walking upstream…
Kehlani
sourcesThe FADER — Kehlani Earned This (bio, upbringing) · Billboard — Lauryn Hill's 'Ex-Factor' · Billboard — Brandy Sprinkles 'Some Brandy Sauce' Onto Kehlani's 'Folded' (Brandy) · Vibe — Kehlani Says Brandy Should Be On Every R&B Singer's Mount Rushmore Of Vocalists (Brandy) · Clash Magazine — Inspiring Dream Chasers
Kehlani Ashley Parrish was born in a south Berkeley apartment in 1995 while her mother was on the run from police; her father talked her mother through labor by phone, and within a year an aunt in north Oakland was raising her. That aunt's house ran on one soundtrack: neo soul. "All she played was neo-soul music," Kehlani told Complex in 2014, naming Jill Scott, Erykah Badu, Lauryn Hill and the Fugees on repeat. A knee injury pushed her from dance into her school's choir, then into a teenage cover band led by Tony! Toni! Toné!'s D'Wayne Wiggins, singing three years of other people's soul records before she wrote a note of her own. The 2014 mixtape "Cloud 19" turned that apprenticeship into a career; a decade on, the sound she inherited from her aunt's turntable still runs under everything she records.
the sound in question
2017
HoneyKehlani
walk the tributaries ↓
Lauryn Hill1990s · Neo soul / Hip hop / R&B
Lauryn Hill is the first name Kehlani reaches for when asked who taught her to sing. "When I was growing up on Lauryn Hill, when I started singing her songs I literally trained my voice to be able to do runs," she told Complex in 2014 — not fandom but drill, replaying Hill's phrasing until it became her own instrument. The debt turned literal that same year: Kehlani's own "Till the Morning" samples Hill's "Ex-Factor" outright, the teacher's record folded directly into the student's.
listen: upstream & heresource: Complex — Kehlani Talks About the Making of 'Cloud 19,' the Tutelage of Lauryn Hill, and Getting a Hand From Nick Cannon (bio, Lauryn Hill, Brandy) ↗
1998
Ex-FactorLauryn Hill
2014
Till the MorningKehlani
listen forPlay Hill's 1998 "Ex-Factor" before Kehlani's 2014 "Till the Morning" and the connection is literal: elements of Hill's original are sampled directly into the newer track, sitting underneath Kehlani's own verses. Listen past the sample too — Kehlani's phrasing keeps the aching, run-heavy delivery she has said she built by singing Hill's songs on repeat as a teenager, the technique outlasting the direct borrow.
Brandy1990s · Contemporary R&B / Pop / Soul
No influence gets repeated as often, or as emphatically, as Brandy. In 2014, a 19-year-old Kehlani was already being told "you sound like a Brandy"; by 2025, when Brandy actually sang on a remix of Kehlani's hit "Folded," Kehlani wrote on Instagram that Brandy is "the reason i know how how to use my voice this is still who i study, who i reference, who i consider to be my absolute #1." A year later she put it plainer still: "We'll never call her a peer. We'll always call her a mother."
listen: upstream & heresource: Complex — Kehlani Talks About the Making of 'Cloud 19,' the Tutelage of Lauryn Hill, and Getting a Hand From Nick Cannon (bio, Lauryn Hill, Brandy) ↗
1994
I Wanna Be DownBrandy
2025
FoldedKehlani
listen forCue Brandy's 1994 "I Wanna Be Down" before Kehlani's 2025 "Folded" and note the vocal stacking: Brandy built her breakout hit from tightly layered harmonies wrapped around one lead line, the technique Kehlani names as her direct education. On the "Folded" remix, that lineage collapses onto one record — Brandy layers her own harmonies directly behind Kehlani's lead, the teacher's voice literally underneath the student's.
Erykah Badu1990s · Neo soul / R&B
Kehlani names Erykah Badu in the same breath as Lauryn Hill whenever she's asked about her foundation, but a 2024 Numéro interview gets specific about what that meant beyond sound. "I was very lucky to grow up listening to India Arie, Lauryn Hill and Erykah Badu," she said. "The fact that they spoke openly about how they felt was crucial for me... it made me realize how much influence you can have on someone with songs." Badu's unhurried, conversational phrasing became part of the blueprint for Kehlani's own delivery.
listen: upstream & heresource: Numéro — Interview with Kehlani, the spiritual and sensual R'n'B singer (Erykah Badu, bio) ↗
1997
On & OnErykah Badu
2019
Nights Like ThisKehlani
listen forCue Badu's 1997 "On & On" before Kehlani's 2019 "Nights Like This" and listen for the shared pocket: both singers let the vocal trail a beat behind the rhythm rather than snap to it, phrasing conversationally over a spare, late-night groove instead of chasing the downbeat. Neither song rushes toward its hook — the space between phrases carries as much of the mood as the notes themselves do.