Mehek’s Music Mondays: Ke$ha

November 30th, 2009

Kesha

Oh hai thurr music enthusiasts.

We’ve got this new thing going on – we’re gonna have our own Music Mondays, where artists from all sorts of genres and success levels will be profiled, just to spice up the lovely day that follows the weekend.

To inaugurate this occasion, I spent a great deal of time trying to decide who to discuss first. I Googled, I iTuned lurked, I asked some friends – and then one afternoon, as I sat with my roommates flipping through the channels, I found this gem: Ke$ha.

Come on, anyone with a dollar sign in their name deserves a little attention, right?

The 22 year-old singer’s story starts in 1987, where she was born in San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles, to mother Pebe. A then singer-songwriter, Pebe experienced minimal success through penning Joe Sun’s “Old Flames Can’t Hold a Candle to You”, a song which was later covered by country singer Dolly Parton. Kesha’s family went through a rough period living on welfare, leading to their relocation in Nashville, Tennessee.

There, Kesha found her real roots in music, citing Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, and Dolly Parton as some of the performers fuelling her love for the art. With that inspiration and years of her mother’s encouragement, Kesha left her Columbia University-bound life to pursue singing in Los Angeles at 17, hoping her vocals and outgoing personality would lead her on the path of success she was looking for. Did I mention that in an attempt to achieve her dreams, she snuck into Prince’s house and dropped her demo? Yeah. NBD.

Kesha eventually caught the attention of famed producer Dr. Luke (Katy Perry, Britney Spears), and has been working on putting her name out there since. This past year, her vocal talents landed on Flo Rida’s hit “Right Round” (I know it’s playing in your head right now, don’t lie to me), placing her on the map.

But don’t expect her material to be your typical poppy sound and have metaphorical lyrics; Kesha insists that she’s not going to beat around the bush – what you see, what you hear, is what you get. When asked by Esquire magazine back in August about her songwriting process, she said “I’ll usually go out, have one f@#*%*# insane night, come home half-drunk, stumbling, and write down a few words. The next morning I’ll wake up and be like, Whoa, this story needs to be told.”

So what kinds of stories does she have to tell on her upcoming album, Animal (due out in 2010)? Well, there’s that time she puked in Paris Hilton’s closet. Or the boy she stalked when she was 15. How about a backstabbing friend, or a boyfriend who cheated on her with someone famous?

Yeah. She’s pretty open about her life.

Ke$ha is tearing up the charts with her first single, “Tik Tok”, a song that has people murmuring of her being the next Gaga. I don’t know if I’d agree with that, but she definitely has the talent and attitude to go far, so look out for her in the next year.
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If you have any suggestions for next week’s Music Monday, please feel free to comment or send me an e-mail at mehekmusicmonday@gmail.com :)

Tags: correspondents, kesha, music