Written By: Viktoria Ngô
Kayla DiVerene is a rising pop star and actress based here in Los Angeles, CA. She started writing songs at the age of 13, and has been pursuing music ever since. Ahead of her newest release, we sat down with her to talk about all things music, acting, and so much more.
Q: You have just released your newest single “Bubble Gum Glue”. What inspired that song specifically, and what was the writing process like for that song?
A: The song is about that feeling where you have this person in your life who just like sucks the life out of you and drains you and you try so hard to distance yourself and try and cut them out, but it never really works, and I thought that a good comparison to that was having gum on your shoe and trying to scrape it off.
The writing process was crazy. It was just me and the producer [Bruce Wiegner], and I told him about this friendship that I had that was draining me. I just went on a bunch of tangents and started with the pre-chorus and then the verse and then the chorus. We didn’t really follow a structure; we just dove in headfirst and implemented a bunch of different ideas in. It was really cool, and I had never written a song in that way. It kind of just came naturally, and it was kind of like how did that just happen?
Q: Alongside music you also act, work as a barista, and do social media. How has being able to balance all of that been like, and how do they mergein a way also?
A: I definitely think I am always trying to find balance, it’s so hard because two of the things I do (acting and music) are so sporadic. With acting, auditions come and go, and I have no idea when I am going to get calls. Music-wise, I don’t know when I am going to get sessions to write. Everything kind of happens so randomly, so I don’t know if I’ll ever find that true balance I am looking for, and I try to keep my head up. I feel like all of these let me express myself differently and are all ways that are really important to me. Music lets me express myself and who I am, acting lets me fall into a character, and being a barista with customer service taps into a completely different part of my brain. I feel like all of them come together and form who I am, even though they are all super different
Q: You released your debut single back in 2020. How do you feel your music style and writing have evolved over time?
A: I feel like I have just from that time versus now. I have really grown as a person and have gone through a lot more experiences. I feel like I have this new knowledge and experiences that I am not afraid to write about and be honest about, and experiences that have transformed me as a person.
Q: What music have you been loving lately? What music and artist have inspired your current sound?
A: I really try to listen to everything! I love Dominic Fike, Role Model, Olivia Rodrigo, Sabrina Carpenter. I am constantly inspired by everyone, whenever I see all the new releases, I get so inspired, and the fact that these people are all putting out insane music is so inspiring for me. Sometimes I’ll listen to a song and think “How did they make this? How did they even write this because it’s so perfect?” I am also so interested in people’s methods because everyone has their own way of creating, and I want to be able to see that.
Q: To close this out – what is next for Kayla?
A: I definitely want to do a project. For the rest of this year, I am releasing singles, but next year I definitely want to do a body of work, it’s kind of what I need exactly at this point.
Kayla’s newest singles “Bubble Gum Glue” & “Sally Had Patience” are out now!
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