When MAPHRA goes for a really long note, I stop breathing. I feel like the air is being sucked out of my lungs, and it’s only when she inhales again that I can let go and breathe. I don’t get that with many singers — and I’ve been doing this a long time.
But here’s what I actually came here to tell you. MAPHRA has a pattern: calm, dark verse, then she ploughs into the hard stuff in the chorus. This is my sixth MAPHRA reaction, so I know that pattern well. On her cover of “Kill or be Killed” by Jutes, she throws it out in the first verse.
And that’s the thing that genuinely took me by surprise: Jutes himself waits for the chorus to do it. MAPHRA doesn’t. She sings the verse with a low larynx, hooding the voice to make it dark and sheltered — and then leaps straight into that incredible belt. Exactly the same key as the original. Completely different song. We already know her range. We know she’s a Ferrari, nought to a hundred miles an hour in about two seconds. What I didn’t expect was for her to change where she does it.
I’m Rachel Walker Mason — a Grammy voting member, Billboard-charting songwriter and Estill-qualified vocal producer — and I see music in colour.
In this reaction I break down:
🎤 Low larynx and “hooding” the voice — how she makes the verse sound darker and lower in the same key
💥 The belt that arrives a whole section early, and why breaking her own pattern is the most interesting thing on the record
🩸 The little crack on the first note — the tiny break between a straight and a tilted larynx that she shares with Adele and Sia
🌬️ Why I physically can’t breathe on her long notes, and can only exhale when she inhales
💔 The lyric: “if it’s kill or be killed, I’m already dead” — a song about stalking, entrapment, and being haunted by someone who isn’t there
🎚️ Pitched vocal into unpitched vocal and straight back into thin folds, with no audible gear change. I want to get a camera up her nose and watch it happen
🎨 The colour report: dark blues like a stormy sea, a chorus like blood shooting up, and the whole thing like a slasher movie — red all over the walls
This is also the sound of being fifteen. Early 2000s, emo, nineties pain — I was that kid, black nails, feeling all the feels. This is what my heart was screaming, and MAPHRA gives it a voice. Is that what it is for you too? I really want to know.
📺 I’ve reacted to MAPHRA before:
▶ MAPHRA – The Emptiness Machine (Linkin Park):
▶ MAPHRA – Unethical (Faouzia):
▶ MAPHRA – Doomed (Bring Me The Horizon):
▶ MAPHRA – Circle With Me (Spiritbox):
▶ MAPHRA – Silence (The Plot In You):
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⏱ CHAPTERS
═════════════
0:00 Welcome
0:18 First listen — MAPHRA, “Kill or be Killed”
0:50 Early 2000s pop punk, my happy place, and who Jutes is
1:32 Low larynx and hooding — then the belt that broke her pattern
3:15 Why her voice sounds like our pain
6:05 I can’t breathe — and the lyric about being haunted
9:29 She had another gear — and the two women changing rock right now
13:26 Pitched to unpitched with no gear change
15:02 Colour report: a stormy sea, then blood on the walls
🎵 ORIGINAL VIDEO
Jutes – Kill or be Killed (MAPHRA Vocal Cover):
Go support her: @MaphraMusic
Jutes – Kill or Be Killed (Lyric Video):
👇 Tell me in the comments: does her voice do that to your breathing too, or is it just me?
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👤 About Rachel Walker Mason
BBC-recognised songwriting expert | Grammy voting member | Ivors Academy | Songwriters Hall of Fame executive member | Billboard Top 20 | UK Chart Top 10 | Estill-qualified vocal producer | Synesthete 🎨
#MAPHRA #KillOrBeKilled #Jutes #MAPHRACover #VocalAnalysis #SongwriterReacts #GrammyMemberReacts #ListenInColour #MaphraSquad #FemaleRockVocals
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she is it for me! there is NO ONE like her on earth. shes special, from another galaxy, a true gift to the world!
THX 4 this Video – when Original is 7/10 Maphra 10/10 so easy NEAR 11/10
Listening to you listening to MAPHRA is one of my favorite things to do 🎉. I can't breath either… #MAPHRASQUAD
MAPHRA is the lone artist I actually get excited to hear a new track from in years.
Didn't know the song, maphra released this cover I loved it.
I listened to jutes' version and it was so underwhelming as a result
9:33 "and there is more". Oh yes, there is, very much indeed. 😁
Came for the music, stayed for the kitty
The Headbangers Guild said she has the voice equivalent of the Ford Cosworth engine – she can pootle around a song and be really gentle – until she boots it into action and POW!. I agreed – but this takes it up to RS500 levels….. beautiful….
Maphra with every release she does: Oh! So you thought you understood my skill? That is so cute. Now hear what I can actually do! BAM!
I feel like a caveman watching actual real magic happen. There are many that are fantastic. But only a very few where I go: How is that actually possible?!? Maphra is on that list.
She is the depressed scream.
Your reactions are literally all of us. They should name the next rollercoaster at Six Flags MAPHRA.
I had mentioned on another channel that I believed that Jutes intended this song to be a battle and dialogue between himself and his addiction or depression. I learned later that it is in fact about depression. The lyrics manifest this perfectly and Maphra brings it to life. She doesn’t simply sing the songs she covers, she lives them.
Cover, original, it doesn’t matter. I just want to hear her paint.
😂😂😂🥰
ich bin jedesmal fix und fertig, am Rande der Erschöpfung, wenn ich mir diese Interpretation anhöre. Sie ist wirklich ein Phänomen. Ich liebe diese Stimme, das Gefühl, das sie vermittelt und auch ihren Ausdruck. Einfach perfekt. ❤❤❤
It is insane what MAPHRA makes you feel… I feel like realy pushed, like riding into battle, like pushing 100kg on the bench, sad and joyfull at the same time. Just overwhelming what this woman can do…
I’m not sure if she has already but she needs to react to sleep token
Yes, Jutes has written an incredible song! I tend to think it's about an internal psychological struggle. I catch myself holding my breath as well when she'd performing. Thanks for your insightful reaction. RE these new female vocalists … I feel like this is part of a cultural matriarchical resurgence long overdue. "Genuinely wow!" 😊
still beast watching #MaphraSquad this is by far the way we feel she make the goosebumps take flight it’s like a metal opera and we love it🎉🎉she’s a 6 speed in a world of 3 on the tree😂😅
I said about her Plot in You – Silence cover that she sings with like an onomatopoeia to her vocal style, like the scream before and after the word separation to put a literal separation in the screams and then the next line scream before and after the word desperation while making her voice sound like a cry for desperation only on the word desperation. Almost like the old "pow, bam, kapow" onomatopoeia popups from the old 60's Batman show to give it that extra oomph, if that makes sense.
Yes! She shows us all the importance of fully feeling what you feel when you feel it and also releasing those suppressed feelings of not being heard and feeling small in whatever situation you're in. She embodies raw unadulterated unapologetic power. Never suppress, always express!! ❤ Also, the technical aspects of this are so incredibly difficult. I wish more people understood what it means when we say she has complete control over her instrument. She shows a complete mastery of virtually every vocal register and extended techniques. Unheard of!!
The kind of feelings may differ for each person, but Maphra certainly causes a lot of them for many people. That's what she's getting loved for.
12:42 I have goosebumps throughout the entire song, but that scream gives my goosebumps goosebumps😅
To whoever hurt Maphra:
How dare you cause pain to this beautiful creature……….and also…thank you……..
I would legitimately like someone to try to recreate her with AI to show how impossible it is. Because they wouldn't be allowed to use her videos as a base. She is amazing.