* En anglais uniquement
Redlight King is the songwriting project of
Mark Kasprzyk, an Ontario native whose music combines rock with hip-hop samples.
Kasprzyk, or “Kaz” for short, began recording music as a 16 year-old, modeling his sound after a wide range of influences that included
Bruce Springsteen,
A Tribe Called Quest, and
Nas. He also practiced judo, eventually gaining admittance into Canada’s Olympic training center to ready himself for the 2000 Games. He didn’t make the team, though, and returned his focus to music, resulting in an album that earned him a JUNO Best New Artist nomination in his native Canada. After struggling with substance abuse, he cleaned up and relocated to Los Angeles in 2008, where he began writing the songs that would comprise his U.S. debut,
Something for the Pain. The album’s centerpiece was “Old Man,” a song that sampled
Neil Young’s 1972 classic (the first sample use granted by
Young), and set it to an aggressive hip-hop beat. For his follow-up,
Kaz took
Redlight King's sound in a different direction, scaling back the samples and hip-hop influence in favor of a more traditional approach on 2013's
Irons in the Fire. ~ Andrew Leahey