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Photo by Brea Lynn

I have been enamored with New York City-based singer-songwriter Kevin Atwater since stumbling on his transfixing song “rotted out with flies” in early 2024. There is something disproportionate and askew to the instrumental arrangement and/or vocal performance of this tune, and others throughout his catalog, that immediately separate him from many of his contemporaries in the indie pop field, as does the intricate, twisted fashion in which he crafts his lyrical content. As a storyteller, he is impressively concise, abbreviated, and illustrative. 

Months later, I became similarly enamored by “lonely gift,” a then-unreleased tune he had been heavily teasing on TikTok before its inclusion on his debut album, Achilles, out now. He performed a divergent version of it this past November while opening for Jeremy Zucker and Chelsea Cutler’s brent tour at NYC’s Town Hall, opting for a bridge that can be described as sustained and improvised melodic free flow. With his mouth nearly fully closed, he traversed up and down his chest voice, mixed register, and head voice, on a notoriously difficult rounded ‘OOH,’ in what was one of the most impressive displays of vocal control I had seen in some time. A portion of this interview is dedicated to Atwater’s technical response to my query of just how he was able to execute this feat. 

Primarily, our conversation delved into the denseness of the musical, conceptual, and lyrical aspects of Achilles, a uniform, engaging project not built for passive consumption. From the confounding oddities that are “threat,” “the cage” and “Jamie’s Daydreams,” the minimalist studio version of “lonely gift,” the connected tissues of “jailer” and “Call Of Duty” and the horrific real-life implications of the latter, the digestible breathers that are “family party” and “ferry beer,” and the utter gobsmack of the closing title track. 

On “Achilles,” Atwater was joined by singer-songwriter Jake Minch who provided uncredited background vocals to assist in molding the gang vocal-style template that the fullness and aggression of the song required. In a rare instance, Atwater played the electric guitar on the track, obsessively sifting through takes until he felt his vision was achieved. 

OnesToWatch: What made this collection of songs the right bunch for an album instead of another two or three EP’s? 

Kevin Atwater: There was the intention, about a year and a half ago, that I was going to be writing an album. A lot of the time I’m writing music without much intention of a bigger picture. It’s usually digging into my life with one focused story, a moment, or I’m looking to capture a feeling. There was no other way of working, for a while. 

I wrote “Call Of Duty” two and a half years ago and I made the conscious decision that that was an album song, even though I didn’t really know what that meant. I didn’t think it belonged on my Downers Grove EP, and it definitely wasn’t a single. So, the world of the album kind of blossomed from me knowing that that would fit somewhere in the context of it. As I started writing other things that were explorations of themes that were similar, like violence, or complicated relationships to family, or the way you can internalize things that happened and the way they affect you down the line, there are a lot of general ideas that came from that. 

Did you spitball “Call Of Duty” off the dome in 20 minutes and then go back in and add some pretty harmonies?

Kind of, yeah. But it was, like, three isolated incidents of spitballing. I knew right away what I wanted to say, but initially I just set out to write about the story of my grandmother. It was top of mind for me. My grandmother was shot and killed in her car, on her way to church, when my mom was 21. A random act of violence. I obviously did not know her, but it affected my family a ton. I used to make “movies” with my brothers… sort of violent stories I thought were entertaining because I was a kid. We were showing them to my mom, and she was really disturbed by them. She didn’t like us holding fake guns, and told us the story about my grandmother. I remember feeling so ashamed. I wrote that first verse and chorus and there was nowhere to go. It felt like, ‘That was it. That’s all I want to say about that.’ So, I sat on it for some chunk of time.

The second verse and chorus are me then going internal and thinking about a random incident of violence that happened to me when I was 21. I just thought it was cosmically ironic that I was the same age as my mom was when her mother passed away. The interesting part of the song to me is the ending, which is tying both of those instances together. Looking at the greater theme of the song, which is how to move past these things. 

A man threw a bottle in front of the huge Pentecostal 

And called me a word that I used to take straight to my heart

When I tell it now, I skip around and leave out that part

A story I’ve never forgot… the word, the heights, the cross

The church, the night, my age 21

I’ll never throw a punch, I’ll never touch a gun 

Even if I could’ve used one

There are other songs of yours with examples of religious imagery, though they aren’t as closely tied to life and death. What weight do you feel religious imagery adds to a song? 

I was raised Catholic, so there is always that hovering over me and in my DNA. The religious specificity in my music is never by accident, it’s purposeful. In the case of this song, it is, incidentally, just a detail. I used to live in Washington Heights, right near a huge Pentecostal church that I walked past every day on my way to the subway, which is where the incident against me took place. I find it darkly funny to mention these religious images in a story that is solely about violence. Even the name of the song is a dark wink. My songwriter brain likes the complexity of that too… making people uncomfortable having to think about it. 

In terms of not wanting to say too much, or draw the story out, the same could be said for “lonely gift.” Why was it important to do less on the studio version than you do live? 

As someone who has made a career out of teasing spare versions of songs online… Perhaps keeping it the same and perhaps not, something I have had to learn is to embrace the evolution of songs. The way you can do whatever you want with them whenever you’re inspired to. I like the idea of that song having multiple lives depending on how I’m feeling, like when it’s being performed for people. The album version is sort of a quiet, but subtlety more looming, emission of defeat, maybe. Or resignation to your circumstances. 

