NKD Mag - Issue #73 (July 2017)

JULY 2017 04 STEVE MOAKLER

16 BRANDON FLYNN

38 RUSTON KELLY

a reflection on ten years in nashville and steel town

on the importance of telling 13 reasons why’s story

on cleaning himself up and finding his voice

08 TORRANCE COOMBS

22 THE NIGHT GAME

40 KEIYNAN LONSDALE

on playing good vs. playing evil and letting chapters end

born out of a need to fall back in love with music

on overcoming his shyness and becoming kid flash

14 ANTOINETTE ROBERTSON

24 RUTH B

46 GALLERY: CMA FEST

on culture, empowerment and dear white people

on safe haven and finding her way on a stage

highlights from the annual festival that takes over downtown nashville

28 JAKE MILLER

on creating his most personal and authentic record yet

CATHERINE POWELL

publisher, editor, photographer, designer, writer

SHELBY CHARGIN

IAN HAYS

OLIVIA SINGH

AUTUMN HALLE

STACY MAGALLON

ELIZABETH ZAVOYSKIY

writer writer

writer writer

writer writer

steve moakler Words by IAN HAYS Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

You can take the boy out of Pittsburgh, but you can’t take Pittsburgh out of the boy. Steve Moakler is a rising country star who should already be on your radar. The singer-songwriter has been in Nashville for the past ten years or so carving his own path. He released several albums and wrote songs for other country artists. And it was then that Steve decided to tackle songs centering around Pittsburgh and the surrounding areas- a place that has never left his heart. He released Steel Town in March of this year, being born anew.

Steve was born in Morristown, New Jersey. His father was a local and that is where Steve and his family lived for the first four years of his life. And even at that young of an age, he was picking up on the music his architect father would play while working from home.

“He would listen to Bruce Springsteen – a lot of Brue Springsteen. He listened to Billy Joel, Elton John, a lot of the ‘70s troubadour type of stuff.”

From birth, Steve was fed a

healthy diet of singer-songwriter standards. More importantly, he was exposed to how to tell a proper story.

Due to an illness in the family, Steve’s parents moved them up to Pittsburgh to be closer with his mom’s side. And it was from 4-years-old to 18-yearsold, the most formative years of one’s life, Steve lived and breathed Pittsburgh.

It was when he picked up a guitar at 14 that the music bug bit him.

He began immediately writing his own songs and everything revolved around music. “I began putting everything else off – sports, schoolwork. It was around 16 that I decided this is what I wanted to do. So at 18 I moved to Nashville,” he says.

After two years of college in Nashville, Steve dropped out to pursue music full time. But, those two years were not a waste in the least.

It was there that Steve became more inspired than ever. As he puts it, “A lot of musicians come to Nashville and put away their guitar and never pick it up again. There’s just so much talent there.”

But, this talent didn’t discourage him – it just got him more excited.

Even ten years later, Nashville is still surprising Steve with the amount of incredible musicians it produces. For those who have never been, Nashville is its own ecosystem of live music that is not for the faint of heart.

Luckily, he was prepared for the long road. (At 18, he had already passed up on an independent record deal at the advice of his lawyer.)

For the first few years after dropping out, Steve was having a rough time. A label had not yet picked him up and he was watching friends graduate from college.

“It wasn’t like I had anything major going on at that time. I wasn’t on some tour or had some hit song. I didn’t have anything. I was booking my own gigs and messaging people and venues on Myspace,” he says, “I learned a lot about myself during that time.”

But the hard work began to pay off. With affordable rent, he was able to find ways to start making a living off of music. He had some success NKDMAG.COM

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with his first indie release that was put up on iTunes; he was even able to land some TV placements for his songs. These checks plus touring on the college circuit is how Steve cut his teeth and slowly polished himself into the successful artist he is today.

But while he was monetarily successful, he was not building a fan base doing college shows. So, he decided to play little-to-no paying club gigs and garner a fan base from the underground upwards. It was over the course of this second phase that he really focused on becoming a songwriter, rather than a pay-forplay living jukebox.

Over the course of his three albums leading up to Steel Town, Steve began coming into his own.

One of these shifts was not just being touted as a singer-songwriter, but a full blown country artist. “It was a conscious decision in the sense that it happened naturally, it that makes sense. My first record is not country at all. It is purely pop, singer-songwriter,” Steve reflects, “The second record, you can hear a bit of a shift and other influences coming in – country, pop, rock. The third one, was a very rootsy album; I think it’s a country album. And then Steel Town is just fully embracing that country sound.”

Steve attributes the shift to country music as a two sided. On one hand, his music naturally progressed that way, soaking up country sounds through osmosis, not even realizing what he was absorbing at the time.

The second is the genre of country music itself. Country has exploded beyond all predictions over the past 10-15 years, and with that came shifts in sounds, especially with radio-ready pop producers chomping at the bit for a genre that was once denoted as “hillbilly music”.

He also feels that he came in to country music through the back door. Focusing on being a songwriter, he would go and listen to the writers behind all the hit country songs.

He would hunker down with the others at hotel lobbies and bars for their special sets. Seeing this process made him hungry for more and he 06

developed a taste for country.

All of this has culminated into Steel Town. Like the best of us, Steve was focused on the future. He was eagerly clawing for it. It wasn’t until he went through ups and downs that he started to reflect on his roots and where he came from. That meant exploring what it meant to identify with Pittsburgh and how much of a product he is of that place. “When I was 18, 19, I was focused on the girls I was dating at that time and the songs reflect that,” he says,” It was still honest, but the songs reflected that. Now, being on the brink of 30-years-old, you just have a different perspective on it all.”

With an earnest and delicate approach, Steve crafted Steel Town as an album that residents of Pittsburgh would accept as their own. To live in Pittsburgh means to have pride in your city – and the city has welcomed him back with open arms. Within six months of releasing the title track, he fulfilled a dream of playing at the Steelers’ stadium before a game. He came back for a club gig and brought the house down. Pittsburgh residents have a “very clear identity” and it appears that Steve did them justice.

People in other states and towns have started bringing the infamous “Terrible Towels” to shows as a sign of solidarity with other transplants from Pittsburgh. “It wasn’t until the songs were recorded that I really saw a theme with the album. About half the songs are looking back; the other half are bringing you to the moment - you’re trying not to miss the moment,” he says.

And this is what is garnering him new fans and keeping his old fans. He will have people shout out requests at shows for songs off his first records, but also be singing and dancing to the new stuff. And it’s this acknowledgement that will continue to bring his success and allow for a mutual appreciation of growth between him and his fans. He admits that he should pay more attention to stream numbers, but that is not his focus. His focus is on his craft and having a shared experience with those willing to listen. NKD

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torrance coombs Words by CATHERINE POWELL Photos by CATHERINE POWELL Grooming by ANDREA PEZZILLO

Torrance Coombs in a word is intense. With every word he speaks, it’s from a well-thought out place that’s hard not to be impressed by. Being a Canadian actor, Torrance got into Shakespeare but quickly transitioned into Canadian film and television. “The nice thing about it is you can kind of cut your jobs there, but the casting pool isn’t as big so the competition isn’t as fierce. So I think there’s a lot of really talented people in the U.S. who can’t get people to pay attention, but in Canada it’s easier to get noticed,” he says. He cites his luck to a lot of international co-productions like his first big project, The Tudors.

