Kylie Cantrall Knows Exactly Who She’s Becoming
BY LIAM GILLINI’ve believed in Kylie Cantrall’s potential since I discovered her music two years ago on TikTok but sometimes an artist gives you a moment that makes you look at that gut feeling differently. After watching Kylie take over Terminal 5 in New York City on Friday for the The Valley Girl Problems Tour, I saw the potential I had sensed two years ago begin to take shape in front of me.
Before Kylie even stepped onstage, the room was already enthusiastic. ELIAS opened the show and the crowd was incredibly loud for him, which immediately made it clear that Kylie’s fans had come ready to participate. Then the lights went down and a countdown clock appeared. A visual of Kylie sitting in a car played on the screen before it looked like she landed directly onto the stage and began with “Boy Is Yours.” It was theatrical, unexpected and immediately established that this wasn’t going to be like any other concert.
Kylie is hungry. You can feel it being in her presence.
She’s been working toward this for years, and she doesn’t perform like someone hoping to become a pop star someday. Kylie performs like someone who already sees where she’s going.
Throughout the show, videos about Kylie’s upbringing gave the audience a glimpse into how long she has been working toward this moment. There was something really amazing about seeing those pieces of her story while being surrounded by fans who have followed her since her days on YouTube. Her “Valley Girl” upbringing isn’t just part of her image; it’s part of the story she’s been telling about herself and the person she is becoming.
I first discovered Kylie around the release of Descendants: The Rise of Red in 2024. From there, I went down the rabbit hole of her music, and “Boy for a Day” was one of the songs that made me think, “Oh, she could really be something.” Since then, she has continued expanding her world through EPs such as B.O.Y. and Valley Girl Problems, while returning as Red in Descendants: Wicked Wonderland. Watching her career develop since I first found her has made this concert feel like a particularly interesting moment in her career.
One of the things that makes Kylie Cantrall especially intriguing to me is the generational rise happening around her.
Disney Channel may not as culturally dominant as it was when I was growing up, but I wouldn’t count the network out. It’s still producing successful franchises like ZOMBIES and putting young performers in front of audiences that can grow with them. Olivia Rodrigo went from Bizaardvark to becoming one of the defining pop stars of her generation, while Sabrina Carpenter went from Girl Meets World to headlining Coachella this year. The Disney machine may look different now, but its ability to introduce young talent to a massive audience is still working very well.
I may have aged out of watching Disney Channel and I’m obviously no longer the target demographic for a lot of its newer stars. However, I still enjoy paying attention to who is coming up through the network. There’s something exciting about knowing who these kids are before they potentially become the next people shaping mainstream pop culture. I grew up watching the Disney stars who came before them such as Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, and countless others, so I know how interesting it is to watch that transition happen.
I think one of the most valuable things a child star (turned musician) can get from growing up on Disney Channel is an audience that grows up with them. If viewers spend years watching someone on screen, there’s already a familiarity and emotional connection there before that person ever releases a song. That can eventually become something much more powerful: loyalty.
But I think there’s an important catch: the music has to grow with the audience. You can’t expect someone to stay invested forever if the artist stays exactly where they were when the audience first discovered them in their childhood/pre-teen years. The transition has to feel natural. The artist has to give longtime fans something they recognize while also showing them a version of themselves they haven’t seen before.
That’s what makes Kylie Cantrall’s trajectory stand out so much to me.
My Gen Alpha cousins already knew exactly who Kylie was because they grew up watching her on screen, while I discovered her later through Descendants: The Rise of Red and then her independent music. For them, Kylie isn’t necessarily a Disney star who is now trying to become a musician. She’s already part of their childhood.
I grew up watching the Disney stars who came before her; Gen Alpha is growing up watching Kylie in real time.
The crowd at Terminal 5 reflected that. The audience was predominantly children and young teens, but I also saw plenty of older Gen Z and millennial fans there. Honestly, it was comforting. Sometimes when you’re watching an artist whose audience skews much younger, there can be a feeling that you’re seeing something that everyone else hasn’t caught onto yet. Seeing people my age singing along reminded me that Kylie’s appeal isn’t limited to the generation that grew up watching her.