On a technical level, when you played it live, your mouth barely opened. I was looking at your neck to see what your veins were doing. If there was any physical transition from your head voice down to your mix and down to your chest. Your eyes were closed, your body was centered because you were playing guitar. How do you DO that? 

Haha, hmm… [He pauses and smiles, a look of intrigued and humored perplexity on his face] 

Ok, wait, let me try to answer this technically actually, this is fun. Thank you for that question!! I love musician on musician talks. 

I’m SO happy about this. 

I had a voice teacher for four years who was a countertenor. I used to be really unsure of how to use the upper register of my voice, and he was a classically trained countertenor, so he would have me do sort of operatic vocal exercises. I don’t really use that part of my voice. I do more of the breathy falsetto vibe instead of the supported mix, I guess you could call it. That sound, to me, sounds like crying or wailing. 

It was like a yodel. When you’re up in that register, your vocal tract sits in a certain place for a while, which makes it harder to go back down to where you were in the verse. 

The adjustment is… difficult. I’m happy you thought it was easy, but it felt really hard in the moment and continues to. I’m up for a challenge. That even helps the emotional connection to the song. Doing that with my voice feels like such an emotional release. 

What is your tolerance level for musical accompaniment that is a bit more off-kilter from the vocal, like on “the cage” or “Jamie’s Daydream”?

I’ve really enjoyed pushing myself and exploring more… the things that would catch you unaware. Sounds that are messy or distorted or gross. A lot of my music is very light in space, aethereal in a way. It’s fun to play with the deep and dark sounds, especially because of the subject matter. I like the dichotomy of a lighter voice over something really gnarly. 

Do you feel like you’re adjusted to the off-beat syncopation of “the cage” immediately after you write it? Or does it take time to get used to sitting in a different pocket?

That is an awesome question. It’s hard! Even from a musical composition angle, I was determined to write a song in 5. Not a traditional 4 or 3 structure. I had an obsession with writing in crazy time signatures. Also, I feel like something physical happens when your body gets adjusted to this strange meter. It forced me to sing and write differently because nothing comes natural to me in five. So, I feel like it made sense for a song that had a really dark subject matter to be impossible to groove to upon first listen. Forcing your body to comply is the darkly ironic part of the song. 

What is the key to portraying being the recipient of a drunk text, call, outburst on songs like “lonely gift” or “why did you invite me to the wedding?” And do you feel there is something gripping about that kind of honesty?

Well, there are two sides of it. Even if the intention behind it does hold a certain amount of shame, it’s that shamelessness of receiving something that is unfiltered. But also… a lot of the time, people have needed alcohol to connect with me, or I’ve needed alcohol to not feel shame about doing emotional or sexual things with other people. I think it adds a certain amount of complexity. 

Do you think there is an allure to toxicity in music? And do you think you are perceived a certain way because of how you write about it? 

I do think there is a toxicity. I get really nervous that I’m going to be held to a certain standard because I’m writing music that isn’t necessarily about the deep pride and joy of being a queer person. I am so proud to be, and I love my identity. But, I think music is allowed to exist in its own space and serve its own purpose. I don’t think any part of this project explores shame in my identity. I’m more than just my queerness.

Jumping back here, is “jailer” connected to “lonely gift” conceptually? It seems designed to mirror it musically. 

Yeah, oh my gosh. There are lots of hidden connections in “jailer.” They are in the same key. On a technical musical level, my hand position for “lonely gift” climbs the neck of the guitar, while it descends on “jailer.” Also, the songs are about different people, but they are both about the deconstruction of a relationship. There is a fundamental miscommunication happening. Whether it’s because of shame, or alcohol. It’s usually about some sort of insecurity that these people cannot [pauses]… I’m saying, “these people,” but they’re about me. 

I think you’re saying “these people” because there is a character you’re portraying, even though it is about you. 

I try to take on this omniscient perspective so that I don’t write with bias. A lot of the time I think it’s instinctual to want to paint yourself as the victim and illicit sympathy. The challenge is trying to dig around that to the circumstance, and ask, “How did I participate in this that did not elicit a good outcome,” which this album explores a lot of, too.

And that’s the story of “Achilles,” the song, right? 

That was the last song we finished. I had it written and figured it out on guitar, but we weren’t sure of what we wanted it to sound like. Did we want it to be more paired down? Do we want a bigger more folk-rock moment? There’s so much tension in this project. Even when there is quieter tension, there's restraint. It’s occasionally let loose in bursts, but the album is almost like a whisper, or a confession. 

The song is about me being REALLY frustrated with my own relationship to intimacy, and other people’s. Specifically, it’s about me wanting to hold my boyfriend’s hand in public and sometimes feeling like I can’t. It’s being angry at my boyfriend, angry at me, angry at other people. Then the ironic part is then me saying, ‘But I DON’T WANT to fight… this shouldn’t be my burden to carry.’ I would love to live in that fantasy land. The song needed to be loud because, even as I’m talking about it, there are a lot of loaded statements and I wanted the ending of it to feel like, ‘Ok!! Are we… happy?? Are we angry?? What is happening??’ And all the answers are yes.

I can throw it back now

Why am I the one polite? 

It gets heavy being so light 

You could make me cry now

I don’t wanna prove you right 

It gets heavy being so light

And I don’t wanna fight! 

Listen to Achilles, out now: