Pigeon Spins Featuring an Interview with The New Citizen Kane

The New Citizen Kane - PSYCHEDELIKA Pt.1

PSYCHEDELIKA Pt.1 is the first installment of my master project.. A Kaleidoscopic look at life through an unfiltered lens, sometimes surreal, sometimes raw, always vulnerable and absolutely human.

The New Citizen Kane is the sound of memory wrapped in melody. He makes music that feels like a dream you can dance to. Born Kane Michael Luke and now based in London, his work as a singer, songwriter, producer, and visual artist connects feeling and form—tying synth lines to heartbreak, and cinematic visuals to personal truth.

After nearly a decade of silence, his 2024 album The Tales Of Morpheus wasn’t just a return—it was a statement. A full visual album with textured electronic production and deeply felt writing, it was equal parts diary and DJ set. Kane doesn't just drop songs—he crafts mythologies.

Now, with the new single “San Diego” and his upcoming project Psychedelika, Kane is expanding even further. The storytelling is sharper, and the production is huge. The emotion still bleeds through, but the lens is wider. He’s not playing catch-up. He’s building a new lane. Kane isn’t trying to be everything—he’s trying to be fully himself. Every track is a journal entry dressed in synths. Every video is part séance, part self-portrait.

After years of building behind the scenes—studying sound, making films, living deeply—he’s stepping out with intention. He’s not industry-safe. He’s artist-first. He’s not trying to relive his past sound. He’s sketching what’s next. He’s not nostalgic. He’s haunting.

Interview with The New Citizen Kane

(º)> What inspired you to create PSYCHEDELIKA Pt.1 as a fully visual and sonic project?

I flirted with the visual side of things with The Tales Of Morpheus, but I was mostly making edits using pop culture clips, my first fully realised music video was for Forget The World, and it was so satisfying to create & it was actually good! I had the luxury of being able to focus solely on creating while making PSYCHEDELIKA, as I took the step to focus 100% on music back in January, leaving my regular job which I was still doing at 40% up until that point, but with the amazing reception to the Could Have Been EP I actually started to see a potential future working purely as an independent artist. That luxury of focusing on creating meant channelling all my time & energy into it, and the thing about creating is that it’s exponentially incremental, the more you create the more ideas come. I worked on the visual & audio components in parallel, so each influenced the other in a way & the evolution of the project into this larger era encompassing various avenues has felt very organic.

(º)> How does this project expand on the themes and style of The Tales Of Morpheus?

The Tales of Morpheus was autobiographical and cathartic — I was diving into my past to heal and close a chapter, many of the songs were songs I’d written a long time before, picking songs from over a 20 year period of my life — Psychedelika is my reawakening. It’s louder, stranger, more playful, more expansive. It looks outward as much as inward: meditating on anxiety, forbidden desires, the disconnection of modern life, politics & prejudice, and the paradox of escapism. At its core, Psychedelika is about perspective; how the mind bends, how love evolves, how the night hides as much as it reveals. Every track is a different lens — some playful, some devastating, all rooted in a refusal to look away from life’s contradictions.

(º)> What role does vulnerability play in your songwriting and visual storytelling for Psychedelika?

It is the core of the album, to quote a line from Buy Me A Ticket, “I’m giving myself up to you on a platter”. Every line is me being honest, open and unafraid.

(º)> How do you approach connecting synth lines to emotion in your music?

I love creating sonic reflections of the words and mood I’m writing about… Music is so expressive, so emotional, but I think a lot of pop music can be lazy and just scratch the surface of what the song could be. With Afterglow for example, it was essential to the essence of the song that the synths felt like a warm embrace, on Eyes Wide Shut on the other hand it needed to be grittier, to capture the tension and the push & pull of self-destructive desire. I’m not going to give away my exact technical secrets, of how I achieve these things, but I think when you listen to each song the music amplifies the meaning behind the words.

(º)> Why did you choose to work entirely solo without collaborators for this project?

Because that was the only way to execute my vision authentically, purely.

(º)> How does lead single Afterglow reflect the overall vision of the album?

Afterglow is about the period of anxiety that led me back to making music, and it’s about the healing, so really it is the reason I am here today speaking to you. It was actually the last song I wrote for the album, I mean I thought the album was done back in August and then I wrote Afterglow, as I have spoken to the anxiety as the reason I came back to music in interviews but I’ve never spoken about how it felt, and that is actually the most important part, because it feels so isolating even though it’s such a universal feeling for many people at different points in their lives, so it was important for me to share so that anyone who hears it that is going through the same thing right now doesn’t feel so alone. It’s me saying “yes it is real, but it does get better”.

(º)> What cinematic or visual techniques are most important to translating your music into video?

While I am a qualified sound engineer & producer, I have studied photography, I have no cinematic training whatsoever, so I cannot speak to technique to be very honest. My approach is a mixture of mood based storytelling & film inspired creation, for videos like San Diego & Ratbag Joy I rely a lot of visual effects to capture the mood & narrative of the song, while on Well, Damn! Here You Are I was trying to capture a kind of Almadovarian kithcy melodrama, or Whispering Tango is quite an abstract visual interpretation of Chinese Whispers and the dangers of miscommunication.

(º)> How has nearly a decade of behind-the-scenes study shaped the production of this new work?

The biggest impact to my work has been the confidence of trusting myself, the confidence of being in my 40s, the confidence of no longer needing & seeking approval in what I do.

(º)> How do you balance the surreal and raw elements while maintaining a cohesive narrative?

Life IS pretty surreal when you think about it, this universe is all very surreal, but it is real and raw at the same time… I don’t actively think about whether it’s balanced or not, I think about capturing my point of view as honestly as I can, and naturally that blends rawness with a little sense of humour and touch of visual imagination.

(º)> What do you hope listeners and viewers take away from the experience of PSYCHEDELIKA Pt.1?

I don’t want to speak to what people should or shouldn’t feel, because music like all art is subjective, my only hope would be that perhaps it opens the door for some open & honest conversations for people, that listeners focus on the similarities we all share as humans, as emotive beings, regardless of race, gender or sexuality, as far too often we tend to focus on the differences.

(•)> That's all, Folks! Check out The New Citizen Kane on the Pigeon Spins Playlist