Kali Uchis

Kali Uchis during an appearance in 2018

Kali Uchis (born July 17, 1994 in Alexandria , United States , real name Karly-Marina Loaiza ) is a Colombian-American soul and indie pop singer, songwriter , music producer, video director and designer.

Uchis had her musical breakthrough in 2012 with her mixtape Drunken Babble , which she herself describes as "disregarding style". Her first EP Por Vida was released in 2015; The very first studio album Isolation followed on April 6, 2018 .

biography

Early years

Loaiza was born on July 17, 1994 in Alexandria , Virginia . Her parents fled the ongoing conflict in Colombia from Pereira, Risaralda to the United States near Washington DC in the early 1990s. When she was seven, her parents returned with her to Colombia, where she attended elementary school attended in Pereira up to the third grade. Her family then moved back to the United States. She attended TC Williams High School in Alexandria after elementary school . In the seventh grade, Uchis joined the school choir and played the piano and saxophone, among other things. During her school days, she began to write and record songs and to compose her first small pieces of music.

Musical career

In 2012 Uchis released her first mixtape, Drunken Babble , which she describes as "genre-contemptuous" and has influences from Doo Wop , Reggae and late R&B . The mixtape was released on August 1st. Two years later she recorded the song On Edge with singer Snoop Dogg . This appeared on his mixtape That's My Work 3 , released in the same year .

Uchis produced their first EP Por Vida on their own website in February 2015 . She released this Extended Play about a month later on the iTunes music platform . Uchis worked with Alex Epton, Diplo , Bunx, Tyler, The Creator and Caleb Stone, among others . In the same year, from October to December, she made her first tour of the United States and Canada. She was accompanied by Leon Bridges on the tour .

At the beginning of 2017 she took part in the song She's my Collar by the group Gorillaz on their album Humanz . In April Uchis released the song El Ratico , which she recorded together with the singer Juanes . This reached number 1 in the Colombian charts as well as number 31 in the Mexican and number 99 in the Spanish music charts. On May 22, 2017, the single Tyrant was released in a duet with the English singer Jorja Smith .

In June, Uchis announced that she was going on tour for a second time. The tour began in August and ended in October. During her trip, she performed in well-known locations in North America, at the annual Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival in San Francisco and at the Pop Montréal Festival in Canada.

On September 27, 2017, the American singer Lana Del Rey announced that she would go on tour with Uchis. In January 2018, Uchis sang alongside Del Rey on the opening round of the LA to the Moon Tour . The tour, which mostly took place in California, began on January 5th and ended on April 10th.

On April 6, 2018, she released her first studio album Isolation . After its release, it was at number 32 in the US Billboard 200 charts, at number 70 in the Canadian album charts and at number 62 in the UK album charts. In the Belgian charts, Isolation reached 65th place in the Flemish and 189th place in the Walloon charts.

The coronavirus exit restriction delayed the release of Kali Uchis' next album. During this time at home, she recorded the EP To Feel Alive , which was released on April 24, 2020.

style

Uchis' music often has elements of early soul, R&B and doo-wop. Her style mixes with common rhythms with musical style elements from the 1960s and 1970s. Uchis said in an interview that she also likes to play jazz and is inspired by well-known American artists such as Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday . She also names Curtis Mayfield , Irma Thomas , Loose Ends and Ralfi Pagan as her role models. Even Mariah Carey is one of Uchis models and has great influence on their music.

social commitment

In 2018, Uchis sold clothing through the social shopping app Depop and donated the proceeds to charity in her hometown in Colombia. In a post on the Instagram platform, Uchis wrote that she was able to distribute medicines, groceries, school supplies, clothes, shoes and household appliances to families in need in her hometown of Pereira . In addition, she had renovations carried out on buildings and houses for people with disabilities. Since August 2018, Uchis and her family have been working with charitable associations in Pereira and Medellín .

Discography

Kali Uchis in March 2017

Studio albums

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)		Remarks
		UK	US
2018	isolation	UK62 (1 week) UK	US32 (4 weeks) US	First published: April 6, 2018

EPs

• 2015: Por Vida
• 2020: To Feel Alive

Singles

year	Title album	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, album , rankings, weeks, awards, notes)		Remarks
		US	MX
2016	Get You Freudian	US93 × 2 Double platinum (6 weeks)US	-	First published: October 20, 2016 Daniel Caesar feat. Kali Uchis
2017	El Ratico Mis Planes son Amarte	-	MX31 (5 weeks) MX	First release: 2017 Juanes feat. Kali Uchis

gray hatching : no chart data available for this year

More singles

• 2013: What They Say
• 2014: Know What I Want
• 2014: On Edge ( feat.Snoop Dogg )
• 2015: Rush
• 2015: Loner
• 2015: Ridin 'Round
• 2015: Lottery
• 2016: Only Girl (feat. Steve Lacy & Vince Staples )
• 2017: Tyrant ( feat.Jorja Smith )
• 2017: Nuestro Planeta (feat.Reykon)
• 2017: See You Again ( Tyler, the Creator feat.Kali Uchis, US:platinum, UK: silver)
• 2018: After the Storm (feat. Tyler, the Creator & Bootsy Collins , US:gold)
• 2019: Time (with Free Nationals & Mac Miller )
• 2019: Solita

Mix tapes

• 2012: Drunken Babble

Tours

Headlining tours

• North American Tour (2017)
• In Your Dreams Tour (2018)
• Isolation Tour (2018)

Co-headlining tour

• The Kali & Jorja Tour (with Jorja Smith ) (2019)

Supporting tours

• Coming Home Tour - (with Leon Bridges ) (2015)
• LA to the Moon Tour - (with Lana Del Rey ) (2017-2018)

Awards and nominations

Nominated Latin Grammy Award

• 2017: in the “Record of the Year” category for El Ratico

Grammy Award

• 2017: in the “Best R&B Performance” category for Get You

UK Music Video Awards

• 2018: in the categories "Best Urban Video - International" and "Best Production Design in a Video" for After the Storm

Soul Train Music Awards

• 2018: in the category "Best New Artist"

Web links

• Official website kaliuchis.com
• Kali Uchis - Bio, Facts, Family - Famous Birthdays
• Kali Uchis at last.fm

Individual evidence

1. ↑ [1]
2. ↑ [2]
3. ↑ [3]
4. ↑ Kali Uchis - Isolation (album) | pitchfork.com
5. ^ Kali Uchis: The Making of a Modern Icon
6. ↑ 2,4,6,8… we appreciate kali uchis
7. ↑ Kali Uchis Went to Her Hometown in Colombia to Donate Food & Supplies to Families in Need
8. ↑ ^{a b} Chart sources: UK US