THE
MUSIC 2025
JOURNAL
To call Kaki King a guitarist has always felt too small a description. Over the past two decades, she’s redefined what the instrument can express, transforming it from a tool of melody into a vessel for thought, movement, and imagination. She’s moved fluidly between solo albums, orchestral commissions, multimedia performances, and even the silver screen, composing original music for the enduring film Into the Wild alongside Eddie Vedder and Michael Brook.
Kaki’s artistry has always been marked by risk and reinvention. She has pioneered projection-mapped performances that transform the guitar into a living canvas, expanded the possibilities of tuning and texture, and invited audiences to experience sound as story. Yet for all her virtuosity, it is her vulnerability that resonates most: the sense that behind every note lies an artist grappling with the same questions we all carry about community, parenthood, and how to keep creating in a world on fire. She’s opening fresh worlds of imagination, from guitar meditations in the park to BUGS, a live multimedia concert for children that revels in slime, insects, and gooey wonder.
What emerges is a portrait of an artist who continues to invent new languages for sound while remaining rooted in the most human of concerns: how to connect, how to endure, and how to keep imagining forward.
You’ve said the guitar feels like an extension of your brain. When you’re composing, does it feel like the guitar is thinking with you, or like it sometimes surprises you and takes you somewhere unexpected?
I think maybe I need to walk that back - an extension of my thought process maybe? But also writing on the guitar is like a process of discovering what the guitar was already thinking about. And my guitar has some very strong opinions so I do in fact have to go to the unexpected places it wants to go.
You’ve pioneered visuals as part of your performances, merging projection mapping with music. How do you think about silence, absence, or darkness in your compositions - the things that aren’t heard or seen?
Silence, space, darkness, rests, etc. are what brings dynamism and meaning to all the music and visuals that do exist. I often feel too maximalist as a media performer - trying to cram in as many cool moments and tricks at once instead of allowing the eyes and ears to have a breath. It's good to be reminded of the value of quiet and dark.
You’ve embraced technology in your performances in ways few guitarists have. How do you see it shaping your creativity and your relationship to the guitar?
I see it as much the same as the rest of my career. The guitar is infinitely fascinating and infinitely creative despite its small size and limited range. So I'm just trying to discover all of the things, aspects, that the guitar already inherently has in it. Using media or technology is the same as using an effects pedal which is the same as using a different tuning or writing a song in 7/8. It all already exists.
Being a musician and artist right now means carrying so much, from politics to division to climate anxiety. How do you keep yourself inspired to create in times like these?
Woof it's hard for everyone right? It's still hard for me to just put my phone down. I'll say that at least when I'm playing guitar I'm not capable of being active on my phone, and maybe that is enough to just give my brain a break. I'm afraid to say I'm doing anything more positive than that, but I can always do better.
Do you feel art has a responsibility to respond to the moment we’re living in, or is it just as powerful for art to exist on its own terms?
The age old question right? I think it's ok in times of turmoil, which are all times constantly no matter what, that you can make ephemeral abstract art for no purpose whatsoever. That all art is inherently political but all art is also inherently personal. To the writer and the audience. We make meaning out of it based on the context that we live in according to K. Harris' mom.
This is a hard one because in some sense, yes, I am entering a pared back phase. I remember seeing this happen to other older musicians and being really critical because it didn't seem like any ground was being broken or boundaries being pushed. Now I see it as the most difficult task - of writing and performing something simple that is at the same time complex, emotional, and eternal.
Has your relationship with tuning, texture, and alternate techniques changed over time? Do you feel yourself becoming more experimental, or more pared back and essential?
You composed original music for the film Into the Wild, an enduring piece of cinema, working alongside Eddie Vedder and Michael Brook. How did writing for film stretch your sense of storytelling through sound compared to writing for yourself?
I love writing for visual content because so much of the tempo and the emotional context is already there. It's easier to write something that really only needs something supportive behind it rather than having an empty span of time and space in front of me. The music I added to that movie was easy to write because the scene seemed to spell it out for me. And guess what. The editors moved some of the music I wrote for one scene and used it in another. So much for me knowing what to do!
Listeners often describe finding vulnerability in your work as much as virtuosity. How do you balance those two forces, strength and fragility, in art and in yourself?
The virtuosic playing is a fun ride. It's on the edge, it's exciting, it feels like it could crash at any moment. It's like athletics in that way. But it can be rough and messy and sweaty and there's room for error. The more vulnerable calmer songs require the same amount of physical and mental precision but in a calmer way. I have to slow down, I have to breathe, I have to intuit and I have to feel on a deeper level. Like a different kind of athletic routine. So they're two sides of the same coin I suppose.
Do your children ever hear your music in ways that surprise you?
My children want Bieber and Tay Tay and Chappell Roan. Listening to their mom's music and oohing and ahhing would be very weird and uncomfortable for all of us at this point. One day they can take a deep dive into my catalog and find meaning in that if they want. In the meantime they exist for the pop hits and frankly that is something way too powerful for me to oppose.
Music can sometimes be a solitary practice. Where do you feel most connected to community in your craft?
Oh man this is hard because I am a very social person! I love hanging out and speaking to everyone about everything. But I also love playing guitar and the calm it brings. I've gotten good at bringing an instrument to the park and just playing something simple over and over while people make conversation around me. That's probably when I am the happiest. I also run guitar meditation events where we come together to play methodically and slowly together over a long period and it's one of my favorite ways of being together without talking.
Has motherhood shifted your relationship to music, or how you think about time, patience, or legacy?
Motherhood has limited my time but increased my patience. I play less, I write fewer songs, I get the thrill and honor of raising two amazing kids. One of them can even make herself her own lunches now. So I'll get to write more songs eventually, and I'm patient enough to know that I don't need to rush their childhood for anything.
What should we look forward to from you in the near future? New music, tours, projects, or directions your fans might not expect?
I have a new live children's multimedia concert experience called BUGS. It's a feast for the eyes if your eyes love gooey melty strange weird insects and slime and colorful ooze. Coming to a children's theater near you!
To learn more about Kaki’s upcoming project and tour info, check out kakiking.com
PHOTOGRAPHS BY JUNG KIM