In 2007, DJ and producer Errol Reid, under the alias Paleface, released a single called "Do You Mind" on his own Northern Line Records. Featuring a singer credited simply as Kyla, the track was representative of a UK house subgenre known as bassline, a style that resembled a sped-up version of UK garage, and was epitomized by a track from another pseudonymous producer-and-vocalist combo, T2's Jodie-featuring "Heartbroken."Crazy Cousinz, a duo of Reid and his cousin Luke "Fluke" Reid, remixed "Do You Mind" a year later in the syncopated mold of yet another then-emergent UK microgenre, known as funky house, wonky, or simply "UK funky." The Crazy Cousinz mix was transformative, and definitive.
Fast forward to April 5, 2016. In a single day, Drake released two singles from his upcoming album Views From the 6. One, the rap-focused "Pop Style," features fellow industry heavyweights Jay Z and Kanye West. The other, the melodic "One Dance," features Nigerian pop star Wizkid... and Kyla, whose slyly insinuating "Do You Mind" lines are sampled and slowed down on the track.
Now married to Paleface, 32-year-old Kyla Reid (née Smith) lives in Huntingdon, about an hour or twooutside London ("in the sticks," she tells me with the first of many warm laughs). She quit her job as an ESL teacher about seven years ago to focus on her music career and, in the past two and a half years, on bringing up the couple's young son. "It's very family-based," she says of the remix Drake sampled. "We're all really proud. It feels lovely to think that something we built as a little unit has done so well. It's a really nice feeling."
Kyla spoke with Pitchfork over the phone about "One Dance," her (other) favorite Drake songs, the xx's memorable "Do You Mind" cover, how the original song helped spark a real-life love affair, and her future plans: "Fingers crossed you'll hear a lot more of me."
Pitchfork: How has your life changed since "One Dance" came out?
Kyla: Oh, hugely. Massively. It's the most bizarre feeling, it's amazing. I've been a singer for years and I did stop for a little while to get married and build a family. I didn't plan on stopping but I got really sick—pregnant—so I had a lot of time off just recording. I felt like I was doing the mumsy thing, sipping tea with my friends, having a relaxed mommy day. And then the next day just went "bang."
Pitchfork: So when this happened, you thought it was an April Fool's joke?
Kyla: Yeah! As I said, I was with my friends. We'd moved into the mommy meet. And we were sitting down, and my emails just kept pinging. I was like, "Well, OK, let me check." So I checked my emails. And I was getting these really sort of alarming, urgent messages: "Please contact Sony. They're trying to get hold of you." "Yeah, I'll do it a bit later," I said. And then my father-in-law phoned me, 'cause they somehow got hold of my father-in-law. He said, "I think you really need to make this call." And I was like, "Yeah, I'll do it later." I was really brushing it off like it was nothing.
When we got home and eventually phoned and they said "Drake," I was like, "Ahh! Why did I leave it so long?" Drake's team was literally like, "We've got this tune, we've used your track, and we really want to push this out to be one of his first singles of his album." I wanted to push for a feature, and when we ended up having the conference meeting, I didn't even need to initiate it. They were straightaway like, "How would you feel if it were a feature instead of being sampled?" And I was like, "Yeah, let's go for it." It was what I really wanted anyway.
Pitchfork: Did you re-record the vocal, then?
Kyla: No. They got my track, cut the bits out that they wanted, and just made a song out of it. They explained to me that two tunes [from Views] had been leaked, so they weren't going to send the song over to me. They played a little snippet of it over the phone. They were very much like, "Let's run with this version, there's no time for recording it or anything like that. We're getting hacked left, right, and center."
I thought it was going to be a good few weeks before it dropped, but I saw it in the paper on Monday, and Tuesday it was out. It was really crazy, really quick.
Pitchfork: How did you first hear the full thing properly?
Kyla: On my Facebook and my Twitter, I was getting lots of people being like, "This is amazing." So I went home and I bought it and I played it. I think upset my neighbors because I had it really loud and I must have played it 20 times (laughs). They didn't complain, but yeah, I don't think they like me very much.
Pitchfork: Had you listened to Drake before that? What do you think about him in general?
