Kenton ○ Gift of Loneliness

  From UNITED STATES 

Kenton is a singer-songwriter and musician based in Los Angeles. Sweetmouth is his debut full-length original solo project.

Kenton is a graduate of USC’s celebrated Thornton School of Music, where he studied jazz. In 2011, he gained national attention with The Backbeats on NBC’s The Sing-Off, and opened for Ben Folds on his national tour.

Since then, Kenton has established himself as a sought-after singer, collaborating with popular projects as Postmodern Jukebox and Scary Pockets and supporting pop artists such as Benson Boone, Billie Eilish, Kesha, Demi Lovato, Portugal. The Man, Cynthia Erivo, Jennifer Hudson, among others. He toured for several years with Katy Perry, while part of her Las Vegas residency.

On camera, Kenton has appeared in over a dozen national commercials, and several TV shows: Superstore(NBC), Platonic (Apple), Night Court (NBC), The Rookie (ABC), Perfect Harmony (NBC), and Room 104 (HBO). He recently voiced the character Mogui in Jentry Chau vs. The Underworld (Netflix), and was a featured singer in the animated movies Wish (Disney) and Wish Dragon (Netflix).

Raised in Irvine, CA, Kenton is the son of Taiwanese immigrants, both of whom moved back to Taiwan later in Kenton’s life. Much of Sweetmouth takes its inspiration from a 2022 visit Kenton took to Taiwan to visit them for Thanksgiving, the visit marking their first time seeing one another in nearly six years. The trip brought forth many difficult emotions for Kenton, particularly around his identity as a queer person and the tension wrought by his parents’ religious beliefs.

In his own words, Kenton describes Sweetmouth as his way of “processing the shame, guilt, grief and anger I've harbored over the years, of honoring the heritage of [his] ancestors, and of learning the art of forgiveness so that [he], as an adult, can choose love.”

Though California isn’t, say, the Bible Belt in terms of its homogeneity, Kenton still felt like an outsider growing up in the affluent community of Irvine, where his father worked as a minister. Teachers would make fun of the food he brought for lunch, and it felt difficult, at times, to fit in with the other kids. Those experiences became formative for Kenton, who still finds himself working through the baggage of his younger years.

“It was still a very, I would say, heteronormative, white, American-dominant culture,” he explains. “And things that now I'm still unpacking that I didn't realize that I was like, Oh, you think that way? Because you didn't know any other option. You know? And I didn't realize how much it affected my sense of self-worth, you know, all that type of stuff.”

Sweetmouth is an attempt at regaining that sense of self-worth. Kenton recorded the record with producer and Young the Giant guitarist Eric Cannata, a childhood friend from Irvine. He and Cannata first discussed the possibility of working together before Kenton’s fateful trip to Taiwan, which would prove fruitful artistically if difficult personally.

“We talked about that trip and the root of what I do, why I do what I do,” Kenton says. “And we kind of distilled it down a lot, to being a pastor's kid and being a child of immigrants and all that I’ve experienced. I've always felt like I carry that with me. And I perform because it's one of the few times that I feel like I'm not constantly having to push back against all of that. It's one of the times I feel truly free.”

Kenton says that while part of his impetus for making the record was finding a way to forgive his parents for not accepting him as he is, he also wanted to honor them with his music. His father had a stroke prior to his 2022 visit, and complications rendered his father unable to play music like he used to. 

“He taught music at home,” Kenton says. “And we actually played a lot of Chinese instruments at home. I wasn't very good at it. But he taught us, and my sister can play. After the stroke, he hasn't played at all. He hasn't really sung at all. And so, I wanted to honor the sounds I grew up with, the sounds that he taught and the sounds that he grew up with.”

The first single from Sweetmouth, “I’m Breaking My Father’s Heart,” is a gorgeous, wrenching ballad that showcases both Kenton’s nimble, emotive voice and his raw, frank songwriting. “Did what I had to do, or I wouldn’t make it through / Still I think there are things I regret, I died a million deaths so I could live,” he sings, in a powerful depiction of trying to assimilate as both an immigrant and a once-closeted queer person. Before the track’s end, he decides to “let go of someone else’s dream” in pursuit of being his true self. 

The second single, “Wannabe American,” pairs deceptively jaunty production with wry lyrics, like the opening line, “Took a Tai Chi class from a white guy / Threw my back out while he philosophized/ How our Western hustle culture / Turned us into anxious vultures. / Now I think I need acupuncture.”

The third single is the dark and poppy “The Gift of Loneliness,” which opens with a skittering synth line and features some of Kenton’s more fiery vocals, as he sings of the hard-earned, unwanted skill set he developed to protect himself from the world.

The fourth and final single, “Dirty Laundry,” sets the stage for the album’s full release, warning everyone “I’m bringing shame upon the family (probably) / I’m calling out the truth as I see (my b)” as he airs out all the secrets he’s been afraid of releasing, including his own sexuality.

Another notable track: “3 AM in Taipei” pairs a snaking bass line with vivid images from his travels, with Kenton wondering what life would be like as someone else, native to his parents’ homeland.

Sweetmouth takes its title from Kenton’s childhood nickname, which he got from helping to care for his mother’s feelings as a child. “I was really good at placating her and saying what she needed to hear,” he says. “Simple things like, ‘We love you, Mom,” or, “Nobody appreciates all the work you do.” And it's really hard. I never really processed what that did to me, or how that impacted me emotionally, taking on that caretaker role.”

Sweetmouth closes with “Let Light In,”  a glimmer of hope after the preceding LP’s grappling with lifelong trauma. The song acknowledges that Kenton still has a long road to travel, but also that he’s ready to let go of the past and allow light into his life. It’s a particularly moving bookend to “I’m Breaking My Father’s Heart,” as the listener travels on the redemptive journey alongside him, hopefully inspiring others to take similar steps of their own.

Kenton shares, "It’s important to me that this album isn’t just for me. Yes, it’s my way of reconciling my past and present, but it’s also an encouragement to all the immigrant queer children who never felt they belonged. There is life beyond being just a sweetmouth. We can choose to love with healthy boundaries. We can give without resentment. We can process our own pain and not let it bleed or isolate us from the community. Yes, we can. It’s not easy to let go of the painful stories we tell ourselves; but it's the only way to take responsibility for our present, and fight for a better future."

 

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