SAP

by Okay Kaya

Overview

The project of Norway-raised, New York-based musician/artist/model/actor Kaya Wilkins, Okay Kaya won Norway's Spellemann Award for best indie/alternative album of 2020 for her second album, Watch This Liquid Pour Itself. Work on the follow-up began in pandemic isolation in Europe, where Wilkins had traveled for a series of museum appearances and exhibitions of her art (one such installation amplified music made underwater). Using studios loaned by friends, she wrote, performed, engineered, and produced her third album entirely alone until inviting a number of guests -- including Nick Hakim, L'Rain's Taja Cheek, the Moldy Peaches' Adam Green, and over a dozen others -- to contribute finishing touches upon her return to New York. A concept album about consciousness ("Even my subconscious is self-conscious," she offers on "Inside of a Plum"), and with a title and select lyrics comparing certain human processes to those of trees, SAP is an off-balance, sometimes unsettling, meandering 15-track work that was also partly inspired by undergoing ketamine therapy treatments (the same song begins, "Doctor deposits the ketamine/Intravenously rushing towards my brain"). SAP opens with the dramatic, soul-tinged "Mood into Object Personified," whose woozy, Theremin-like keyboard and guitar tones and layered vocals seem to deliver listeners to a dream state. It's followed by the more straight-forward, yet still intentionally misaligned bedroom indie of "Jolene from Her Own Perspective," which has Wilkins imagining Jolene's reaction to the Dolly Parton classic ("I can't believe we're arguing about some man. That's so silly"). What follows are tracks that combine the psycho-biological, relationship-based, personal, and character-driven on songs with titles like "Pathologically Yours," "Spinal Tap," "Rorschach," and "I've Spent Forever Planning a Crisis" as well as "Jazzercise," a funky, half-spoken, advertisement-styled track; "In Regards to Your Tweet," whose seductive sophisti-pop remarks "I write a song until I feel something new"; and "Like a Liver," a beat-heavy synth track that retains the album's swimmy sonic sensibility. Due to its length (nearly 50 minutes), cerebral constitution, and tenuous songs structures, SAP can take some effort on the part of the listener by the end, although its unpredictability, enveloping intimacy and creative restlessness are just as likely to engage. ~ Marcy Donelson

Product Details

Release Date:	11/18/2022
Label:	Jagjaguwar
UPC:	0656605243382

Tracks

1. Mood Into Object Personified
2. Jolene From Her Own Perspective
3. Origin Story
4. Jazzercise
5. Pathologically Yours
6. Spinal Tap
7. Inside of a Plum
8. Rorschach
9. In Regards to Your Tweet
10. Dep. Chamber
11. Pearl Gurl
12. The Lesson
13. I've Spent Forever Planning a Crisis
14. Like a Liver
15. Weltschmerz

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Okay Kaya   Primary Artist
LEYA   Featured Artist,Harp,Violin
Adam Green   Vocals,Featured Artist
Eli Keszler   Percussion,Featured Artist
Nick Hakim   Guitar,Synthesizer,Featured Artist
Aerial East   Vocals,Featured Artist
Starchild & the New Romantic   Featured Artist
Zannie   Featured Artist
Farao   Featured Artist
Kari Jahnsen   Vocals
Zannie Owens   Vocals,MIDI Guitar,Featured Artist
Bryndon Cook   Bass
Deem Spencer   Vocals,Featured Artist
Taja Cheek   Vocals
Moist Paula   Saxophone,Featured Artist
Michael Wolever   Vocals,Featured Artist
Ydegirl   Vocals,Featured Artist
Toniann Fernandez   Vocals,Featured Artist
Stix Omar   Vocals,Featured Artist
Iris Taborsky-Tasa   Flute,Featured Artist
Franziska Aigner   Cello,Vocals,Featured Artist

Technical Credits

Austin Lee   Design
Ryan Schwabe   Mastering
Chris Wang   Mixing,Vocal Engineer
Jack Hallenbeck   Mixing Assistant
Kaya Wilkins   Design,Artwork,Composer,Engineer,Producer
Michael Brennan   Design
Eliza Ryan   Management