Kissey Asplund
Sweden
By Regine Zamor
Photography by Kwaku Kufuor
Kissey Asplund’s explosion onto the music scene has brought popularity to a forgotten word - plethora. The 26-year-old Swede decided on Plethora to title her debut album because of its anonymity. “It’s not negative or positive, it just means too much. It’s a good word,” and rightfully so, it properly captures the Guyanese and Swedish beauty that the world just cannot seem to get enough of.
Asplund had the grooming of a musician, yet her success still shocks her. Tina Asplund, as her family and friends know her, majored in singing in high school and took a hiatus because she didn’t like the sound of her voice. Asplund admits that this was a teenage phase, but soon after took up fashion design, fine art and other creative outlets - all but music.
“A friend forced me up on Myspace and I realized I could use a name where no one knew me - like Kissey Asplund. Kissey is the name that my mother calls me,” she explains. The nickname helped Kissey to freely share her music, and from here on out the story organically unfolds. Though Asplund doesn’t want to walk around as a Myspace poster child, she cannot discredit the relationships developed there, which led to her music emergence.
“After a while on the Internet you get to this change where you need an album. People want to work with you and everyone was like ‘do you have a project, do you have a project?’” What is now Plethora began as a project, and after sharing a few tracks, the Myspace connections were at it again. “R2 Records asked to hear the whole thing, and we sent it over and they said ‘this is brilliant,’” Kissey says, as her face still lights up with the energy of surprise.
Produced by Papa Jazz, a French based Jazz collective, Kissey recorded vocals after a two-month lock-in. “I locked myself in the apartment. I was working full time, and after work I’d go home and be in the studio till two o’clock, then back to work.” Within four months, the new artist had a first draft of her album and has become a humble innovator in the soul and electronic music realm.
Asplund is dreaming up her second album and now aspires to work with Dwele and George Clinton and is establishing her music career through learning and developing lasting relationships. When asked about getting a website, she replies, “Everyone keeps asking me. I am going to,” proving that Kissey’s Plethora is indeed, never too much.
|
