SINGER KAUL REVEALS TRUE SELF
Indian-American reveals her true self
SHREYA Kaul was taking a chemistry final at Texas A&M University when inspiration struck. But it had nothing to do with atoms or compounds.
“I got the idea for a song,” Kaul says. “I started humming it. My teacher came up to me, and she was like, ‘This is a final. You need to be quiet or else you’re gonna be kicked out of the class.’
“I was like, ‘If all I can think about while I’m taking a test is music, then that has to be a sign.’ ”
Kaul, who was born in India and moved to the U.S. at six years old, decided to take time off from school in Dec. 2016, just after the beginning of her sophomore year, to pursue a dream she had been too afraid to fully explore.
“We’ve been planning out my whole life since I was a kid. I was like, ‘OK, I’m gonna go to college, med school, become a doctor.’ I had my whole life mapped out,” Kaul, 20, says. She was following in the footsteps of her father, a doctor, and her mother, a dentist.
“But this part of me, while I was in school, I just was so miserable. I couldn’t deal with it. I just wanted to sing. I’d look for any opportunity I could just to sing.” Kaul worked for almost a year with local producer Eddie Ferguson, whittling down 30 songs to the six that appear on her debut EP, “Skin.” It was released earlier month — a silky, spectacular collection that heralds the arrival of a promising new talent. In the wake of Hurricane Harvey, Kaul is donating all proceeds from “Skin” to the Houston Food Bank. “I thought she was super dope,” Ferguson says. “She’s really proud of her culture and what she represents and wants to represent. We’ve added some of those cultural elements to the EP.” Indeed, almost every song artfully combines modern R&B and pop with traditional Indian elements. One song features a few lines in Spanish. And she goes from sultry spoken word to full-on belting with her voice.
Vocally, Kaul sometimes echoes Ariana Grande. But there’s much more bite in the lyrics, which detail everything from sex and smoking pot to struggles with her traditional parents.
“‘Skin’ is basically my coming of age story,” Kaul says. “In the beginning, I was a little more hesitant. I wanted to stay clean and cute. But after awhile, I just kinda got suffocated. I had so much to say. In Asian and South Asian culture, I feel like it’s really taboo to talk about certain things, like sensuality, relationships, love. Growing up, I didn’t know anything about it. I never had anybody to tell me, ‘It’s OK to fall in love. It’s OK to have a heartbreak. It’s OK to start being confused about your body and loving your body.’ ”
Despite a strict upbringing, Kaul grew up with a love of performing, drawing inspiration from Indian stars Shreya Goshal, Sonu Nigam and Shaan, as well as American singers Beyoncé, Aretha Franklin and Etta James. She was in show choir at Seven Lakes High School in Katy and performed at coffee shops, clubs, weddings and “anywhere I could get my hands on a mic.”
She also showcased her powerful voice via covers on her Instagram page (@shreyasings) and quickly built up more than 100,000 followers.
“I’ve always known. But I was too scared to do the weird thing,” Kaul says. “Ever since I was little, I would just dance and sing and pretend I was in movies. I’d act out scenes in my room in front of my mirror and pretend I was Angelina Jolie. I would do Bollywood dances in my room.”
Though her parents were aware of her knack for performing, dropping out of school and becoming a singer initially didn’t go over well. But Kaul says they eventually came around.
“I think over time they could see how passionate I was, and they’re such loving parents, that they gave in. They could see how bad I wanted it,” she says.
“I think with a lot of parents and children, the problem they have to face is a generation gap. But with my parents and me, we have to face a culture gap, which is so much harder to get over because you have these conflicting ideals and morals battling each other at all times. That’s been a struggle that I’ve been trying to work through — and still am working through.”
She details some of those experiences on “Sweet 16,” the EP’s most personal song, and one that set the course for the project. She coos at the start of the track:
Sweet 16 You took my love away, away from me
My mama told me she gon’ murder me But I did it all the same Ashamed
It’s a risk, she says, to be so uncensored in front of her parents, her community and the world. But this is her time.
“I’m so scared. But I’m ready,” she says. “I’ve never heard another woman of (Indian descent) express these struggles, and I feel like if they had, my childhood and growing up would have been so much easier.
“If one person comes up to me and says, ‘I’ve been through this, I felt this way,’ it would mean so much to me because I was always alone. I need other people to hear it. I need them to say, ‘You’re not crazy.’ I really want that acceptance for who I actually am.”