Kyla: I've always been a fan of Drake's. I wouldn't say I listen to all of his music, but I would say that I pick tunes out of his that I love and then put them on repeat. I'm terrible for that. Any songs that I like, I sort of rinse them out. I loved "Hold On, We're Going Home." I was obsessed with that tune. And yeah, just this huge—(singing) "Started from the bottom, now we're here." I am really a big fan. I honestly felt someone was having me on when they were like, "Drake wants you on this track." I was like, "Yeah, right. (Laughs) You know he's just done a track with Rihanna, right? Why would he want Kyla on his tune?"
Pitchfork: He has worked with Jamie xx before, and the xx covered "Do You Mind," of course. What did you think about the xx's cover?
Kyla: I loved it. It was nice to hear "Do You Mind" in a completely different style. They're amazing. I was trying to work out where they were gonna go with it, and it's done really well. I feel so blessed that they done that. For me, "Do You Mind" is one of my earlier songs from when I was teaching, and I left because I wanted to pursue this music career and I didn't know if I was doing the right thing at the time. You think, "I'm gonna give something up that's stable and I'm gonna go into a world where, I might not work." At the time, it was really nice to hear my music doing well and that people wanted to remix it, especially the xx. I love the flavor and the style that they went with.
Pitchfork: What do you remember about how "Do You Mind" happened in the first place? Were you and Errol married yet?
Kyla: We weren't married, and I would say we fancied each other at the time. That must have been like the third tune we'd done. It's so straightforward, the tune with no backing vocals or whatever, a straight recording. But we must have recorded it for like three weeks. Every night we'd go into the studio and change bits and come back. It was really enjoyable, because I think it was where me and my husband were getting to know each other and we trying to be professional and be like, "Yeah, business, just straight business. Let's not flirt with each other or anything like that." (Laughs) We were being really good, but they were memorable moments for me, because it was how I met my husband.
I've written lots of tunes, but that one always sticks to me. We got to know each other through that tune. "Do you mind if I take you home tonight?" It's really flirtatious. It's really just a laugh and banter sort of track. It wasn't a track that I was taking seriously, to be honest. And I think that's the best way. Sometimes you can overthink things. We were enjoying the company, we were having a good time, and it was just an enjoyable recording—that took about three weeks to make. (Laughs)
Pitchfork: You mentioned all your other songs. What else have you been up to musically over these past few years?
Kyla: During the day, I'll do things with my little boy, but when I get him down to bed, then I go into the studio. We've just been building lots of tunes and coming up with some really good hooks, so I've got a good bank of songs for when I'm ready. That's still what I plan to be doing now. I'm putting my head down and making sure that I'm coming out with some really good songs. And hopefully everyone will like it when I show it off.
Pitchfork: What does your new music sound like?
Kyla: Not so funky; a lot of people have asked me whether I'm sticking to funky. When I was talking to Drake's team, I had asked what made him choose "Do You Mind."And they were like, "You know, he loves music and he's just feeling the tune." That's very much where I'm at. I love making music and if I hear something that's quite challenging and it's a different kind of beat, I will go for it and see what I can do. You're gonna get quite diverse tunes from me. Pop, R&B—I'm a big R&B fan. Drake's singing tunes are very much where I'm at as well.
Pitchfork: How connected did you feel to that whole UK funky scene?
Kyla: It was really strange because for me, before I met Paleface, I was always very much an R&B singer. And I met him and he was like, "Have you tried singing this pop tune, have you tried doing this tune." He took me down a genre that I'd never seen before.
We'd done "Do You Mind" originally as a bassline tune, which is really bassy, really big fat bass underneath. And I was kind of like, "I'd never heard this kind of music before. It's brilliant." And then we had it remixed into the Crazy Cousinz "Do You Mind" version you hear, and the funky-house beat. That took me into a genre of music I'd never heard before, and it was just an eye-opener. It was fresh, and a lot of people were really hyped about it.
People say I influenced UK funky, but I think it was heavily influenced on me as well. I come out of there after "Do You Mind" feeling like I wanted to give them another funky tune, and I didn't even really know that scene at the time. "How do you make this music?" I thought. "How does this work?" Seven years ago, everything was so new to me, and I didn't understand the music world at all. I got thrown into it really quickly, and I felt like I had to learn it overnight really quickly. UK funky taught me a lot.