“With a couple exceptions they aren’t even hiring Americans on a show like that even though it’s an American Showtime production,” Torrance says.

For Torrance, The Tudors was his “oncein-a-lifetime” moment as he worked alongside actors like Johnathan Reyhs Myers and Henry Cavill. “I didn’t know where I fit into all of that. In my mind I treated that job like ‘this could be the last job I ever do. What if I’m terrible?

This is such a big platform and a big opportunity’,” he says. Throughout his time on set he just tried to savor as much as possible because he didn’t know where it 10

would lead.

Torrance’s intensity and his ability to challenge you into a different way of thinking is refreshing and clearly plays a huge part in why he is such a successful actor. It also helps that he has this ability to do a posh British accent, but that doesn’t mean he can do any kind.

“It’s funny because they think once you can do one accent that you can do them all. So my agent will call me and be like ‘How’s your Russian accent?’ and I’m like ‘I’ve never done one.’ And she’s like ‘Great you have an audition tomorrow morning’,” he laughs. “I always cobble something together that I think is okay, the only one I just could not get and I worked on it for about a week and then I just gave up the audition was Northern Irish.”

While The Tudors was definitely a launching point for him Torrance quickly moved onto recurring roles on shows like Heartland and Polaris before moving in to play Sebastian on The CW’s Reign. “The cool thing about CW is they’ll give unknowns a chance.

They’ll give a guy no one really knows a lead role,” he says. His appreciation of the network and how they’ve helped to shape his career is clear. For Tor-

rance, Reign was a journey of learning about his cast mates, creating a family and hopefully making friends to last a lifetime. “We’ll always have that. But you find out who your closest friends are when you move beyond that and you no longer have that shared experience,” he says.

Leaving Reign was tough on Torrance. “I was never sure I was making the right decision and of course it wasn’t solely my decision. I did ask but they had to be really kind to let me do it, to let me go pursue something else,” he says. And while he didn’t have anything lined up, Torrance’s intuition felt the character had run it’s course and it was time to move on and allow the show to grow. Adding to his unique ability to seemingly sense where the world he’s in or the world in general is going, Torrance has been able to see his characters for who they truly are and know when their story has been told. With Sebastian, Torrance says “After a few years, he’s just me. So I love a lot about him.

He was a fun guy to play for a bunch of reasons. He got to dabble in court life for a bit, he got to dabble in this sort of cool weird magic hocus pocus in the woods stuff.” Leaving Sebastian to play

a more purely evil character was quite the change-up. With Sebastian, he was always the good guy and the guy who did thing with a positive intent. “At the core of the character, I guess he just had a good heart. He always felt he was morally on the right side of things which made him an easier character to play. So there were only a couple instances I had that dirty feeling of being the bad guy,” Torrance says.

With Torrance’s personality, and his heightened sense of awareness, it’s not really a jump to see why playing a character who is a bad guy isn’t always the easiest. However, he cites characters who are always consistently evil as easier to play than ones who have both good and evil in them. “You kind of get into the mindset of somebody who thinks differently… But if you’re a guy who is normally making good decisions and is a good guy it feels like a weird kind of character assassination when you get a script that makes you do something terrible,” he says.

The Shonda Rhimes produced Still Star-Crossed gave Torrance a chance to sink his teeth into something new: Count Paris. “Morally I align a lot less with him,” he explains. “I didn’t want to

leave Reign and hop onto just doing the same thing again, because that would be disingenuous for the reasons that I left.” Citing status as one of the big differences between Paris and Sebastian, Torrance is also aware of how these things apply to the world today. “He’s high status, he doesn’t really consider the consequences of his actions for common folk so much… He’s a bit more selfish and he’s not as worried about the fallout for that,” Torrance says.

Breaching into the topic of cruelty, Torrance thoughtfully explains how hard it is at first to be so cruel and horrible to another human. “You have to find the bad guys moral canter and their justification because most people in life don’t believe they’re the bad guy,” he says. He stresses that there is a huge the difference between being destructive with a purpose and just “being a dick”. He confesses that once you get over that initial hump of justification “there’s a great power in being mean to people, and you understand why people do it.” “I understand why people would go around being a bully, there’s a lot of power in it. I think people can get addicted to that,” he adds. It’s a weird parallel for the world around us and

Torrance doesn’t miss a beat to share that sentiment. “I think right now what we’re seeing is a lot of people who’ve led relatively stress-free lives compared to others in the world, but who nonetheless feel persecuted and feel like they need to exercise some sense of control or assert dominance again once more just to get back to feeling like the way things were, and I could catch some heat for saying that,” he says, “And I’m not trying to say that everybody on that side of the spectrum doesn’t have grievances or hasn’t had hardships but I think there’s a lot of folks who haven’t, and something they never realized they had was taken away from them, but it was never really theirs to begin with.”

Outside being a talented actor, politically competent and a thoughtful speaker, Torrance and his wife run a lifestyle blog where Torrance is able to dabble into photography. There’s travel, food and the experience of two young people in love experience the world together – not to mention an elevator pitch that will immediately convince you to book a flight to Iceland. While the fate of Still Star-Crossed is still up in the air, Torrance should have no trouble keeping himself busy. NKD NKDMAG.COM

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antoinette robertson Words by SHELBY CHARGIN Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

Antoinette Robertson is one of the most empowered women in television. Growing up in Jamaica, she came to New York to for college where she got her degree in chemistry but fell in love with acting when she took a theater class as an elective. Three classes and a monologue later, Antoinette was hooked. “I fell in love with the kind of freedom and the kind of expression that gave me,” she says. She continued to pursue acting without telling anyone; getting her degree and working as a model. She kept her lives completely separate.

“No one from modeling knew I was a chemistry major, and no one from chemistry knew that I was modeling or acting,” hse says.

Going from Long Island to New York constantly, Antoinette managed to pull off a double life so to speak. “I was kind of like a double agent, I want to say, which is really funny to say,” she laughs. “I just booked like random little ‘woman in this’ and student films and stuff like that.” Soon ABC gave her a recurring role on Zero Hour where she played a South African orphan. “It was awesome because that day in acting school I had just learned a South African accent because I was bored and wanting something to do,” she recalls. This need to learn is what gave her the competitive advantage for the role, but it also seems to be what drives Antoinette to such success in her life. Her confidence is infectious as she speaks about her career that has only just begun.

With a recurring role on Hart of Dixie Antoinette began to win over the hearts of comedy lovers all over America. The show was supposed to have her in for a three-episode arc, but they kept her on for 10 episodes, despite the fact that Antoinette never saw herself as funny. “I never thought I was funny, people thought I was funny. I just never personally believed it. I think comedy’s a very very difficult medium,” she admits. And although the cast seemed to be a bit concerned – constantly asking Antoinette if she was okay once she was written out – she made it very clear that not only was her confidence not going anywhere, but neither was she. Having a chemistry degree isn’t the worst backup plan for an aspiring actress, but she hardly needed it. Soon after Hart of Dixie, Antoinette continued booking projects consistently until landing her most iconic role yet: Coco Conners on Dear White People. “I’m utterly obsessed with this character,” she states.

