarr)
Photographer: Raul Romo (@raulromo)
Photo Assistant: Natalie Thomas (@nataliethomasphotography)
Digital Design: Carlos Sotelo Olivas (@barlosx)
Creative Director: Philip Cosores (@philipcosores)
Writer: Aaron Williams (@ aaronsmarter)
Stylist: Jennifer Udechukwu (@jenniferudechukwu)
MUA: Kevin Luong (@kvn.luong)
Photographer: Raul Romo (@raulromo)
Photo Assistant: Natalie Thomas (@nataliethomasphotography)
Digital Design: Carlos Sotelo Olivas (@barlosx)
Creative Director: Philip Cosores (@ philipcosores)