[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/WIM-Thumbnails-Kehlani-V2-1.jpg?w=1024″]<\/p>\n
\n\tBillboard Women in Music 2026 Impact Award recipient Kehlani takes us deep into her creative process and emotional journey behind her hit \u201cFolded\u201d and her self-titled album. From bedroom-recording sessions to navigating the complexities of the music industry, Kehlani opens up about her passion for R&B, the challenges of staying true to her artistry and the impact her music has had on fans and the genre itself. She also talks about collaborating with iconic artists such as Ludacris, Lil Wayne and Clipse, the unexpected success of \u201cFolded\u201d and more!<\/p>\n
\n\tKehlani: There are some people who are like, \u201cI can\u2019t wait for y\u2019all to stop listening to this toxic song. Like, this song is so toxic.\u201d And other people are like, \u201cOh, girl, it\u2019s a sex song. Like, she just wanted to get cracked.\u201d And then there\u2019s other songs that\u2019s like, \u201cOK, so they had you messed up and you\u2019re just gonna take them back and you just folded the clothes like that?\u201d I\u2019m like, \u201cOh, wow, let\u2019s talk about it some more.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tThis album was two more albums before this. I think I was on tour and every single break I had in between all the tours, I was living in an apartment at the time, and my engineer would come over and I was recording in my bedroom. So for months, in between these touring months, every time we had a break, I was just in my room with my engineer writing completely alone to beat packs. And there\u2019s all this kind of darker, emotional \u2026 I was, like, processing a lot of things that were happening that I was being completely silent about, dealing with all this external chaos, but I was muted. I was going through so much that I wasn\u2019t speaking, and the only thing I was able to do was really write in my room. Then I went to Hawaii to see my cousins and my friends, surf a little bit and write. We made one song, and I was like, \u201cIt is not time for this weird-ass album. Get your head in the game, girl. Like, it\u2019s not time for this right now. You wanna go alternative so bad, and it\u2019s just not that. I know what time it is.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tWe admitted, OK, it\u2019s time for my self-titled. Like, if there was ever a time, it\u2019s right now. I just went on a really big tour. There was all this chaos that I was at the center of. I just came out of it and went on kind of this redemption tour of, like, \u201cLet me see who really is still here with me through all the chaos.\u201d And I was like, \u201cOK. All right, let\u2019s do it.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tI started making that album. That album was also not true to me at the time. I think it was a part of me, but I think I was shooting for it in this, like, \u201cIt\u2019s my self-titled, I\u2019ve gotta go big. I\u2019ve gotta pull out all my stops.\u201d Then we made \u201cFolded.\u201d So can you come pick up your clothes? I had them folded.<\/p>\n
Keep watching for more!<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/video\/kehlani-folded-changed-everything-billboard-women-in-music\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/WIM-Thumbnails-Kehlani-V2-1.jpg?w=1024″] Trending on Billboard Billboard Women in Music 2026 Impact Award recipient Kehlani takes us deep into her creative process and emotional journey behind her hit \u201cFolded\u201d and her self-titled album. From bedroom-recording sessions to navigating the complexities of the music industry, Kehlani opens up about her passion for R&B, the challenges of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[48,226],"class_list":["post-1889813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-billboard-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1889813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1889813"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1889813\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1889813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1889813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1889813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}