As an older Gen Z/young millennial, I also find Kylie’s musical identity particularly refreshing. I grew up around the late-’90s and early-2000s R&B sounds she draws from with singers such as Lauryn Hill and Destiny’s Child. I have desperately wanted to hear that kind of influence return to mainstream pop. What I love is that Kylie’s music doesn’t actually feel nostalgic to me. It feels new.
She’s taking those influences and curating them into something that belongs to her generation rather than simply recreating the music of mine. There’s something familiar in the melodies, production and R&B influence, but she isn’t making a nostalgia act. She’s showing what those sounds can become in the hands of a new generation.
What I love most about Kylie’s discography is her attention to creating an immersive experience around her music. Her EPs use interludes and transitions in a way that makes the listening experience feel almost cinematic, like you’re watching a television series unfold rather than simply moving from song to song.
The transition from “Carrie Bradshaw” to “The Answer (Interlude)” and then into “Girls Like U” on Valley Girl Problems is elite and always has me playing it over and over again. Each song naturally pulls you into the next, creating a sense of continuity that feels bigger than an individual track.
What makes that especially exciting is seeing those ideas translate to the stage.
Kylie isn’t only creating seamless transitions in the studio; she’s bringing that same sense of storytelling into her live performances. The countdown, the car visual, the choreography, the interludes and the way the set moved from one moment to another all felt connected. Kylie isn’t just thinking about what her songs sound like individually; she’s thinking about what her entire world sounds and feels like.
In a way, she’s already manifesting the future version of her live shows through the music she’s making now.
She also knows how to make the audience part of that experience. Kylie taught the crowd the choreography to “Valley Girl Problems,” brought two fans onstage for Kylie trivia and performed the unreleased “Pretty Privilege.” These moments felt less like obligatory audience interaction and more like an extension of the relationship she has already built with her fans online. Kylie also regularly acknowledges and reposts fans, and that gratitude seems to translate into her live shows.
Her fans knew the lyrics. They participated. They screamed. They showed up for her. That relationship matters.
Kylie Cantrall doesn’t just have fans; she actively cultivates a community around herself. And when you combine that with an audience that has already grown up watching her, the potential becomes even more interesting. The kids screaming her lyrics at Terminal 5 today could be the teenagers and young adults camping out and buying her tickets for sold out arena shows years from now.
That kind of loyalty is incredibly difficult to develop after the fact. Kylie is getting the opportunity to build it now.
“Red” also highlighted how much Kylie has grown as a performer and was one of the stand out moments of the night. The song, which many fans know from her time on Disney, took on a more mature quality during the show. Hearing her approach it with more sophistication showed how naturally she can bring her past work into the artist she is today.
That is the key. Kylie doesn’t need to reject the things that introduced people to her. She can build on it and create something amazing.
There was also something exciting about hearing “Pretty Privilege,” because it gave the audience a glimpse of where she might be headed next. Even within a set that already had a clear identity, there was a sense that Kylie is still building. She isn’t presenting a finished product. She’s showing us the artist she is becoming.
My favorite song of the night was “Closet,” which felt like one of those moments where everything Kylie does well came together: the sound, the performance, the attitude and the connection with the audience.
One of the things I look for when watching an artist early in their career is whether they can make a small venue feel like an arena. Kylie did that without hesitation.
Terminal 5 is not an arena, but there were moments when it felt like one. The production had ambition. The crowd had the energy. Kylie had the confidence and the presence. She understood how to command the space without needing to prove that she belonged there.
That is what ultimately convinced me that my “Boy for a Day” feeling from two years ago wasn’t just a feeling. Kylie Cantrall is truly going somewhere.
She has the Disney foundation. She has a fiercely loyal young audience. She has older listeners beginning to discover her. She has a distinctive musical identity rooted in R&B without sounding like a throwback. She understands storytelling, visuals and transitions. She knows how to engage her fans and most importantly, she looks hungry.
I think Kylie is going to be selling out arenas in a few years with no hesitation and at Terminal 5, she ate—and left no crumbs.
Kylie knows exactly who she’s becoming. And I have a good feeling we are watching a superstar in the making.