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Her empowered attitude seems to stem from the idea that anything people look at as a hurdle or an “I can’t” Antoinette wants to say “Okay, well I did.” Her family – filled with realtors, accountants and doctors – saw acting as her back-up plan, and while Antoinette had a plan in place to use her chemistry degree – to create skincare line and perfume – and then become the successful actress she is, she always knew acting wasn’t her back-up. Her own self-assertion also made her very aware of how people treat her as a woman in a lot of situations in life. “When I was modeling, people would treat me like an idiot. They just assumed I didn’t have any sense. Again, it’s weird because people have a tendency to just assume if you are beautiful that you’re not intelligent, and I don’t understand why they think those things are mutually exclusive because they’re not,” she says.

Dear White People is one of Netflix’s biggest conversation starters of 2017. The show surrounds the lives of diverse students in a predominately white Ivy League college and has been well-received by critics and fans alike. While the show is a hot topic in 2017, and a blessing for Antoinette, it’s also raising a new type of awareness to the current racial climate constantly surrounding our culture. “I understand that sometimes the world doesn’t necessarily create art from the marginalized perspective, and given that this industry has a tendency to – and I want to say more so recently now than ever I’m starting to see people of color shine in television shows – for a very long time a lot of the shows that I always watched that I identified with, they didn’t necessarily have black people in them,” she says. In television history, often-marginalized groups are confined to their stereotypes, and the characters remain stagnant with a lack of dimension that we often find in characters who we fall slowly in love with on TV shows.

It’s these diverse multi-dimensional characters that have young actors of color so brilliantly expressing their culture and connecting with people everywhere on such a deep level. For Antoinette, Coco wasn’t just a character, but an opportunity to showcase a reality that so many young, black, professional women face today. “The parallel that exists between Coco and myself would be that we’re both black women trying to navigate

this world in terms of our identities and what society assumes us to be versus who we believe we are and what we’re falling into and having to deal with everything else that comes with that in terms of the world’s perception of beauty and how we’re perceived in terms of success,” Antoinette says, “Being a black face in a white place so to speak.” It’s Coco’s unyielding need to accomplish her goals that is so easy to see in Antoinette. Funny, charming and smart are attributes that aren’t afforded to women right off the bat, but it’s the one place where Coco and Antoinette seem to truly become one. “She’s influenced me to be more girly. I’ve never been this girly in my life. I’ve always been a tomboy. I’m embracing the glam now. It’s actually kind of fun. My mother’s very proud,” she laughs.

But where the difference between Coco and Antoinette truly lies is where Coco was initially looking for success. “At first Coco wanted to be defined by a man, to have her success be defined by a man. I’ve never experienced that. I think the attention that she seeks comes from the fact that she’s had a lack in her past and people have a tendency – in the hierarchy of needs – people have tendency to go after that which they’ve lacked in their adolescence or in their childhood,” she says.

Antoinette grew up showered in affection and given a healthy amount – and maybe even too much – attention at points that it causes her to shy away. For her, being recognized isn’t something she constantly or ever wants. For both girls, it’s about the difference they make in the end.

Speaking to her more in-depth views on feminism, on race and on her own self-realization, it’s clear Antoinette is not only educated, concise and brilliantly funny, but she’s aware of the world around her and her affect on it. “I don’t look to other people for validation,” she insists. She’s the type of woman who has proven that it doesn’t matter who you are, but what you want in life. Antoinette’s strength, and her ability to showcase in each character she plays a bit more of her independent self is the exact type of role model young women all over the world have been craving.

She may not seek to be a mega-star, but to be an actress with a chemistry degree, able to be a girlfriend, a daughter, a friend and still be a proud independent woman gives light and hope to women who also want to do it all. NKD

brandon flynn Words & Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

There’s something familiar about Brandon Flynn that I can’t quite wrap my head around. Maybe it’s because he went to college not to far from my hometown, so I understand all his references and New Jersey-specific jokes, or more likely it’s because of his portrayal of Justin Foley on the hit Netflix series 13 Reasons Why was so sympathetic that the line between Brandon and Justin is permanently blurred.

I meet Justin atop the the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Downtown Los Angeles over Memorial Day Weekend. In a few weeks, Brandon will head North up the Pacific Coast Highway to start production on the second season of 13 Reasons Why. It’s hard to believe that it’s only been a year and a half since Brandon graduated from Rutgers University and thrust himself into the acting world, and to say it’s been a whirlwind would be an understatement.

Brandon was born in Miami and lived there until he was 18. As a kid, he tried a handful of different sports but didn’t like any of them. It wasn’t until he was 10 that he found theatre and simultaneously found his thing – though he wasn’t super interested at first. His class was required to participate in the school’s production of Peter Pan, and Brandon was cast as Mr. Smee. “I never memorized my lines, and I got the hiccups on the first night,” he recalls, laughing. Despite not knowing his lines, his teacher saw promise in Brandon’s ability to work the stage without them, and told his parents that Brandon needed to continue acting. Begrudgingly, he continued with acting and by the end of middle school he had fallen in love with it.

For high school, he opted to study at a school for the arts instead of traditional high school and began to truly hone in on his technique. For college, he auditioned for a few different theatre programs and decided on Rutgers University in New Jersey, where he spent another four years perfecting his craft. Following graduation, he spent about three months working catering and bartending jobs in New York before booking 13 18

Reasons Why – a job that has since completely changed his life.

With one day’s notice, Brandon packed up his life and headed west for the six-month filming block for the first season. Not having worked in television before, arriving to set was a bit daunting for Brandon at first, but luckily, most of his cast mates were in the same boat, and those with more experience were happy to show them the ropes. “No one is setting for you to fail,” Brandon says, “Everyone is so great on that set. There’s no bad people.”

As obsessed as fans are with the show, they’re equally obsessed with the tight relationship the entire cast has. Whether they’re on set or not, the cast is filling up Instagram with photos of group hangs and support for one another. According to Brandon, the connection was almost instant once they all arrived on set last summer. They had a few days before filming started and were all staying in the same hotel, so much like a college orientation weekend, they gathered around the ping pong table and got to know each other. “We all ended up moving into the same place, so it was like a giant dorm,” he says.

Equally as daunting for Brandon was stepping into the role of Justin Foley. For those living under a rock, 13 Reasons Why follows the aftermath of high school student Hannah Baker (Katherine Langford)’s suicide. In lieu of a note, she leaves behind 13 cassette tapes explaining why she did it – each tape dedicated to a specific person. Except for Justin, who earned himself two tapes: one for taking a suggestive photo of Hannah on a slide and then telling his friends they did more than just kiss, and one for allowing his girlfriend, Jessica (Alisha Boe), to be raped by his best friend, Bryce (Justin Prentice). “It’s every actor’s dream to get that part that’s kind of villainized, but you can’t judge your character,” Brandon says.

Originally, Brandon auditioned for Clay (ultimately played by Dylan Minnette), but called his agent immediately after his audition and confessed that he didn’t feel it was the right role for him – as much as

he loved the script. So his agent did some digging on the other characters and Brandon went in for Bryce. “It was like, the hardest audition ever because it was like three lines and I was like, ‘I don’t even know who this person is’,” Brandon recalls. He knew pretty quickly that the role of Bryce wasn’t supposed to be his, either. A few weeks later, after not hearing anything, he got the audition for Justin, which proved to be the right role for Brandon.

