The Underground Galaxy: Champion World Builder! Kas
Written by High FrequenTi
Published on October 7th, 2025
Bass lines that reverberate through the earth, intensely passionate vocalization, and heartfelt ATTITUDE is what my mind can recollect at first. As I go back again and again, there’s a deep certainty that follows each track as we journey through a progressive Techno-Rock’n’B soundsphere laced with 70’s Psychedelic guitar riffs, somber decrescendos, and AfroBeats-esque rhythms that set my soul aflame. I am deeply obsessed with instrumentals that capture freedom. All this backed by choruses that are steadfast affirmations? So decadently tasteful, soulful and electrifying.
I’ve found myself listening to “Sovereign Tapes” by Kas on repeat since it dropped.
From witnessing this musician live, I could tell how their spirit guides them through their music, a voice so dense and controlled it enthralls every person in the room they are in. Kas has taken their time with this project and popping they SHIT! Thank you for being loud and proud, what a beautiful essence to embody.
At some point you gotta put being humble to rest, how am I taking control in amplifying my truth? It’s done so candidly you’re singing along before you even know it. Such Rockstar energy! Channeling suddenly becomes Demanding suddenly becomes Releasing… feelings of shedding, proclamation, liberation, and standing in your authenticity follow with every note change. It is magnetic, and recycling these songs through my consciousness has given my spirit a soundtrack to prevail through tumultuous times. I remember the power of the voice and will; what a commitment to one’s craft sounds like.
You can feel the intentionality and prayer set behind this project. My brain finds traces of 10cc, Solange, and Amaria, with the richest most spacious cadence, like Ama, as I sift through my mental music library. But, I come back to recognize that Kas cannot be categorized and is paving a lane of their own, prophesied by a fearless self-devotion…
Revolutionary. Industrial. Earth-Bound Sentimentality. Monumental.
“Sovereign Tapes” by Kas has reconnected my soul to the ethers and given me permission to sing the load out loud. It invites those who are heavy-ladened to be seen in their strife and desires. I often think about what draws me to a project, a rawness that infiltrates my defenses and expresses itself through goosebumps and a deeper curiosity for the artist’s mind. My spirit is activated through Kas’ heavenly vocals, their battle cries.This project brazenly mirrors the experience of trialing a mountain, each track a step closer to an internal peak that reminds you of your agency, the power within yourself and our collective humanity. To not only survive, but excel, supersede with ambition and grit and still prevail in the softness of your light. In a world where our existence is the protest, our art becomes the commandments by which we call in heaven.
This project reminds me of the transformative magic of collectively desiring bodies of work that make us feel unstoppable. That is the gift I feel is enveloped with this EP. “You Don’t Own Me” is soooooooo fire. A track I wish I could’ve heard at the start of the summer, deserving of being my anthem for the next one! It is tantalizing and the rhythm is equally as intoxicating. Lessons of autonomy have been so present in my life this last year, it’s been a lot of me realizing what standing in that self-determination should FEEL like. Navigating the world as a non-binary person has had its tribulations, and other intersections within my life have subjected me to the harsher realities of being stripped of my self-governance. “Diamond in the rough got, Grounded down to dust, Learned that the hard way, Can’t trust anybody! You don’t, you don’t, YOU DON’T OWN ME!”
Louder for the people in the fucking back! How refreshing to hear as we feel the effects of being in a hyper-surveillance state. As we hold the frustrations of a government that is in a relentless pursuit of enslaving society within invisible constraints. Many of us are still deprogramming from family systems that pressure us into assimilation for acceptance just the same. Or feel the effects of humans becoming agents of the state in the endless power dynamics we face with one another… This joint takes me back to 2010’s, when economic/ societal decline made us give it all to the music that helped us release our inhibitions and dance like it was the end of the world. To feel it all and come back to our bodies and what we can control, how we are always allowed to take up more space within our reclamations and rejections of what is meant to stifle us and dim our beings.
I get so emotional about “Undone”. I be “this is my songgg”ing myself to death, but it’s that serious! This track soothes us with a winding, serene acoustic surrender. “It’s done, we’re done, put a bounty on my love you had your fun!”. So deeply cathartic and holy. I’m allowed to be defeatist, to walk away without a care of the pieces that were impossible to mend, left more worn and bruised by how much either one of us tried to press them together. To leave it worse than we found it is so real to me. Heartbreak in your mid 20’s becomes more layered and complex, only to still be heartbreak in the end. Only to still come back to a compassionate release of a reality that is eroding at us both. At one point in the song, it’s just Kas singing along with the guitar, as they dance through a sensually luscious riff that scratches all the right parts of my R’n’B brain. This whole album carries a spiritual undertone, and in this song it triumphs as an absolute conclusion. The type of endings where you feel like you can finally breathe and just continue forward. It’s DONE.
The track “Sovereign” is the heart of the project. The opening, reminiscent of a melodic dawn, as Kas illuminates the auditory landscape with defining the project’s namesake. Kas finds a pulse, and transmutes it into a Psalm for all of God’s true soldiers to chant. It’s a call I didn’t know I needed, but was definitely yearning for. The demands of millions of hearts are met at so many points in this project, thank you Kas for connecting us to our humanity. Despite all the complications, the walls embedded interpersonally, We are still marching free. It comes back to it all being connected on this track. The continuation of a legacy of resilience and authority. It is living, ancient, resounding and devoted.
The lyrics, “I met her in the mirror, at only 9 years old” resonate a lot, as I remember experiencing whispers of revelations at this age, affirming that I am a pillar in the world. Soul deep remembering echoing “You are the chosen one.” Kas’ shepherding guides the expedition through this track. Singing out in angelic harmonies, cosmic story-telling imbedding us deeper into their emotion. And then a pulse again, a quickened umph in exposition. This is intensely energetic to experience. Moments of anticipation with roaring cymbals, a guitar playing pure lightning, and the momentous manifestations crash like ocean waves!
“From the River to the sea, Palestine will be free… From the River to the sea, God’s people, we will be FREE!” We are living testimonials! The arbiters of human endurance, which is the strongest shield to chaos energy in the universe. THIS SONG IS ENDURANCE. A beloved affirmation expressing the never ending battles of a radical heart. These are the calls that need to ring all around earth! This project feels like a confessional of deeply sacred truths of the artists, and I am so grateful with every listen I get to experience.
“My use of raw bedroom vocals, pensive ambience, organic instruments, and Black archival sound form an emergent interpretation of R&B, electronic, and neo-soul music that offers free contemplative space for those historically barred from dreaming. My music, live performances, and short films center lineages of personal and political transformation from “the rest of us,” grounded in place, sentience, truth, and resistance. In my latest work, titled “SOVEREIGN TAPES,” Kas calls upon a lineage of the sovereign artists, abolitionists, scholars, organizers, caregivers, children, neighbors, lovers, and friends who built their homes—literally, emotionally or spiritually—out of nothing but broken borders and a dream”(Kas, 2025). “I don’t have upcoming shows scheduled at the moment, but I am planning one for later this Fall! I’m also interested in doing a remixed deluxe version of the EP!” -Kas.
