Skiddle's Future Headliners: Kelly Lee Owens
This week's Future Headliner is Kelly Lee Owens, an artist who has continued to evolve since her debut.
Date published: 20th Jun 2022
This week on Skiddle's Future Headliners we're covering a very special artist who has already had some critically-acclaimed records and is as capable of hitting you deep in the feelings as she is at getting you to move. It is of course Wales' own Kelly Lee Owens who is a delightfully experimental electronic music producer.
After moving to London from North Wales, Owens interned at XL Recordings before working for a string of record labels. Her first entry into making music was through Daniel Avery who she contributed vocals for on his EP Water Jump and his 2013 album Drone Logic. She then went on to make her own debut in 2015 with Lucid, a single that mixed light and airy vocals with a beat that was on the cusp of fragility, making for a dreamy experience.
She then made the next logical step and released her self-titled debut album in 2017 which featured Lucid on it. The album feels like a fully-formed experience, where the production is perfect and centres you fully in the world that Kelly Lee Owens creates, which has become a key part of what makes her music so effective.
A mixture of techno and dreamy pop, it's an album that can easily get under your skin if you let it. Owens has had an interest in "healing frequencies" and you can feel that throughout her debut. Her form continued on the equally brilliant Inner Song which was released in 2020.
Featuring techno bangers Melt! and Night, the two tracks prove that Owens' music is not simply effective at creating epiphanies whilst listening through your headphones, it is equally capable of providing those cathartic moments on the dancefloor. Inner Song is a reflection of a time of intrinsic thought from the artist, making the album deeply personal, it's an invitation into her world.
More recently, Owens has released her third album titled LP.8, it saw her stuck with the conundrum of not being able to tour during the pandemic, so she upped sticks and went to Oslo and worked with Lasse Marhaug on her most experimental album to date. You can read more about this fascinating album in our track-by-track review here.
What we believe makes Kelly Lee Owens a potential future festival headliner is her ability to get a crowd moving in a transcendent state. Her songs are portals to places far better than our present, able to instantly excite, relax and inspire all at her whim. There are so many satisfying, sudden drops that change up tracks completely that can absolutely delight the crowd.
A shape-shifting inventor, Owens is constantly switching up the energy to keep you on your toes and she could easily headline an electronic music festival one day. For now, you can find her playing festivals such as Bludeot this summer. She will also be joining Jungle as they headline South Facing Festival in London. You can keep up to date with what she's up to here.
Kelly Lee Owens is truly a master of creating fascinating soundscapes.
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