Soulection's Joe Kay Built An Empire And Now He's Betting On Himself With First EP

🔥 Joe Kay just released his debut EP, and the vibes are immaculate

If you’re a child of the blog era and Tumblr and you love R&B music, chances are you’ve heard of Soulection Radio. You’ve pressed play and immediately been calmed by the “Future Beats, Eclectic Soul & Forgotten Gems” voiceover (voiced by Omarion). Over the past 14 years, Joe Kay has built Soulection from a weekly SoundCoud-based radio show to a cultural phenomenon and worldwide collective.

Today, Soulection has over 650 radio shows and is a clothing brand, creative agency, traveling DJ collective, record label and so much more. Joe Kay is also stepping out from behind the boards to create his own “name-first” projects, like his new EP ‘If Not Now, Then When?’

Soulection started as an underground college radio show in 2011 by then-California State University, Long Beach student Joe Kay. After 4 years of building on platforms like SoundCloud and Bandcamp, Apple Music announced Soulection as an official Apple tastemaker with their Beats 1 Radio launch in 2015. Joe’s radio shows focus on soulful music across the diaspora – from R&B and hip-hop to amapiano and Brazilian funk.

Before our favorite YouTube DJs and apartment dance parties got popular – Soulection was holding down with 2-3 hour mixes for connoisseurs of new vibes and fresh energy. Soulection was a true pioneer in the Internet age.

Artists like Daniel Caesar, Cleo Sol, Bryson Tiller, Smino, Kaytranada, and Snoh Aalegra have been recipients of the elite cosign that is being played and mixed into Soulection Radio shows. Joe Kay has built an online and IRL following that truly trusts his taste – something that is hard to come by in this Internet age run by AI algorithms and “ads”.

Joe Kay can sell out DJ events worldwide based on the following and the trust he and his collective of collaborators have built over the years. The Soulection fan is a fan who loves real music and feel-good experiences (kinda like The Yamily 😎🍠😅). And now in 2025, Joe Kay is betting on himself by releasing his first-ever music associated with his own name and brand.

‘If Not Now, Then When?’ sees Joe play executive producer and curator (think DJ Khaled albums or Rory’s ‘I Thought It’d Be Different’) to today’s rising R&B stars. The EP houses features from Arin Ray Isaiah Falls, Sinead Harnett, Dylan Sinclair, Cruza, and more, with production coming in from the likes of D’Mile, Jordan Manswell, Flowr Chyld, and more. It’s groovy, it’s funky, it’s future-forward and past-respecting. It’s everything you’d imagine from a Joe Kay curated project.