INTRODUCING —
RAE KHALIL
Rae Khalil wants the world to move with her. The California singer and rapper draws on her spiritual values and quick lyricism to create uplifting songs you can’t help but dance to. Khalil’s music seamlessly blends a refreshing take on new age soul, R&B, and pop stylings with more classic hip-hop influences, threaded together by euphoric production and vivid storytelling. She won a Grammy in 2021 for her songwriting and vocals on Anderson .Paak’s “Lockdown,” after which he signed her to his APESHIT x Def Jam label. Now she’s entering a new chapter with the single “Is It Worth It,” a thoughtful teaser for her upcoming album, CRYBABY. Even as she acknowledges this is her most introspective journey to date, Khalil is preparing to let the world in.
“Is It Worth It” was recorded late one night in New York with .Paak and musician-producer Alissia Benveniste (Mary J. Blige, Bootsy Collins). “I’ve been putting me first,” Khalil sings. “Is it worth my time?” The track’s smooth vocals, retro soul influence, and atmospheric production create a backdrop to a theme of empowerment. Khalil recalls how magical the studio was that night: “Being able to watch that happen for my song, I felt the love, seriousness, and the dedication that we’re all putting in,” she says. “It’s all for a reason.”
CRYBABY sees Khalil diving deep into self-reflection with the help of .Paak and longtime collaborator Jared Rubens. “I think it was great for me to have someone like Anderson on this album to run off my ideas and him say, ‘How can you take these to greater heights?’” she says. On the title track, she faces the mirror, confessing the song’s subject is mostly herself: “I’m just playing with anything that makes me really emotional, whether it’s my relationships, my job, my personal journey.”
Album opener “Hot Track” features a classic O.C. Smith sample Rubens played for Khalil in the studio. She knew the name sounded familiar: The R&B singer, one of her grandmother’s closest friends and spiritual mentors, had officiated her parents’ wedding.
Throughout CRYBABY, Khalil’s soulful and provocative vocals are accompanied by immersive production, at times groovy and uptempo. She shows an even more vulnerable side on the stripped-back “Bittersweet,” assuring a lover “I’ll give you everything and more,” and the soul-searching “Overcast Overture,” where she pleads, “Does anybody feel me now?”
Khalil grew up in Torrance, CA, where there was always an eclectic mixture of music playing at home, including The Clash and Parliament alongside jazz, musical theater, and early-’90s rap. A self-described late bloomer, she discovered Chance the Rapper and the Wu-Tang Clan’s 36 Chambers in her late teens, which spurred her to write her own raps.
After dropping out of college, Khalil fell into a rut, going back and forth with what she calls “shady jobs” while struggling to balance her passion. She met Rubens via Vampr, a kind of social network for musicians, and recorded her debut hip-hop album, Girlfriend, at home in 2018.
Khalil appeared on Netflix reality music show Rhythm and Flow shortly after that, earning co-signs from Queen Latifah and Common, as well as Los Angeles-based R&B band Free Nationals, .Paak’s backing band. They played on her second album, the more conceptualized FORTHEWORLD, whose tracks “ALLSTAR” and “FATHER” have racked up millions of Spotify streams. She chose that album’s title deliberately: “I wanted to make music for everyone,” she says. “Music that I thought everyone could dance to and enjoy.”
With CRYBABY, Khalil insists her new songs are still very much danceable—you just might have to get a little creative. “This album for me was such an amazing rollercoaster ride to make,” she says, “but I was also pushed to my limits of how far can you take these songs and when are you able to say, ‘Okay, this is enough. I’ve done it.’”
Opening up her process, and in turn looking increasingly inward, Khalil is pushing herself to be more honest and vulnerable—sharing her journey, challenges, growth, and everything in between.