Justin’s character breakdown described him as a kid who’s not from the right part of town, but is popular at school despite his interesting home life. “And for some reason that really attracted me, because I remember being in high school and you wear all these masks,” Brandon says, “Justin wears masks constantly. It’s almost like a survival technique, because you see what happens to him at home and you see… being a product of how you’re brought up and how that can make you interact with other human beings.” He found that to be the overall story of 13 Reasons Why: you don’t know what’s going on in other people’s lives, and everything affects everything.

In the original book by Jay Asher, 13 Reasons Why didn’t have a chance to fully develop the villains in Hannah’s story. On screen, however, their stories were much more flushed out and gave viewers reasons to sympathize with and understand the actions of those orbiting Hannah’s life. “It makes you, as a viewer, conflicted.

Which I think is very important in terms of art. We should always feel no certainty,” Brandon says.

The second season of 13 Reasons Why is expected to explore the other side of the story beyond Hannah’s point of view, as well as show some of the repercussions for Hannah’s accusations in the tapes. But beyond that, storylines and scripts are being kept tightly under wraps. “I always laughed and made fun of Game of Thrones because they’re so secretive, but now I understand it,” Brandon says, “We’re about to blow a lot of people away, story wise. I think we’re prepared to go for it and surprise

people.”

As someone who had only 2,000 followers on Instagram before Season 1 premiered, the success of the show was instantly understood by Brandon, who now totes over 3 million followers and quickly had to disable notifications on his phone once people started binging the series. Just one day after the show premiered, Brandon was recognized at a coffee shop in L.A. – and was addressed as Justin Foley.

While fans are eager for more episodes, the show has sparked a massive worldwide debate about the subject matter and if it’s appropriate for teenagers to be watching unsupervised. Some schools have even gone as far as to ban it from conversation and encourage parents to ban their children from watching it. “My immediate reaction to anyone saying ‘ban’ is like, disgusted,” Brandon says of the controversy, “You have all these stories like 1984 and Animal Farm where that stuff doesn’t work.” He’s also keen to the fact that if you tell kids not to do something, they’re immediately going to go do it, and “no press is bad press”. He does, however, find validity in the strong reactions the show is evoking. “It’s a really tough subject that I don’t remember talking about in high school,” Brandon says, “I also remember getting bullied and not talking to anyone about it, and I also remember saying horrible things to people and them not talking to anyone about it.” He thinks that telling high school kids that they’re “too young” to watch it when things like bullying and sexual assault are happening to and around them is narrow minded, and he urges parents and teachers who have advised against the show to sit down and watch it for themselves before jumping to conclusions. “They listen to the news and they form opinions on what it is,” he says, “And I’m constantly like, ‘have you watched it?’”

But for every skeptic out there, there’s an outnumbering amount of supporters. Because of the show’s intense subject matter and realness, Brandon has had many experiences with fans that go well and beyond 20

a quick selfie on the street. Two in particular stand out for him, the first being while out to dinner with an old acting teacher from Rutgers and fellow actor, Tom Pelphrey. A man at a neighboring table immediately recognized Tom for his show Iron Fist and had a total fanboy moment in front of him. Cut to later in the meal and a teenage girl approached the table and thanked Brandon for the show and said it had really helped her. When he got up to hug her, the girl started crying. “That was the first time I was like, ‘Wow, our show is doing something a little more special than what a lot of shows are doing’,” he recalls.

The second time was when he went to speak at a high school in The Bronx that didn’t have a proper theatre program, and Brandon’s friend was running a makeshift program for kids who were interested. One girl, who was not even involved in the program, approached Brandon and asked if they could speak privately.

She told him that she had started watching the show with her parents, and it allowed her parents to connect her to the storyline and for the first time they started speaking with her about what was going on in her life, which led to her parents encouraging therapy and paying more attention to how she was doing. “Sometimes high school feels like it’s the endgame, you know? It feels like if you’ve not made it there then you’re not going to make it anywhere, which is so not true.

But I know that feeling really well,” Brandon says.

Those types of conversations are what remind Brandon why he wanted to be an actor. With 13 Reasons Why, there was a possibility of the show revamping entirely and bringing in a new cast to tell a new story. Thankfully, though, everyone will be returning to continue the story that fans fell in love with. “I think partway through [filming] Season 1 we all knew we were doing something really cool, and probably after the first week [it was out] I was like, ‘We’re probably going to go back for a second season…’”

Brandon says, “I think it would be more shocking if we didn’t come back.” NKD

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the night game Words by AUTUMN HALLE Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

The Night Game is a lesson in never giving up.

As a project that began out of frustration with both the creative process, and the industry itself, creator Martin Johnson’s journey to his anthemic new sound came with a lot of twists and turns. The musician, who credits The Night Game with his newfound love of music, had almost given up.

Born in Andover, Massachusetts, Martin was encouraged to explore music 22

practically from birth. His mother, in particular, always had aspirations to pursue music, but never got the chance.

“If she had one wish when I was in the belly, it was that I would learn to sing, because she never got to do it herself,” Martin says of his mother’s influence on him.

The music that infiltrated his home growing up included Nancy Griffin, 1960’s folk rock, and acoustic guitar singer-songwriter type of artists. “We

had these VHS tapes of Simon and Garfunkel Live in Central Park and The Graceland Live in Africa concert, I was super little, maybe three-years old. I would sing and play along with my ukulele — and that was really the first time I remember feeling I wanted to perform.”

At 3, he was already playing the guitar and ukulele, by 7, he was writing his own music. In high school, he began performing in musical theater productions, thinking he’d found his calling.

But, it was a fated night at Boston’s iconic The Rathskeller, seeing his cousin’s punk-rock band, that changed the course of his musical aspirations.

“I just remember standing on stage that night, watching these guys with brass knuckles stage diving into the crowd, and thinking, ‘Man, I just want to play!’” Martin reflects, crediting his cousin’s band to what eventually put him in the center of the punk rock world. He moved away from musical theater, forming a ska band with one of his his school friends, and they started performing locally.

The story from there is one that people probably already know. After playing in a Battle of the Bands competition he encountered another band that asked him to join them as their lead singer.

That band became Boys Like Girls.

They booked a tour almost immediately, and Martin left behind day-to-day high school life and musical theater to embark on his first DIY tour across the country. The band took off, allowing Martin the opportunity to experiencing things he never thought he would, touring all over the world, and eventually leading him to Los Angeles.

Once settled in L.A., Martin experimented more with songwriting and producing, working on tracks for other artists including Avril Lavigne and Taylor Swift. But eventually, the hyper-structured and restrictive aspects of the music industry started to get to him.

Disillusioned with the creative process, Martin almost walked away from the industry completely.

That is, until one last dose of inspiration hit him in 2013. “I really just wanted to make something fresh and honest, so I locked myself in a room with an engineer and started writing music,” he continues. “That music turned into The Night Game project.”

“I had honestly fallen out of love with music. I was daring music to tell me to quit,” Martin says of the time right before he started the project. “I went into this thinking, if the project turns out to be shit, I’m just going to move to the mountains.”

