Exclusive Interview: Devin Kennedy Talks Debut Album California Rain, Creating Music on His Own Terms, and Connecting with His Fans

Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Devin Kennedy has never shied away from his creative vision. As an independent artist, Devin states, “It starts and ends with me.” It’s that unwavering belief in himself that has seen Devin rise from one to watch to a voice of his generation. With over 80 million streams on Spotify alone, Devin’s music and lyricism have struck a chord with listeners around the world, and seen him receive praise from the likes of MTV, iHeart Radio, Elvis Duran, and many more.

This June, Devin releases his highly-anticipated debut album, California Rain.

Pop Culturalist was lucky enough to catch up with Devin to talk about his debut album California Rain, creating music on his own terms, establishing his creative vision, and connecting with his fans.

PC: There’s so much growth that you hear when you’re listening to California Rain, and the album feels so personal but universal. What’s played the biggest role in your development as an artist, songwriter, instrumentalist, and producer?
Devin: It’s a lot of trial and error. With anything really, it’s finding that sound, releasing more music, and making more music. I’m out here making a song every day pretty much, so I’m just picking my favorites and the ones that I gravitate towards the most. When you do that pretty much every day, you can see that growth over the years.

I always look back and at any given moment, I feel like I’m making the best song that I can make. Then I look back a year later, and I’m like, “I can’t believe I thought that a year ago because I just made this song, and this song is so much better.” That growth is a driving factor for me to keep getting better. It’s the most exciting part about the creative part of making music for me, it’s looking back and seeing that progress. It keeps me motivated to keep making new songs. The more I do it, the more interesting and unique the songs get. That’s what I love about it.

PC: You were on tour earlier this year with Daniel Seavey as his opener. When you’re performing to a crowd that might be less familiar with your music, how much do you use that experience to determine what gets released and what makes the album?
Devin: It’s always interesting to see how songs are reacted to live because it can be different than how they are reacted to on the internet. The energy, the tempo, the feeling, and the emotions of the songs come across a different way live, especially coming out of the pandemic. Last year and this year, I’m playing a set list that I’ve never played before.

Every song that I’m playing is a song that I’d never played before that point. I’ve been releasing music steadily through the lockdowns and everything, so it’s interesting to go out there. I had no idea what my setlist was going to look like, but I had an idea of what songs I should play based off what had done well and what I wanted to play. I think I gauged that pretty well. I had chosen the right song to end with and the right song to start with. The set felt really good. There were certain songs that were a little slower, so you have to put those in certain parts of the setlist to make sure that people are ready for a slow song after you played all these energetic songs.

There’s a whole science to it. I had a super fun time on the road testing out new songs as well. We got word that we were going on tour only a few days before it started. It was a very, very quick turnaround to get on the road with everybody. It started on January 3rd, so top of the year. We jumped out and started playing shows without a ton of heads up.

I really wanted to release new music. I had just finished my first song for California Rain before I left, which was the first single, “Love You Anymore”. It felt like the right song to come out with. I really wanted to come off the tour and put out a song. So about halfway through the tour, I figured, “Let’s start playing it,” so I can get some live footage of it and see how people react. Do people like the song? I played the slowest version of it ever. It was like a five-minute version of the song. I was in DC when I played it for the first time.

The thing with that song is that it’s so lyrical. I would pause between certain lyrics that I thought were really impactful to hear the reaction from this crowd that didn’t necessarily know who I was, definitely had never heard the song before, and there were people crying in the audience. They were having this loud, visceral reaction to the lyrics, and they didn’t even know who I am. That was an eye-opening experience. That was the driving factor to, “We gotta put this out.” That was so special. Not a lot of songs get that type of reaction, especially when you’re playing to not necessarily a warm audience that knows who you are.

PC: You’ve always made it your mission as an artist to connect with your audience. As it’s grown, how have you continued to make the connections?
Devin: I’ve always tried to do this, and you’ve watched me do it for five years. These people who are supporting me and coming to my shows, streaming and buying merch, commenting and liking, these are my friends. For them to show me that much love on my music and not expect anything in return and being there to show love, those are my friends. That’s my family right there. That’s how I try to treat everyone whether I know them personally or not. It doesn’t get much more special than that.

I try to interact and be friends with as many people as I can possibly keep up with on the internet because I spent so long making music and I didn’t have a fan base. I was in bands that didn’t have a fan base. I wanted what I have now for a long time. I will never let go of that. I will always do my best to send that love right back because it’s amazing.

