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k-os comes out of the rock closet

The Canadian music cornerstone talks about making his rock-hip hop hybrid album
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rock star Canadian hip hop veteran and rock fan, k-os, is set to play in Whistler on Friday. Photo submitted

Black on Blonde, the latest album from Canadian hip hop veteran k-os, is all about math. The record is his fifth full length in over a decade, it's split into two discs, half featuring rock songs and the other half hip hop tracks, and it includes no fewer than 10 guest appearances by everyone from Metric's Emily Haines to can-rock icon Sam Roberts.

Pique caught up with the artist formally known as Kevin Brereton ahead of his show at the World Ski and Snowboard Festival April 19 to chat about his deep well of Canadian music friends, making his latest record and how 80s heartthrob Corey Hart still calls the shots.

Pique: You're currently on a Canadian tour. How has it been?

Kevin Brereton: Amazing. I think the big adjustment is trying to figure out what songs to play. There are (five) albums now of material and you've got an hour and 20 minutes. That's been the most fun part just trying to put together a cool selection of tunes and now there's a huge rock and roll element to the show, so we're trying to figure out how to do that gracefully and tastefully and not throw anyone off. It's kind of like DJing; you have to keep the crowd involved and not throw too much of a curve. That's been the real fun part, how to present the show of all this music in the most natural way possible so you get the full impact of all the different vibes we're trying to put out there.

Pique: The latest album, Black on Blonde, is packed with a crazy number of guests. How do you deal with that live?

KB: Someone asked me that this morning and it was the best question because most of the (musicians) on the record, I'm a huge fan of. Like Sam Roberts, he's been on my records since the beginning. When his part comes on it's my turn to get into his zone. Because I'm a fan of these guys I just do their part and have fun with it... I do my best to present my version of their (part of the) song. Otherwise you'd just be doing half verses or leaving things blank. It's a challenge to present the full vibe so you don't really notice.

Pique: So, were those collaborations then or did you tell them what you were looking for?

KB: Everyone talks about the magic, the magic, the magic, but a lot of times it's just the timing. You have a sentiment that you're trying to express and then another artist is like, 'I'm in that zone' and they express it for you... They're all collaborations. I think the one that stands out the most is the Corey Hart one. That's the first song on the Black side. He said, 'Send me stuff' and I sent a demo to him. He emailed me back and said, 'What is this? This makes no sense to me.' And he ripped into me on song structure. I was so embarrassed, but it was the best thing for the song because when you listen to it, it's two people. I remember to my engineers he was like, 'Turn it up in this part.' We really, really went back and forth. I'm proud of that song. It's actually the first single in America. It's so good to have a true collaboration in that sense. It's a great question because it's a lot of his ideas. It's just amazing to work with someone like that with so many hit songs.

Pique: How did you decide who you wanted to be on the album?

KB: Just everyone I was friends with. There's nobody on this record I just called up and said, 'Will you be on this record?' I've toured with everybody, I've hung out with everybody... Everything is friendship vibe connections.

Pique: The record took two years to make. Usually people are cranking these things out pretty quickly.

KB: I think we're living in a time when people are so transient. People want to move on to the next, the next, the next. After two years if you're still feeling a song and you still like it, that means it's a good song. It allowed me to separate the sheep from the goats in terms of what the good songs were. After two years I was like, 'Wow, I'm still feeling this.' Some things got boring and they didn't get on the record. But the things that stayed are the things that (have) emotions that still resonate. I'm super paranoid about making songs that will last 20, 30, 40 years into the future and not making something that's so current it just becomes a musical style that's forgotten. I feel like these songs all achieve that.

Pique: The idea for this album is so interesting: rather than sticking to one genre you did half hip hop and half rock. Did it feel like you were doing something kind of groundbreaking?

KB: There's no way when I started making this record I thought it would be a double album. It was only half way through the process I couldn't handle lying anymore. I came out of the closest, per se because I was like, 'I love rock 'n' roll I'm going to do a whole record. People can accept it or not.' The beauty of this concept is some people might not be interested in my hip hop stuff. They might only listen to the rock stuff. That makes this idea work. I don't think I'm doing rock better than the Strokes or Bob Dylan and I don't think I'm doing hip hop better than Biggie or the Roots or A Tribe Called Quest. I think I'm doing both those things pretty well and that's what the whole idea is about. What makes it groundbreaking is not the individual records. It's the fact that there's one guy doing both of these things. No one's ever done that before and I'm happy about that.