The songs created in this period of time were heavy with nostalgia and yearning, tapping into pieces of himself that he had yet to convey in his previous songwriting. He reflected on coming-ofage themes like the struggle of following your dreams, how to really love what you do, and searching for love in the wrong places. Without the backing of a label and the financial ties that typically dictate how an album plays out, Martin was free to explore music in a way he never had the chance to. To say that it was freeing, would be an understatement.

“Everything I had written up to that point was a caricature of who I thought people wanted me to be,” he says of the experience. As he fell back in love with music, the music itself took on a whole new form.

“I started to find the euphoria in music that made me believe in music again,” Martin explains. “I just honestly hadn’t tasted that drug in a really long time.”

“The Outfield” was one of those songs. With equal parts longing nostalgia and celebratory anthemic qualities, the sonic musicality of it speaks to an underlying positivity. Despite the fact that it’s about a woman that won’t let him into her world, the hints of a 1980’s Bruce Springsteen-esque vibe and the uplifting, pop-infused beat immediately made it a standout track— capturing the attention of critics, fans, and other musicians.

“It’s been an incredible outlet for something that’s really honest and real, and means something to me. I’ve been totally blown away by the response to it,” he says. One of those responses included a personal invitation from John Mayer to join his summer tour, where Martin will finally get to put his performers hat on again.

“With ‘The Outfield’, I wasn’t really interested in giving that situation power by telling the story to the world,” he looks back on the songwriting process.

“But it felt like it was too good to not let that story out into the universe. So, this process was really about getting over those kinds of fears and just allowing things to happen.”

The songs from his time in the studio have turned into an album, one he wasn’t sure would see the light of day, until “The Outfield” changed that. Without a marketing plan or label in place, he plans to release the album one track at a time, giving listeners the chance to immerse themselves in the songs one at a time.

As for finding the confidence to fall in love with music again and give it another go?

“People feel like they need someone to cosign that something is good. Artists just want someone they trust and respect to say, ‘you’re doing something good,”” he continues. “I’ve felt the same way, but being able to have the self esteem to tell yourself that it is good, is so important.”

“If you have the balls to step out on stage and sing in front of ten people, let alone thousands, you know if you’re making something good or not,” he stops to think about it before he adds.

“Who even knows if this thing I made is good or not, but it made me fall in love with music again, and that was really the point.” NKD NKDMAG.COM

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ruth b

Words by ELIZABETH ZAVOYSKIY Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

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One quick glance at Ruth B’s online presence is truly a snapshot of her life. While the images speak for themselves, the captions to her photos potentially speak even louder. Her Instagram biography reads “baby you’re my safe haven”, an allusion to her recent album titled “Safe Haven”. On May 5th in a post announcing the release of her album, Ruth writes “to anyone who has walked into, out of, or by my life; you are the music in me. Thank you.

This is Safe Haven. I hope it takes you somewhere.”

“The last year has been really fast, but it’s been really fun. I’ve got to

it’s about a breakup or falling love.

It’s more so about going from 19 to 21, so there are a lot of different concepts and characters and phases. It’s just about growing, I guess,” she says.

And it’s that exact sentiment that echoes on songs like “If This Is Love” where we see Ruth asking a poignant question in the song’s hook: “If this is love, why does it break me down?”.

While the lyrics describe characteristics of a typical breakup, Ruth’s question is one of understanding heartbreak and learning to navigate not only love but the world.

In regards to the album’s title, she says, “‘Safe Haven’ is the second to

relating to songs by singing along at a show. “There’s a song on the album called ‘Unrighteous’ and it’s really dark, about heartbreak. I think I was at my Atlanta show and there was this 5-year-old girl sitting in the very front and she knew all the words to that song, which was really cute but also really funny because she’s 5 and singing about having her heart destroyed,” Ruth laughs, “It’s so cool that people are getting songs and wanting to memorize them at five.

I remember if I memorized a song at 5 it was because I really liked it.”

With a portion of her fan base being younger adults, Ruth’s conscious of

“Knowing that there are young girls that looK up to me is another reason why i live life the way i do.” go on tour, go to a lot of cool places, and put out an album. I’ve been working on the album for about two years. I was always writing it, I did it all of last year and summer, so it’s been in my life for a long time,” Ruth says just hours before her sold out show at LPR in New York.

Following on the high of “Lost Boy”, the single that caught the attention of over 56 million YouTube viewers, Ruth is excited to see how reception for the new album plays out. “I’m so thankful for that song and all it did, and I’m excited to see where these songs go as well. The album is really diverse. I wouldn’t say

last song on the album and it’s one of the last ones I wrote for it. When I was trying to figure out what to name this thing, I thought these songs have become my safe haven over the last few years. It just made perfect sense,” she says.

For Ruth, songwriting has always been personal to the point where she regards songs as diary entries. “You write a song thinking it’s for you and about you and no one’s really going to get it and someone messages you saying ‘I went through this, I get how this feels.’ It’s a good reminder of why I do this.” Perhaps the strongest reminder of resonance is fans

being a role model, but ascertains that she lives life for herself. “Knowing that there are young girls that look up to me is another reason why I live life the way I do,” she says.

While she’s amidst a tour now, she holds fond memories of her first encounter with touring as an opener for Alessia Cara last year. “It was amazing, I loved it. That was a huge part of me falling in love with performing. On this tour people have told me that the first time they ever heard about me was at the Alessia concert,” she says. Ruth learned a lot from Alessia on that run, and tries to apply the knowledge to her own

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show. “The way she was very honest to herself, she went up there every night in a t-shirt and jeans and sang the songs the way she wanted to, was the way I wanted to do things and it was great to see someone else doing that. I just love the way she does her own thin,” Ruth says, “Going onto this tour, I wanted to keep things stripped back and the way people have always known me.

Just play the songs the way people are hearing them and establish a connection with the audience. I wanted to break out of my habit of just playing to myself and not being aware of my surroundings. It’s been a challenge but it’s the best challenge.

I see myself as a singer and a writer, and all of a sudden you’re told to be a performer and it’s different. Now you’re doing the thing that you love but in front of people. It’s been weird but great and always makes sense when someone starts singing with you, even if it’s just one person.”

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As a person fairly new to this world, she acknowledges that there are still things to work on and that learning to be confident on stage is a work in progress. The rest of this year is devoted to more touring and more writing, both for herself and for other artists – which will be a new endeavor for the young songstress. “I’ve never written for other people, but I have some co-writing sessions lined up. Next month I’ll start so I’m kind of nervous but excited to see how the collaborative side of songwriting works.” Ed Sheeran, if you happen to read this, Ruth’s got her eye on you for some writing sessions.

With influences ranging from The Beatles to Carole King to Adele and back to Taylor Swift, the record is both diverse and a testament to true storytelling. “My biggest goal with this album is to have it impact people’s lives in the best way and I’m already seeing that. It’s like a little

seed that I finally got to plant and now it’s growing little by little but that’s all I could ask for.”

While her debut EP was self-produced and just featured piano, with Safe Haven Ruth was able to amp up the production a bit. “I got to work with Joel Little, who did a really good job of keeping me in my songs and not stamping his sound on it.

He worked to bring me out of it and have my voice shine so I’m really proud of how it turned out. I was worried it would be too far of a leap from the EP but I think it’s a perfect medium,” she says.

