Kaki King

Kaki King (born Katherine Elizabeth King, August 24, 1979) is an American guitarist and composer.

King is known for her percussive and jazz-tinged melodies, energetic live shows, use of multiple tunings on acoustic and lap steel guitar, and her diverse range in different genres.

On graduating from The Westminster Schools in Atlanta in 1998, the two friends attended New York University.

While there, King picked up the guitar again, and revisited the finger-style techniques that intrigued her as a child.

While at NYU she studied with Bill Rayner, a professor of guitar.

From there, King played a few occasional gigs and busked in the New York City Subway.

After signing with Velour Records in 2002, King began recording her debut album, Everybody Loves You. She incorporated fingerstyle "fanning," with both flamenco style percussion and fret tapping techniques, as well as using double open tunings, viola tunings, and traditional Russian guitar (7 strings).

On April 22, 2003, Everybody Loves You was released to positive reviews and feedback on King's skills as a guitarist in relation to her age.

While her later work involves more of a band format, Everybody Loves You is King's only fully acoustic guitar album, with the exception of light singing on the hidden bonus track, "The Government."

To support the album, King embarked on her first major promotional tour in North America.

After King appeared on Late Night with Conan O'Brien, Sony Records offered her a deal with Epic records' Red Ink label.

From there, King headed back into the studio to work on her sophomore effort, Legs to Make Us Longer.

King began to incorporate different instruments and sound effects into her album, such as looping, light drum work on "Doing the Wrong Thing", and her first incorporation of Lap steel guitar with "My Insect Life."

Produced by David Torn, Legs to Make Us Longer was released on Epic's Red Ink Imprint on October 5, 2004 to strong reviews.

In support of the album, King performed as an opening act for Eric Johnson during a leg of his 2005 tour, as well as completing her own nationwide and world tour.

At the end of her tour for Legs to Make Us Longer in 2005, King departed from her previous musical direction out of a desire to escape being pigeonholed as a solo instrumental artist.

She amicably parted ways with major label Sony/Epic and returned to her original label, Velour, to begin work on her third album ...Until We Felt Red.

In February 2006, Rolling Stone released a list of "The New Guitar Gods", on which King was the sole woman and youngest artist (beating Derek Trucks in age by two months as the youngest on the list).

Her career includes six LP and two EP albums, as well as several scores for television and film.

She worked alongside Eddie Vedder and Michael Brook contributing music for the soundtrack to Sean Penn's Into the Wild, for which the trio received nominations for a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score.

King was born the first of two daughters.

While still a small child, her father noticed her natural musical ability, and encouraged her interest in music.

She was introduced to the guitar at the age of four and played for several years, but after taking up the drums a few years later, they became her primary instruments as an adolescent.

Convinced that her break in music would come from drumming, King played in bands in high school with classmate Morgan Jahnig, who would later become the bassist of Old Crow Medicine Show.

Released August 8, 2006, on Velour Records, the album features production work by Tortoise's John McEntire.

With the prominence of electric guitar shoegazing and effect boxes on the new record, and the addition of a full band, the music website, The A.V. Club, called the sound a "post-rock makeover."

She supported the album by going on tour with Sarah Bettens from K's Choice.

In early 2007, Dave Grohl invited King to appear as a guitarist on the track "Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners", a song penned by Grohl for an upcoming studio album by the Foo Fighters.

King agreed and is credited on the album, entitled Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace, released on September 25, 2007.

On November 18, 2007, she joined Dave Grohl on stage to perform the track at the O2 arena in London.

Grohl highly praised King's performance:

"There are some guitar players that are good and there are some guitar players that are really fucking good. And then there's Kaki King."

King toured with the Foo Fighters on the Australian leg of the Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace tour.

While on tour, King finished recording what became the Day Sleeper (Australian tour EP).

It was released in late 2007 after King had finished working on August Rush, and with Eddie Vedder and Sean Penn on Into The Wild.

King recruited Malcolm Burn to help with her next album, Dreaming of Revenge, and in December 2007 wrote about it in her blog: "I finished the new album. Don't get your panties in a tangle, it won't be released until next year, but it's done. And it's amazing."

Filled with more melodic pop tunes than previous albums, Dreaming of Revenge was released on March 11, 2008 to highly positive reviews.

On March 4, 2008, iTunes released a full version of Dreaming of Revenge featuring the bonus track "I Need A Girl Who Knows A Map".

After filming a video for "Pull Me Out Alive", she began her tour.

In the first half of King's tour, she headlined at The Roxy and toured with The Mountain Goats, which led to the exclusive release of Kaki King and The Mountain Goats EP Black Pear Tree EP.