Interviewing Kaja: the self-made and brave Croatian artist talks about her new single "Shameless" and her journey as a Mediterranean singer based in London

In this interview, we’re speaking with Kaja, a Croatian singer, songwriter and producer based in London and raised in Germany, which gives her work a distinctly multicultural perspective. Despite these layered influences, she has always maintained a strong, authentic sense of identity rooted in her Mediterranean background.

This comes through clearly in her music and in her latest single, Shameless, available on all streaming platforms. Brave, independent and direct, Kaja delivers music that reflects both artistic confidence and a clear sense of vision. In this interview, she speaks about her upbringing, creative process, cultural identity and the themes behind her work, including the story and message at the heart of Shameless.

Enjoy!

You're Croatian but based in London. What are the biggest differences you've noticed between the music scenes in the two places?

I am Croatian, but I was born and raised in Germany, in Berlin, so I have a lot more to say about the German music industry as an artist, I think! However, I've worked with a couple of Croatian artists in my capacity as a music producer, and the overall consensus there seems to be that the Croatian market is quite small, and if you're not doing English-speaking pop music or cajke, which is basically Croatian turbo folk, it can be quite difficult to find your audience.

It's interesting to me because I think that the UK and Croatia are kind of on opposite ends of the same problem, basically: Croatia is small, the music industry is small, and especially if you're making more alternative music, it can be quite difficult to find your audience. However, the English-speaking market, the UK, for example, is much bigger, and the industry is huge, but it's also so oversaturated, and listeners are being bombarded by different types of music all day, every day. So if you're an independent artist here, it's also very difficult to find that audience and the people that want to listen to your music. So yeah... not to sound pessimistic, but I feel like it's just a struggle for independent artists everywhere!

Do you think this mix of cultures influences you creatively?

I definitely think growing up Croatian and with Croatian music influences me as a writer, especially. My mother listened to a lot of Yugorock when I was growing up: Plavi Orkestar, Crvena Jabuka, Srebrna Krila, some amazing bands that I still listen to to this day. One thing that really sticks out to me about Croatian, Bosnian and Serbian music is that the tone of the lyrics is always quite self-aware and a bit tongue-in-cheek. Balkan music in general, I feel like this also extends to Mediterranean music, It's very deeply felt. Your heart is broken, your girlfriend left you, you don't know how to live without her, but then also you cheated on her with her sister, so maybe she has a point!

I really like that about the lyrics in a lot of traditional Croatian music. I always want to have that in my music as well. I want to be self-aware, I want to be able to make fun of myself. I'm a fairly sarcastic person in general, so that naturally translates into the lyrics.

As a Mediterranean girl, what does it mean to bring your music to an international audience?

I think it means to be able to communicate to non-Mediterraneans who I am and to make them better understand my culture. Growing up a diaspora kid in Germany, I've always felt like I don't really belong, like people don't really understand me, like I'm the weird one, and that I can't really connect with people in the same way that I can with fellow Mediterraneans. I think this is an experience we've all probably made.

I'm always having an easier time making friends with another Italian, Spanish or Greek person because we seem to come from a more similar cultural background. I feel like a lot of Germans, when I was growing up, struggled to connect with me in the same way because they didn't really understand why I'm the way that I am or my perspective on a lot of things. So I think making music on a more international scale is a really great opportunity to present my culture in a way and also to just explain that this is why I am the way I am, and this has had a huge influence on who I am as a person. Hopefully that helps connect better with other people that don't have that experience and didn't grow up the same way that I did.

Your latest single is called Shameless. How would you describe it to someone who hasn't heard it yet?

Shameless is an alternative pop track that is trying to liberate you from the shame that you were brought up to feel, especially as a young woman in our society, especially surrounding questions of sexual liberty. It's trying to free you from that shame, to make you feel shameless, and also to make you dance while you're at it, because I feel like those things go hand in hand.

How personal is the song? Did it come from your own experiences or from observing people and situations around you?