PC: You went on an extensive writer’s retreat in Joshua Tree. How did that environment and setting influence the tone and everything that we hear on the album?
Devin: We went out to Joshua Tree with a lot of tracks and ideas for the album. We had maybe 20 or 30 different things that I had started, whether they were 90% of the way there or 10% of the way there. Once we got there and started opening up the files, writing, and workshopping them, it felt like we were in such an isolated, interesting environment, and it had a different feeling. We ended up pausing on all the things that we had done in preparation for the camp out there. We started writing fresh, whatever came to mind, whatever tracks we wanted to write.

This Airbnb that we stayed at had a ton of vinyls too. We would cook dinner. We’d throw on a vintage vinyl. A lot of that was influencing things whether we were thinking about it or not. We put on this doo-wop vinyl—I couldn’t even tell you the name of it, but it had some very retro-feeling record. The next day, we wrote “Love You Anymore,” and subliminally, there are those doo-wop background vocals, which looking back on it now, probably came from listening to that record the night before.

So, it definitely played a lot into the development of the project. The isolation of being there evokes a different feeling around the music and around writing the music. It would be hard to capture that if you were sitting in a home studio. It was a completely different feeling from being out there.

PC: This industry has become a singles market, but you’re one of the artists who continues to release these larger bodies of work, and you’ve done that so brilliantly, toeing that line. Why has that been so important to you?
Devin: In terms of music marketing, it’s still important to put out singles, which I always do. What I’ve really enjoyed doing the last few years is putting out these singles that define the project very well, and then eventually putting out the project after these singles get a bit of love and all that a few months later. That the modern music marketing way of doing things.

It’s important to highlight the songs that you think represent a project well, but in terms of developing and defining your own career, projects are important. Eras are important for fan building, giving people something to latch onto, a brand that they understand and can count on, and not necessarily know what to expect, but to support all of that. It’s important to give them more than just singles. Singles are a piece of the puzzle, but certainly not the whole puzzle.

PC: With this being your debut album, did anything surprise you about the experience putting it together? What’s been the biggest takeaway?
Devin: I’ve never made this many songs for a project, and I also wrote more songs than I ever had for a project. I selected 8 from a batch of 30 or 50 songs that I probably wrote for this record. The biggest takeaway is that when you’re making so many different songs with different people and places, the one thing that is going to tie it all together is me. So, I have to stay true to my vision for what I want the album to be. That’s important going into the creation of the album. We may not have an exact idea of what it’s going to look like, but you have to have a vision formalized in your own mind so you can communicate that to everybody who’s working on it with you, whether that’s the visuals, the marketing, the songwriting, or the producing.

If it all comes back to me, I need to know exactly what I want. If I don’t know what I want, then it’s probably not time to start writing the record yet because then you get a lot of different things instead of something cohesive. Being cohesive for an album or a longer-form project is one of the most important things for me. I love artists who have really done that well. Those are the brands, music, and artists that I love. I’m aspiring to give that same type of experience to my listeners.

PC: If you had to choose a song off of California Rain that best encompasses who you are as an artist at this moment, which would it be and why?
Devin: The best representation and this will probably change every day—if you ask me tomorrow, I’ll have a different answer for you—but right now, I’m going to say “Frequent Flyer”. It’s the last single leading up to the project. We loved it from the day we made it. That’s something we made in Joshua Tree that wasn’t planned at all. One morning, I was making a beat. I named it “Smoothie Vibe,” on my hard drive because I was having a smoothie while I made it. Then, everybody woke up and made breakfast. While everyone was having their food, we wrote that song as our last day in the desert. It came out of nowhere.

For me, it represents what I hope to do with this album and project, which is to combine a very musical type thing, very chord-heavy and highly-detailed music production with very well thought out lyrics, but still make it commercial and something that my mom or my dad would love and not analyze it as I might.

“Frequent Flyer” is a good representation of this record because it’s something that I love, which is a slow jam guitar vibe, but it’s still got that pop chorus and buzzy lyrics. It’s that great middle ground of what I hear in my head for this album and project.

PC: The evolution of this project and your artistry is now the visual aesthetic. You’ve recorded a music video for just about every song on the album. Can you talk a bit about how the creative vision and process for California Rain differs from previous releases? Why has that been so fundamental to this debut album?
Devin: Totally. As we were talking about earlier, a piece of the puzzle is the visuals. That took some time to learn, too. The first couple of years, it was just music, music, music. The videos don’t matter. The promotion is the music, right? Now, I’m really enjoying the storytelling aspect of the videos, which it took me a little time to get into that world.

I’m not a videographer by trade. That’s never been my thing. I’m still not by any means, but I can think of ideas, and I can work with creative and talented people to execute that vision. For this project, it’s important. Like on previous projects, I’ve done very bright, sunny, beach-type of things—not on everything, but on a decent amount of things. That was part of the brand for a while.

This time around, I wanted to toy with what’s the direct opposite of that. We’re naming it California Rain—obviously, it would make sense to do something sunny and very California. What is the polar opposite of that? Let’s toy around with what that might look like. So, when we did “Love You Anymore,” that was the first video before we fully strategized the visual rollout. When we did that, it was twilight, pink, purple, and dark blue. It was past sunset and much darker. That matches the tonality of the album as well, which it’s a little bit of a darker, moodier body of work.

So, when we went to make some more videos for the remaining singles—there are two more videos that haven’t been released yet—we wanted to stay in those darker tones in the color palette, which are pinks and purples, and that right there ties everything together and makes it cohesive. From there, it was about executing a cool idea around each video.

We take those ideas and those color palettes, but we go and shoot one video on a Boeing 777, and then we shoot one on a cliff in Malibu. Then, we shoot one in a diner. We get a rain truck to soak me in a parking lot. You name it. That was a really fun process to try and make it cohesive and add little Easter eggs that tie things together.

I think that this is a project that is going to age very well as more and more people find it. They’ll dig in and fine points of all the little Easter eggs, and you can even hear things in the songs that are tied together, lyrics that are tied together between different songs. There’s a lot to unpack there. I’m excited for everybody to find that.

PC: It definitely has a timeless quality. You’re also someone who thrives on a live stage. Often when artists release albums or EP, they go on the road to support it. Is there a tour coming up later this year?
Devin: Yes, I definitely will be on the road later this year. I’m excited to get back out there. Like we were saying earlier, I was out with Daniel Seavey back in January. That was a very quick and amazing thing that I’m so thankful for—the opportunity to meet a lot of new fans and friends and go to cities that I’ve never been to before and explore a bit.

You’re right—that’s the whole reason that I started making music. It’s to play shows, get out there, travel, and meet people. That’s still number one for me. I’ll definitely be back on the road as soon as possible.

PC: As you’ve built this extensive catalog, is there a song that will always make your set list? Is there one that never will?
Devin: [laughs] There probably is. My song, “Forget About You,” which has been out for about a year now, is one of those songs. I can see how people have found it now and listened to it. It’s one of those songs where you could tell how people feel about it. The tone and the feeling of the song are something that people can gravitate toward it seems. I’ve also seen significant growth around my project with that song. That’s definitely a song that in ten years will still be on my set list.

Is there a song that never will make a set list? I’m proud of every song that I have out, even down to the records that I was making in 2018 that might not be my favorite anymore. But those are timestamps for where I was at that moment and how I was making music and the quality of music that I was making. If one of those songs were to pop off and needed to make its way into a setlist, I’d probably rearrange it and play it a different way. Maybe acoustic? But I don’t think there’s any song that I would say would never make a set list, but I’ll get back to you on that.

PC: Anyone who has followed your journey has seen the success that you’ve had, and you’ve done it as an independent artist. Why has that been so important to you?
Devin: I really value my independence. I really value being in control and owning my work and my creativity across the board. It all comes back to me. No matter what, I have to be at the center of this vision and the growth of this project. For me, there hasn’t been a logical reason in today’s music industry to sign that away. I’ve grown this with my immediate team, my lean machine of a company here. I own my own record label. It feels so good when you build something with your family. That’s the best part about it. It feels so right.

Now that we’re seeing the project grow, more and more and more doors are opening and more opportunities, things are getting more and more exciting. That’s an extra incentive for me to stay independent because the hardest part is getting started. We’re past that point. It feels good to be in control. It allows us to jump when we need to jump at a moment’s notice, and no one can stand in our way. There are no obstacles. There’s something that’s very valuable in having the ability to do what we want. I love that. I don’t see that changing anytime soon.

To keep up with Devin, follow him on Twitter, Instagram, Spotify, and Apple Music. Pick up or stream California Rain today.

Photo Credit: Kory Luke