Josh Killacky was standing in the middle of a sushi restaurant. He’d been asked to come that day to audition for a boy band. Chris Stokes, director behind such films as You Got Served and manager for bands like B2K, was at the helm. A long-time admirer of his work, Killacky launched into a cover of Justin Bieber’s “Boyfriend” and immediately hooked Stokes’ attention.
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“I had no vocal experience at all, and I had to sing in the middle of the entire restaurant,” he recalls. The boy band was short-lived, two years to be exact, but it was an experience that inspired him to actively pursue a music career. “The boy band was my first opportunity to hear myself on a song,” Killacky tells American Songwriter over a recent phone call. “There was a lot of drama within the band, and it was a huge learning experience. I’m so grateful for it, regardless.”
Up to that point, he’d never really taken songwriting seriously. It was mostly a hobby, and he’d perform little shows for his mom and sister. “I wouldn’t say I was trying to write hits before,” he says with a laugh. “Sometimes, it’s just writing in a journal and getting thoughts on paper. You don’t even need to structure it correctly. Some of the best songs don’t have a structure. I was really learning how to express myself.”
Killacky found self-expression in another avenue. Wanting him to be a disciplined, respectful kid, his mother enrolled him in taekwondo when he was two years old, and he soon discovered he had a knack for it. “My mom and I actually got our black belts together,” he says. He then toured the U.S. as part of a sparring competition, and even now, he stills draws upon his martial arts work. “It really shaped me as a person and a dancer. I’m a 5’6 small white boy that needs to have some kind of bigger pop energy in order to stand out,” he continues.
He was 12 when he started taking dance classes. He’d already been fascinated with such pop icons as Chris Brown and Michael Jackson, both artists known as much for their fancy footwork as their songbooks, and films like You Got Served. “It was always something I was interested in. At the time, I didn’t know you could take dance anywhere. I thought it was just a hobby,” he says.
Almost immediately, he felt a deep connection to dance. “I finally felt one with music. I needed to express myself in some way,” he says. He had also been playing countless other sports, including soccer and baseball, but as he entered his teens, he needed something different to satiate his hunger to create. “I just had too much energy. Combine that with music, I knew I was doing what I was supposed to do.”
Dance was most certainly his gateway, helping him define himself musically and physically in an exciting new way. “That led to creating music and being vulnerable in writing. That was a hard transition,” he reflects. “I was so used to showing music in a physical form and storytelling. Translating that into recording music and only using my voice was very challenging.”
Today (October 30), Killacky drops his debut EP, Overdue, a moniker, he says, ties in with the pressure he feels around the release. “This is music I’ve been waiting to drop for so long. I’m finally dropping a big musical project that I’ve been waiting my entire life for,” he expresses. “I’ve felt pressure from everyone. Now, I’m itching to drop even more music.”
“I feel like I’m finally gaining respect as an artist and not just as a social media influencer. That transition is very difficult in our world and generation,” he adds. “I’m really trying to do it for the right reasons.”
The six-song project, issued on World of Dance Records, zig-zags from such braggadocious cuts as “Workin’,” featuring Kangfrvr, and “Talk Body” with Bluprint and more vulnerable, acoustic-rich tracks like “Love Better.” Such a contrasting array underscores his strengths with melody and groove, and even when he’s pouring his heart out, there’s a rhythm to it. “Usually, when I’m writing songs, they come from visuals I have in my mind,” he says. “As a dancer and director, my living was based on creating dance videos. I tried to translate those moments in my head.”
For example, as with “Love Better,” he envisioned himself on an abandoned ski lift and riding up the mountainside. “I painted that picture in my head with all the trees: what was the scenery? What did it feel like? What did it sound like? How did I feel? I grasped all that and put that on paper.”
Off the cuff, he goes one step further and details an almost stream-of-consciousness approach. Maybe, it’s “3am at night, and I’m running on a highway all alone ─ and to a certain degree, the concrete becomes quicksand. And now I’m becoming concrete,” he muses. “Do I want to relate that to myself? Or do I want to relate that to finding someone that is concrete? I pull from so many different things. That’s just where my mind goes.”
Killacky, whose influences also include Ludacris and 50 Cent, speaks emphatically about his work, often trailing off on a tangent. This time, it’s about four-beat measures. It makes sense; he’s so used to counting off two adjacent measures in his head for whatever dance routine he’s plotting. In drawing from such knowledge, he’s able to frame beats that stick to the brain without every really thinking about it.
Understandably, he “can never be still while writing,” he admits. “I need to be moving. I can’t just write and be still with a pen and paper.” It’s that constant movement, perhaps winding hypnotic patterns on the floor to rattle a melody loose, that inspires him most.
Overdue twists together more than various strands of genres. He binds hope and hurt into a statement about emotions he never could properly express before. “I’m finally dealing with emotions that I feel I could really only deal with past 10 pm when the world is asleep,” he remarks.
Standout “BYL,” an acoustic undercurrent bubbling below the surface, digs into his own humanity and imperfections. Musically, each piece, from his rough-hewn vocals to the song’s innately unfinished textures, serves a purpose. “I was wanting to do something simpler and more mature. Even when we were mastering it, we went through like six masters. It got a point where it was too radio clean. Some of my vocals didn’t have that rasp. Even the guitar has a reverb on it.”
The EP is equal parts heartful confessions and midnight rave bops, and Killacky always sounds like he’s having the time of his life. He counterbalances heavy emotions with bold, classic alt/R&B grooves that radiate an intoxicating glow. “Especially during this time, I want to project positive energy into people’s lives. We’re all going through [so much] right now. I hope listeners get motivated to get out of bed and off their couch in these tough times and [conquer] whatever mental challenges they have right now.”
Killacky’s Overdue EP carries an even greater importance: it bookends his first decade in Los Angeles. “Through the years, I’ve received hate, whether it be on dance challenge videos and people telling me I’m being a culture vulture ─ or about songs people aren’t into. There are going to be people in your life who are jealous sometimes. Maybe it’s your work ethic or your drive to go after something you’re passionate about, and they’ve never had the courage. You can’t please everyone.”
Photo by James Davis II
