POSTAL CODES | KAY BOUTILIER
Posted by Oak and Oar on
2011 was a big year for Canadian music: Arcade Fire, City and Colour, Drake, The Weeknd, Shad, Deadmau5, The Sheepdogs, Chromeo, Classified, Justin Bieber - to name a few. It’s safe to say that in 2012 this trend will continue, with new, uncharted Canadian artists making waves in the music industry. Over the course of this year we will be featuring some of our favourite up and coming Canadian musicians from all genres in a feature entitled Postal Codes.
Not only was it a big year for Canadians but it was also overall a big year for women’s in hip-hop. You had Nicki Minaj who spent the vast majority of the year promoting her late 2010 release, ‘Pink Friday’. Which, as of November 2011, had sold 1,663,300 copies in the United States alone. Along with the mainstream, we saw the likes of Kreayshawn run with ‘Gucci, Gucci’, which has now been viewed over 30,373,372 times since May of 2011 and just today yesterday I was reading Highsnobiety and see the push for Australian-born female rapper Iggy Azalea.
This leads us into our first Postal Code feature: Kay Boutilier. Hailing from Cape Breton, Nova Scotia this hip-hop scarlet first blew up as most Canadian’s seem to do, on YouTube. She than proceeded to take a little trip to LA where she was “discovered” during a BBQ that was attended by Ryan Tedder’s A&R guy (The face and voice of OneRepublic and responsible for writing two of the most played Top 40 songs in North American radio history). This led her to a deal with Interscope and Universal Music Canada.
Her four song EP ‘My Name Is Kay’ dropped on iTunes on Dec 20 of last year. Her 80′s inspired flare seems to fit into the highly marketably trends we are seeing with the likes of Kesha and the embarrasment of those jegging wearing donkey’s that comprise LMFAO (although must be doing something right if the radio play means anything). Here’s to hoping she continues to bathe and keep her 80′s swag classy, Run DMC style. Either way not your typical Maritime music. Maybe I just like Adidas tracksuits and polka dots, but I am sure you will see a bit more from Kay-ay-ay-ay.
http://www.mynameiskay.com/ @mynameiskay