Karun has been a fixture in Kenya’s music scene since she was a teenager as part of the BET-nominated Camp Mulla. Since her departure from the hip hop group, she has forged her own path as a solo musician. Her 2019 hit record, “Glow Up” established her as one of the faces of alternative R&B in East Africa. Taking a break from music for a year and returning with a rejuvenated passion for music that has birthed her new EP, Catch a Vibe — the seven-track project is an account of Karun’s growth as an artist. Speaking on the project, she shares, “This EP represents a coming of age, I feel like I’ve had enough time to experiment with my sound, and I’m really comfortable with myself at this point so this is like an accurate representation of who I am.” The project opens with the “Let Me Know Intro” where Karun’s vocal abilities are the main attraction. The track seamlessly transitions into “Paths” where she sings about her experience of leaving Kenya to go study in the United States at the prestigious Berklee College of Music. It was important for her to tell stories like this in her EP as it correlates with her intention for honesty. Explaining the Nairobi based singer says:
I wrote about the feeling of moving countries and going off to study and you’re kind of moving out on your own. At the time I was making this project, I had that feeling come back up to me because my cousin was leaving the country. It brought up so many feelings of when I was starting my new journey. So, yeah, it was just honestly how I was feeling [on] the day that I made this song.
The following two tracks, “Here With Me” and “Just Friends” are love songs with relaxed Afrobeats sounds, which is a slight departure from her trademark R&B style. The production of the project was primarily handled by Nigerian-based producer Higo as well as Atlanta-born producer MOMBRU:
I picked those producers intentionally. I’ve been making music in Nairobi for a long time so I felt like I had worked with everybody that I wanted to work with. [With this project], I wanted to experiment and work with someone outside of my bubble. So Higo came up and I fell in love with his music instantaneously and MOMBRU is someone I’ve known for a very long time. He is a genius. He doesn’t have a bad song out anywhere. He sent me like millions of beats and all of them were fire so it was really great to have him on this project.
Karun had a rough direction of what she wanted, however, the two producers gave her a wide range of sounds to work with thus expanding her musicianship. The EP ends with “Grind” which has a more hip hop leaning sensibility to it, featuring Chase Aaron and Xenia Manasseh who are both from Kenya. Karun wanted to end with this record to show her versatility as well as to transport the listener from a soft and indie tone, to a more intense and hard vibe. By the end of the project, the singer hopes that the audience can see her growth as a musician and as a person:
I’ve been in the music industry for ten years and there are still fans who support me, so, I had to make something for them. This is me. For a long time, I’ve been figuring out who the hell I am and I grew up in the public eye, so I just wanted to be honest and encourage others to be honest with themselves.