With a distinctly bright future ahead of her, Ruth hopes to improve her live performance over the next year to be able to tour confidently and feel no nerves coming into play.

Between writing, touring, and growing, she’s got a lot on her plate but if one thing’s for sure, it’s that this self proclaimed “Lost Boy” won’t be feeling like a lost boy for much longer. NKD

JAKE MILLER Words by OLIVIA SINGH Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

It’s 2:00 in the morning and Jake Miller can’t sleep because of the overwhelming amount of thoughts swirling around in his mind. In the past few months, this has become a routine habit, but the 24-year-old singer/rapper has found a remedy. Two feet from Jake’s bed is a studio he’s created and it’s the place where he’s spent a majority of his late nights, writing lyrics and making original beats.

The result is his most honest and authentic album yet, 2:00 in LA. Jake’s initial interest in music began more as a hobby during his teenage years. “I was just making songs on my laptop in my room and going to school the next day and you know, I was just a normal kid putting out music on YouTube just for fun and all of a sudden, the whole high school kind of knew me as that kid who was trying to make music,” he explains.

The more Jake started experimenting with music and posting videos online, the more people in his South Florida neighborhood began taking notice of his talent and potential. “I started to grow this really cool fan base and after I 30

graduated high school, instead of going to college, I decided to pursue music,” he says.

Even though Jake took a massive risk in straying from the path he envisioned for himself his entire life, his decision to focus on music ultimately paid off. “I just worked really hard that summer and I got signed to a record label, I went on tour and it was all from there that it just started going crazy,” he says.

Moreover, having the support of people in his hometown and globally made him realize that music was the career he should actively pursue.

“I didn’t know if it would actually work out, and it was a huge risk staying home from college that one year, just because I didn’t know what would come out of it. But once I started seeing the social media numbers growing and all the YouTube plays growing, I started to get tweets from people all around the world and started to see that I actually have a fan base that I can tour off of and a lot of fans who care about what I’m doing and the music that I’m making,” Jake recalls. “That’s kind of when I

realized that, ‘Wow, I can actually make this a career. I can do this for a long time.’”

Since releasing his first EP and first album in 2013 under his first record label, Jake’s career and personal life have undergone significant changes, and these experiences have served as the inspiration behind his new album, 2:00am in LA. “I’ve learned a lot recently. I’ve learned that nobody’s going to work harder than you. Nobody wants your dreams to come true more than you – and never really forget who’s driving your ship.

You’re the captain of your own ship,” he says.

Armed with this mindset and his status as an independent artist, Jake developed 2:00am in LA with complete creative freedom. He admits that under his previous record label, he let others steer his career, but now he has the ability to control every aspect of his artistry.

“I just have full creative control and I’m making these songs in bedroom, no big, fancy studios,” he says. “I’m literally making them in my bedroom with nobody around

me to kind of influence or give their opinion, which obviously, sometimes it’s nice to have other people in the room to bounce ideas back and forth, but right now, it’s just really nice to have complete creative control.”

“I’ve had my hands in this project more than I’ve ever had in the past. I’m more proud of this album than I’ve ever been before with my music,” Jake adds.

After moving to Los Angeles approximately two years ago, Jake was exposed to a different kind of culture than that of his Weston, Flo. hometown. The last few months in particular have played a considerable role in shaping his new album.

“This one is a little bit more raw and emotional,” he explains. “I’ve been going through a breakup in the last six months after a long, eight year relationship, so that’s obviously inspired a lot of songwriting. Now that I’m living in L.A., I’m seeing a lot of things; I’m meeting a lot of people.”

2:00am in LA is also the first album where Jake has written and produced most, if not all, of the tracks. Just as he taught himself to

play the drums, guitar and piano, he also learned how to create beats and add even more layers to his music.

“It was one point where I just kind of figured, I want to be a one man show,” Jake says. “I want to be able to not rely on anybody. I don’t want to have to rely on other producers to book studio time and go in there and rely on them to make the beats.”

His determination to be a self-sufficient artist led him to spend hours improving his production techniques. “I went to Guitar Center, I bought all this fancy equipment, I went on YouTube and I spent months and months, eight hours a day at my piano, learning how to produce my own beats,” he says. “Now that I can produce my own beats, I can literally wake up any day and my studio set up is two feet away from my bed, and I record my vocals two feet away from my bed and it’s all just a really cool, comfortable, laid back environment now to record these songs – which makes the songs even more authentic sounding.”

The fact that Jake spent nights

channeling his experiences into personal tracks to share with fans is precisely what inspired the title and cover art for 2:00 in LA. “We went to downtown L.A. I think it was like, 2 or 3 in the morning and we were there for about 45 minutes.

We had to break the bed down, put it in the UHAUL truck, drive it to the location, build the bed – and this is all without a permit, so we were hoping that we wouldn’t get arrested, and we didn’t. It was really fun,” Jake says of the efforts made to produce the cover art for the album.

Even though Jake isn’t actually included in the album artwork, the decision was completely intentional.

“I think it’s the first album cover of mine that I’m not in, which I kind of wanted to do,” Jake explains. “I did that on purpose. I just didn’t want the album to be about me or my face or my body.

I wanted it to be more about the music.”

In his early years as a musician, Jake was known mainly for his rapping, but those who have followed his career from the onset to where NKDMAG.COM

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“I thInk It’s always Important as an artIst, or whatever you do, to keep gettIng better and pushIng yourself and tryIng new thIngs.”

it is now will notice his progression. His Overnight EP, which was released last summer, is focused more on singing, and it’s something Jake has been trying to improve in the last few years.

“I think it’s always important as an artist, or whatever you do, to keep getting better and pushing yourself and trying new things,” Jake says. “I did start rapping when I was 18 and last year, or two years ago, I wanted to challenge myself and I got a vocal coach and I really wanted to become a singer – not a full on singer – but just learn how to use my vocals more and make songs from that perspective. That’s kind of what the Overnight EP was and now that I’ve kind of gained all this knowledge about how to sing and how to use my falsetto and how to really use that as a tool, now I’m kind of going back and I’m using both of them – the rapping and the singing.”

2:00am in LA features a combination of both singing and rapping, with one track in particular, “Back to the Start,” that is “for the day one fans.”

“Back to the Start is the last song on the album and it’s the one that I rap on, and it’s kind of just about, ‘Let’s go back to our roots.

Let’s go back to how it was when we were kids.’ It’s a song about a relationship, but it also can in general mean in any sense, for me, as a career, I want to go back to the way that it was when I was 18 and everything was fresh and new and exciting. It’s just a really important song to me,” Jake says.

He also names “Sleeping With Strangers” and “Palm Blvd” as two other tracks that standout as favorites. “There’s this one that I produced and wrote in my bedroom, called ‘Palm Blvd,’ which is the name of the street that I grew up on, and it’s basically just about how I want to go back to the old days where I was a 12-year-old kid living on Palm Blvd. and having no worries in the world, and how that 12-year-old kid probably would have hated Hollywood,” he ex36

plains.

Favorites aside, all the songs put on the album were selected for a reason and serve as a way to share stories influenced by Jake’s time in LA. “All 10 songs are in a specific order that kind of tells a story, so I think that’s really cool. So if you’re listening to the album, whether it’s on Spotify or iTunes, definitely make sure you listen to it all the way through, in order.”

