September 2019 | Rolling Stone | 47
AYLEY KIYOKO KNOWS CARS. Her dream rides
have included a Bugatti Veyron — among the
fastest production cars on Earth — and clas-
sics like a ’57 Chevy and an Austin-Healey.
She can talk everything from torque curves
to five-star safety ratings. “I’m obsessed,”
Kiyoko says as she pilots an Audi e-tron through the tree-lined
streets of L.A.’s ritzy Bel Air neighborhood. “My dad used to
keep auto magazines in the bathroom to browse, and we went
to car shows for Father’s Day every year. Cars are my steez.”
Driving with music, on the other hand, is not. In her own
car — an Audi Q5 — Kiyoko prefers listening to nothing at all. “I
like driving in silence because it’s the only time I can collect my
thoughts,” says the singer-songwriter crowned “Lesbian Jesus”
by her fans. “Sometimes I’ll get home and just sit in my car for
a while. It’s a safe space where no one can bother me. But it
makes my friends nuts — after 30 minutes of driving they’ll be
like, ‘Uh, can you turn on some music?’ ”
The roomy e-tron is a great pick for anyone who loves si-
lence. The SUV, Audi’s first all-electric vehicle, offers a drive
free of engine noise and road racket. And there’s still plenty of
juice in the tank as Kiyoko swings south toward Beverly Hills,
talking about the future. She’s working on an album she de-
scribes as “more daring and evolved” than her previous work
— it will include her latest single, “I Wish,” a midtempo lament
about a callous lover — and while her online popularity and sta-
tus in the LGBTQ community mean the world to her, Kiyoko
hopes for some old-school accolades. “I want a platinum rec-
ord!” she says. “That, to me, is a measure of mainstream suc-
cess. Plus being played on the radio.” Which would be a pretty
good reason to finally listen to music in her car. KY HENDERSONIN THE WORLD of pickup
trucks, tradition reigns and
Western tropes abound. You
can walk into a Ram dealer-
ship and get a dashboard
that’s been cattle- branded,
after all. But change is
coming, fast. A wave of
emission-free, plug-in pickups
is on the way, and you won’t
need cowboy boots to drive
them. In March, when TESLA
held a webcast to unveil
its compact crossover, the
Model Y, a surprise teaser
image appeared: the glowing
silhouette of a truck bed. CEO
Elon Musk later confirmed
it showed his “cyberpunk”
vision of an electric pickup
now in development. Musk
has said the company is
aiming to build a truck that’s
more work-capable than
a Ford F-150 and a better
sports car than a Porsche 911.
No small feat. But he’s not
the only one with such lofty
goals. Even further along
is the Detroit-based outfittruck will boast a range of
400 miles and a zero-to-60-
mph time of three seconds,
in addition to functional
features like a pass-through
“gear tunnel” behind the
back seats that easily holds
surfboards or skis. As with the
Tesla pickup, the idea is to
seduce buyers who wouldn’t
otherwise consider a truck.
“We feel that we’re speaking
to a lot of people outside of
the traditional truck buyer —
the R1T will have efficiency
and refinement that’s just
currently not available,” says
Rivian creative director Larry
Parker. “These people will be
coming out of Land Rovers
and things of that nature.”
Another startup, BOLLINGER,
is now accepting reservations
for its retro, rugged, Detroit-
built plug-in B2 pickup, a
boxy workhorse with a 5,000-
pound payload. And the big
boys are getting involved,
too: Chevy is developing a
plug-in version of its full-sizeRIVIAN. Using $1.2 billion in
funding from Amazon and
Ford, the company plans
to produce its rugged yet
refined R1T model by 2020 at
a former Mitsubishi plant in
Normal, Illinois. The $69,000Silverado, and Ford is working
on an electric F-150. The
company recently released a
video of a prototype towing
a train weighing more than a
million pounds — no cattle or
lassos in sight. J.W.The All-Electric SUV
TRUCKS TAKE CHARGE
MAKE WAY FOR A NEW BREED
OF ECO-FRIENDLY PICKUPS
H
2020 AUDI E-TRON
While its listed range of 204
miles per charge is lower
than that of some competi-
tors, Audi touts the e-tron’s
ability to gain 80 percent
of its charge in 30 minutes
and a full charge in 45
when using a 150-kilowatt-
capable station. Starting at
$74,800, the car features
a Bang & Olufsen sound sys-
tem and optional “air quality
package” that ionizes the
cabin and emits fragrance.
Rivian’s sleek R1T (top) will haul huge payloads and ford three feet
of water. The Bollinger B2 (above) has removable rear seats.PHOTOGRAPH BY Samuel TrotterHA
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