Night Street Records/Interscope RecordsK.Flay will launch a headlining tour this Saturday, February 4 in Las Vegas in support of her new EP, Crush Me. The "Blood in the Cut" singer, born Kristine Flaherty, has opened from artists ranging from Dashboard Confessional to Snoop Dogg, and, naturally, she's learned a lot from those experiences.
"You have to be flexible, you have to have a high level of humility and willingness to learn both from other performers that you're out with, and from different audiences and crowds," Flaherty tells ABC Radio. "Because I think, ultimately, you're there to share what you do and create, hopefully, a beautiful thing for everybody, and there's lots of ways to go about it."
For Flaherty, that means having "a real energy exchange with the crowd" and "reliv[ing] the intent and starting point for each song as much as I can."
"I think, for me, that makes the performance as authentic as it possibly can be," she says.
K.Flay's history of diverse touring partners makes sense, given that her music is influenced by everything from hip-hop to industrial rock. As a headliner, Flaherty has an opportunity to dive deep into all those sounds, which is reflected by her elastic live set-up.
"I play bass a little bit, guitar and synthesizer, so there's kind of some different instrumentation going on, trying to keep it dynamic from a visual [standpoint]," she says. "For me, it's fun to be physically connecting with different instruments throughout the set."
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