There’s a certain vulnerability to sharing details of his personal life with listeners, but at this point, Jake is ready to let others have a glimpse into the kinds of thoughts that he has in the middle of the night.

“I would just say these songs are the most real songs that I’ve ever put out before and kind of just a window into my personal life in the last six months that I haven’t really been sharing because I kind of like to keep that side of my life private – but this album kind of says it all, and I’m excited for everybody to kind of see what I’ve been going through and hopefully they can relate to it and feel.”

According to Jake, fans can expect more music that is heavily focused on his vocals and the skills he has recently acquired. “Singing, I think, these days, is just something that I like more, something that I listen to more,” he says. “I never really make music for other people. If other people like it, that’s amazing, but when I make music, it’s ‘What do I love? What am I gonna listen to in my car and be so proud of ?’”

Jake’s music is influenced by a variety of artists, from rappers like Eminem, Drake and Kendrick Lamar to pop punk bands like The Almost and The Starting Line – but one artist who’s been a steady inspiration is John Mayer. “John Mayer is kind of the consistent artist that I’ve been listening to for as long as I can remember who has inspired me just as much when I was 12 as today,” he says.

His appreciation for that kind of music led Jake to recently get a

second tattoo while in Paris for the Overnight European Tour, with the words “stop this train” written on his arm. Aside from being one of his all-time favorite songs, “Stop This Train” also has a deeper significance.

“The song just means a lot to me. Every time I hear it, I just get really emotional and it not only reminds me to kind of slow down and appreciate life and not let life pass me by, but it also talks about his parents and his family in the song, which is very important to me,” Jake explains. “Everything about that song – that’s just the epitome of a song to me. That’s like, the best song ever, so I wanted to put ‘stop this train’ on my arm to kind of just remind me to slow down and don’t let life pass me by so quickly.”

Although Jake just released 2:00am. in LA, he’s already thinking ahead to his next record and creating new tracks when inspired.

In addition to constantly working on new music, Jake plans on heading back out on tour in the U.S. this fall and looks forward to sharing the album he’s worked on for the past few months with his fans.

“It might be a little bit more intimate than the past tours,” Jake says. “I just want everybody to come out and have a great time and I want it to be an affordable ticket for everybody. More than anything, I just want to play this new music and make everybody have a great night.”

Looking ahead to future, Jake has several goals he hopes to achieve, but his overall objective is to keep growing as an artist and continue doing what he has a passion for.

“I want to win a Grammy, I want one of my songs to go platinum, I want to perform in Madison Square Garden,” Jake says, “But my real long-term goal is just to keep making music, keep touring, keep seeing new cities, keep meeting the fans – and if I can do that and it keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger, that’s all I really want.” NKD

ruston kelly Words & Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

Ruston Kelly was that guy in high school. You know, the one that listened to bands you’ve never heard of and pulled out his guitar at parties? That was Ruston. But now, as an adult, he’s turned those hobbies into a career – and one that’s truly taking off.

Ruston was born in South Carolina, but moved every two years. Eventually, after years of bouncing around both with his family and on his own, Ruston settled in Nashville. He had first picked up the guitar at 14 after his dad, a seasoned steel guitar player, taught him how to play. Music was a huge constant in his life regardless of location.

Shortly after high school – after a stint working on a chicken farm in North Carolina – Ruston started Elmwood with some friends and after their first gig, scored a booking contract with Paradigm. They were playing 200 shows a year for three years straight.

“That was when I discovered drugs,” Ruston says, “And I was always the person to take it way too far.” He began to develop a drug habit, and unrelated to that habit, left Elmwood after three years because he didn’t love the music they were making. While on the road with Elmwood, he started writing songs that were more in tune with his current vibe, and he wanted to pursue that.

After leaving the band, Ruston’s drug habit increased and he found himself in quite a few bad relationships, and was living in the Curb Records writing house on Music Row in Nashville. He spent six months there before getting kicked out, and then started taking his first steps towards

getting clean. Shortly after he signed a deal with BMG and felt like things were starting to look up. “And then I just couldn’t get my personal rhythm right,” Ruston says. Eventually, he went to rehab and cleaned himself up, and it was then that things started to change.

That was roughly two years ago, and now Ruston is out promoting his latest project: Halloween. The record was a few years in the making, but it came to completion in a little over a week. He put it out this past April and the single, “Black Magic” will be impacting radio later this summer.

But Ruston is already looking forward, and has already completed his next record – Dying Star – which will be a full-length. “Halloween is the prologue in my life story, and Dying Star is Chapter 1,” he says, “I definitely feel like now, being clear-headed, my truer voice is coming out even more.” He’s extremely proud of the record, and out of the 18 songs he wrote for the record, he was able to squeeze 14 onto the tracklist. The tentative plan is to release a new single at the end of the year, and then release Dying Star in early 2018.

When it comes to writing for a specific body of work, Ruston feels he has a “spidey sense” when it’s time to stop writing, and when a song is done being worked on. Dying Star was completed over the course of a few days. “Generally, if it doesn’t hit me or strike me, then it doesn’t go on,” he says, “Which is why I think I can finish things so quickly.” His process is so quick that when his publisher warned him before signing his contract that he’d have to write 36 songs a year, he laughed –

admitting that he could do that in less than a month.

While Ruston’s music is considered more singer/songwriter or folk, his Nashville-base keeps him in close proximity to country artists – many of whom are being creating music that doesn’t necessarily fit in the traditional country box. “Country is the sluttiest genre in the world right now,” Ruston says, “It’s a format that’s figuratively opened its legs for anything to just come in. It’s kind of annoying, actually, because there used to be a cool thing – ‘genre bending’ or ‘crossover’.” He cites Dolly Parton’s crossover success years ago, as well as Taylor Swift’s more recent genre jump as authentic. “I think that an artist can cross genres, and should. They should never put themselves in a box,” Ruston says, “It’s the listener, and the consumer and the market who puts things in a box.

And that’s who I blame for some of the trash that we have currently that’s being called country.” Ruston is aware that there are country elements in his music, and he’s been billed on some country festivals, but he’s adamant that he is a folk artist.

For the rest of the year, Ruston will be extremely busy out on the road – aligning himself with artists from different pockets of the industry. He has hopes for some headlining shows within the next year, but that wouldn’t be until next summer. For now, he has dates stretching into the fall and will then be getting married to fellow singer/songwriter Kacey Musgraves in October. “Life is so much larger than your career,” he says. NKD NKDMAG.COM

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keiynan lonsdale Words by STACY MAGALLON Photos by CATHERINE POWELL

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He sings. He dances. And he runs really, really fast. You may recognize him as a speedster in shades of yellow and crimson, but before Keiynan Lonsdale acquired the superhuman abilities of the Speed Force, his powers were limited.

“My teachers thought I was mute because I didn’t speak,” Keiynan, now 25, says of his childhood. The Australian native, born and raised in Sydney, didn’t speak until he got home from school, and couldn’t bear to be around anyone other than his mother -- even with five other kids in the house. “I was very afraid of people.” At a young age, Keiynan was exposed to the charismatic choreography of the late Michael Jackson. The King of Pop’s music videos alone were enough to inspire young Keiynan to get on a stage despite his omnipresent social anxiety.