Shameless is unfortunately a very personal song. I experienced a sexual assault. I reported it and went through the legal process of it. Like so many women before me, I've had the experience that if you dare to report a sexual assault, you're gonna have to deal with a lot of victim blaming and slut shaming. In an attempt to make me seem less believable, the defence did stoop down to the level of "where were you, what were you wearing and why did you have previous consensual sexual interactions before the assault." A big part of that was also to attack my lifestyle, my way of speaking and my way of presenting myself. And it worked. The perpetrator didn't get convicted. Unfortunately, this is a very common strategy used to discredit victims of sexual assault.

So Shameless is all about reclaiming that narrative and reclaiming who I am as a person. I'm leaning a little bit into that persona they drew up for me, and also saying that I don't think it's shameful to be who I am. I don't think it's shameful to have a bad sense of humour, to dress in a certain way, or to have consensual sex with other consenting adults. I do think it's quite shameful to sexually assault someone, but that's just me.

This is what it's about. I really like that in the English language the word shameless can be seen in two ways. It's usually used in a negative way, right? If someone's quite shameless you're like "oh she's so shameless, she's a little bit rude, she's a little bit disrespectful," and that's definitely what the defence was trying to make me look like. But at the same time, the word shameless only means that you're without shame, and that, in my opinion, is a quite positive thing. I really like that I can use that title and kinda twist it in those two directions a little bit. I hope it inspires you to have less shame and to be your most shameless self.

You're both a singer and a producer. Do you naturally lean more towards one side or do you enjoy both equally? 

That's a very good question. I am, I think, pretty much 50-50. I love performing. I can really tell if I don't perform in a while, it makes me feel a bit anxious. I'm a bit like in a bad mood. So I need that. It's like a fix. It's like a bit of an addiction. I need to be on a stage every now and then just to feel better. But at the same time, I really like the creation process, and that to me happens mostly in the studio. So I just need both in my life, I think. I also really like that as a producer specifically, when I'm producing for other people, I can kind of put myself in their shoes and kind of try on their persona for a day and try on their artistry for a day. And then as Kaja, as an artist myself, I can just express myself through my music production and my writing.

When you're writing music, do visuals, places or moods influence you as much as melodies do?

Definitely moods. I feel emotions very strongly and very deeply. I think this is a bit of a stereotype about Mediterranean women, but then again, I like, if I'm looking at myself and I'm looking at all my female Mediterranean friends and my female Mediterranean family members, we're all quite passionate and we feel quite deeply. So yeah, moods definitely have an effect on the kind of music I write.

My next single, which is coming up at the end of July, is called So Help Me God. And that one is just 100% inspired by absolute rage, by just feeling so angry. Sometimes I feel so angry, I feel like I'm always gonna feel that way. And I really wanted to put that in a song. So yes, moods definitely have a huge influence on my music. Visuals and places, for sure as well.

Growing up in a Croatian community in the diaspora in Germany, we would attend church every Sunday. I grew up Roman Catholic. There's a certain aesthetic that comes with Roman Catholic culture and especially Mediterranean Roman Catholic culture. And that aesthetic 100% influences how I present myself, the kind of clothing that I wear, the look of my cover art, for example, and fashion-wise, I'm especially inspired by the four girls that would sit in the bench in the row before me at church. They were sisters, I believe.

They would dress technically very conservatively because in church you can't show your shoulders or your knees, but they looked so hot, they would "serve c*nt" every week, there's no other way of saying that! They would just show up and look like absolute 10 out of 10s, they were just baddies, they would wear heels and these sexy tight clothes. Everything was covered and proper, their hair was on point, their makeup was on point, they just looked so amazing, and that visual of them had an influence on me as an artist and how I wanna present myself.

Is there something about your artistry that you think people should know?

Yes, I think that people should know that I do everything myself: this is very much a one-woman show! I'm not always proud enough of that. I write, produce, record and mix my own music. Mostly because of financial reasons, I fix up my own clothing. I did this (pointing at the amazing top she's wearing in the video interview). Don't look too closely, but from afar it might look nice!

I'm in charge of everything sonically and visually. I do get support from my partner and friends, but the actual creative work is all me, and it's definitely always 100% what I want to do, how I want to present myself and what I wanna say. So I really hope that I get to connect with people in a very meaningful way because there's truly no one between us: there's just me and the listeners baby... that was so corny!

Thank you so much for having me, doviđenja!

You can watch the video interview by clicking here, follow Kaja by clicking here and listen to Shameless hereunder: