Julian Totten, a junior student at Marco Island Academy, is providing a refreshing wave of music to our school and beyond. The up and coming artist has already released two EPs on Spotify, and each one perfectly describes the island life and emotions that you may experience living in paradise. 

For Julian, his journey began at a young age, when his family had a band called No Exceptions. In this band were his father Shane Totten, his brother Elliott Totten, and himself, and they held worship at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, as well as being involved in large events like Relay for Life. This early influence of music within his family introduced the idea and passion to pursue a music career himself.

“My dad was a rockstar back in his days, so that was one of the things that gave me the passion and idea for music,” said Julian Totten. “I also wrote music just for fun, and since my dad has made songs we already had a home studio, so that’s how I got started.”

In his freshman year, he decided to begin recording and making music that would go public, starting with his first hit song MOOLA back in 2018. As a New Year’s resolution, he labeled himself with the artist name “King Bling” and created the song with the intent to imitate the style of mumble rap songs, while rocking out with a crazy hairstyle and white clout goggles. 

“One day, I started listening to mumble rap, and my Dad and I thought it would be fun to make a mumble rap song together. I wrote it in a couple of hours, recorded it, and the song MOOLA came to life for everyone to listen to.”

Shortly after MOOLA released, another one of his hit singles “CARZ” released, followed by “CHILL”, “MARCO THUG” and “SNAX”. Each of these songs includes clean, comical content that’s relatable to the majority of the Marco Island Academy residents, and there was a large amount of support from many of his listeners. 

Due to his rapid growth and his father being a teacher at the local middle school, King Bling had his first concert at Marco Island Charter Middle School during their spring dance. In his own words, the experience was incredible to say the least.

“Man, the energy that I felt from that day was amazing. For my first performance, the fans were so supportive, and I felt like that event allowed me to take my talent to the next level. When I was singing my songs and the fans were going crazy, I knew that I was doing something right.”

“Because of them, I learned to ignore all the hate pretty quickly. I realized that for every person that would come out and criticize my work, there were far more people who really enjoyed it. For me, seeing fans enjoy my creativity and spread it around is a main inspiration for me, and that’s what keeps me moving forward.”

Julian has been hard at work over the last couple of years, dropping his two EPs “Ride the Wave” and “Summertime Mixtape”. These consist of 10 amazing songs that are available to everyone through all streaming platforms. Also be on the lookout for more music to be dropped this year, as he plans to release an album titled “Senior Year”. 

As the king takes his rightful throne in the music industry, all in the kingdom shall be delighted by the sound of paradise.