“My mom was like, ‘If you want to perform, you’ll have to be in front of people.’ I was like, ‘I don’t want to!’” he recalls.

After enrolling at a performing arts high school in Sydney, Keiynan began to immerse himself in dancing classes as well as music and acting. While still a student, he was actively searching for roles outside of Australia. For a while, it was uncertain if he’d ever catch the acting bug unless he was already successful. “Throughout high school, I was slowly building some self-confidence,” he says. Keiynan’s first acting and dancing gig came in 2007, with the release of Razzle Dazzle. In 2008, he appeared in an episode of the Australian medical drama, All Saints. Four years later, he became a recurring member in the second season of Australian teen drama, Dance Academy, with his character Oliver Lloyd becoming a regular in the third and final season. “After Dance Academy wrapped, the rest of the cast decided to head to Los Angeles for pilot season,” he says. “It sounded pretty fun, so I followed.”

When Keiynan first arrived in the U.S. in 2013, his VISA only allowed him to stay for three months at a time.

The audition process was challenging and the time restraint only increased the pressure. “I got no call backs and got dropped by my management,” NKDMAG.COM

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he says. The misfortune followed in 2014 when Keiynan returned with a new team. When he returned home to Australia that year, he spent his time recording self auditions, one of which was for Insurgent, the second film in The Divergent Series. “One month later, I was on Skype with director Robert Schwentke, and two weeks later, I was on a plane to Atlanta,” Keiynan says, laughing.

Filming for Insurgent began in May of 2014. The 110 million dollar picture featured a star-studded ensemble – Shailene Woodley, Theo James, Kate Winslet, Octavia Spencer and Zoe Kravitz, to name a few. “I felt overwhelmed and inadequate, obviously,” Keiynan says. “This was an all-star cast filled with people I looked up to.” Sharing the screen with household names was more than enough to intimidate him, never mind the demanding physical labor it took to bring his character of Uriah to life.

“My mom was like, ‘You got cast. This is real. Do your job,’” Keiynan says.

“It just took a lot of convincing on my part.” By the time Keiynan reprised his role as Uriah in Allegiant, the third film of the series, he settled into the groove of it all.

In 2015, Keiynan auditioned for the role of Jefferson Jackson on The CW’s Legends of Tomorrow when casting directors believed he’d make a better Wally West, the ambitious, temperamental teen disguised as Kid Flash on The Flash. He was filming Allegiant while auditioning for the role, with very scarce competition. “I did four rounds of auditions but I was the only one auditioning,” Keiynan laughs.

“There was such heightened pressure because there wasn’t anyone else I was competing against.”

When asked what attracted him to Wally West, Keiynan’s answer is simple. “He’s a superhero,” he laughs.

After watching the first season of The Flash, he was captivated by the action-packed special effects, familial fondness, and the script’s recurring emotional depths. The DC Comics-themed television series aired in October 2014 and became one of the network’s most-watched pilots ever, second only to The Vampire Diaries 44

premiere in 2009.

Wally West makes his first appearance in the second season of The Flash. The son to Detective Joe West (Jesse L. Martin), kept a secret by Joe’s estranged ex-wife, Francine (Vanessa A. Williams), makes his way to Central City to watch over his dying mother. Wally is thrown into the care of his birth father and his older sister, Iris (Candice Patton), while dealing with the loss of the only parent he’s ever known. Much like his character, Keiynan did not meet his father until he was 10 years old. “I thought the family dynamic was awesome and something I could genuinely relate to,” he says.

Wally is constantly stepping into danger, notably racing street cars, or helping The Flash fight crime throughout the city, all to his father’s dismay.

The stubborn need for freedom is the twist of teen angst The Flash delivers to its younger audience. “I feel like Wally is frustrated by having to prove himself time and time again, whether it’s by being a speedster, or going to a party,” Keiynan says. “Having that independence is so important to him and he’s usually treated like a kid. I think a lot of fans can relate to that.”

Thankfully, Keiynan’s background in dancing makes his job look easy.

He often goes to dance classes with his network-mate Caity Lotz (Arrow/Legends of Tomorrow) just to get moving.

“Sometimes I just stand in the back corner and move around,” he laughs.

“When you’re on set, you’re usually pretty still. Luckily, we play superheroes.”

Since Wally’s introduction to the series, he’s reached multiple milestones -- including his recent addition to the list of Central City’s metahumans. Keiynan’s suit features burgundy pants and a golden yellow top, exactly like the beloved comic book character. “The first time I got to put my suit on, I was in Flashpoint where Kid Flash was already an established hero,” Keiynan says of the third season. “I got my own powers in Episode 10, so the progression into becoming a superhero happened very quickly.”

With Season 3 of The Flash now wrapped, there’s one thing on every

fan’s mind – that cliffhanger. Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) departs Team Flash and accepts the payment of his crime: imprisonment in the Speed Force for creating Flashpoint. He leaves Wally with the responsibility of a lifetime – taking his place as the head speedster of Central City. “We see Wally with a lot of weight on his shoulders,” Keiynan says. “Everyone has gone through an emotional rollercoaster by the end of the season and it’s not a clean, happy ending.”

The Flash is notorious for it’s creative discussion and provoking theories around it’s sci-fi-based plots.

Between alternate timelines, multiverses, and meddling with the past, present, and future, there’s no telling where any of these characters will end up. Not much has been revealed about the upcoming season, but one thing remains true – fans will be surprised.

“I hope Wally continues to bring challenging scenarios for me as an actor whether or not he’s in a good place,” Keiynan says. “As long as I get to play around with it, I’m pretty happy.”

Since The Flash warpped filming for Season 3 in the spring, Keiynan has been in the studio almost every day.

After his first SoundCloud release, Higher Vol 1., in 2015, he has been writing up a lot of content, mostly by himself. He pulls inspiration from Michael Jackson, Frank Ocean, and Jon Bellion, and can’t help but feel their melodies in his own work. In his entire life, this is the first time he’s had enough downtime to work on another passion. “I wanted to move to New York to pursue music, but then I booked Insurgent, and the same thing happened when I booked The Flash,” Keiynan says. “I told myself I could either wait or make both happen.” He hopes to release his next piece of music sometime this summer.

Until Keiynan begins filming Season 4of The Flash this month, his schedule is pretty set – playing video games, hanging out with friends, and changing his hair as much as possible.

He most recently dyed his hair blonde, then a pink/purple/blue hybrid that he sported for our shoot, then back to blonde. “If it falls out, we’ll just say I ran too fast and it fell out,” he laughs. NKD

CMA music festival Photographed in Nashville by CATHERINE POWELL

Luke Bryan

Cole Swindell & Dierks Bentley

Kane Brown & Lauren Alaina

Michael Ray & Randy Travis

Garth Brooks

Brett Eldredge

Old Dominion

Danielle Bradbery

Hunter Hayes

Kelsea Ballerini

Blake Shelton

Jessie James Decker

Maren Morris

Sam Hunt

Florida Georgia Line

Maren Morris & Thomas Rhett

Lady Antebellum

Chris Young & Cassadee Pope

Cam

Keith Urban

Kalie Shorr

Chase Bryant

Miranda Lambert

KelseaBig Little Ballerini Town

Brad Paisley

Lauren Alaina

RaeLynn

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