One More Song

For the greater part of ten years, Wilmington-based restaurateur KYRA TEBO FAINA lived in New York City and studied at The American Musical and Dramatic Academy on the Upper West Side. The Indiananative sang, acted, and even wrote and performed a musical at a local comedy club with her best friend while also waiting tables on the side.

Tebo Faina eventually closed her New York City chapter and moved to Wilmington in 2013 after that friend relocated to the area, too. She started waiting tables at YoSake and managed the sushi restaurant for a long time before it eventually sold. Fast-forward to September 2025, and she opened K-Town Karaoke at the corner of North Front and Grace streets in downtown Wilmington alongside JUSTIN SMITH and BRADLEY BAREFOOT, whom she met while working at YoSake.

Smith and Tebo Faina worked at YoSake, while Barefoot was a “massive regular” there. Barefoot worked with Smith in the theater space for more than ten years and also worked at one of his restaurants during the pandemic. He later became the marketing director at Opera House Theatre Company under Smith’s leadership.

K-Town, 275 North Front Street, is set up with four soundproof, private box-style karaoke rooms, allowing guests to have a private and comfortable space to sing and have fun. Each room has an iPad with access to more than 59,000 songs, microphones, LED lights, and spa seating.

“The whole entire bar is a love letter to New York City,” says Tebo Faina. “ I wanted it to feel like the ’70s. It’s a lot of graffiti, and all the rooms are in a line, and they make a fake subway train.”

The way the karaoke rooms work is that each person is charged per hour. Rentals typically last an hour or two.

“It’s basically just like a little party in a box,” she says. “You go in, and you have your own TV, your own setup. You can sing as much as you want back-to-back with your friends.”

In addition to karaoke rooms, its bar can seat fifty people and serves up popular specialty-themed shots for different occasions, such as the bachelorette and birthday-themed shots. Since opening, the bar has catered to a variety of groups, including birthday parties, bachelor and bachelorette parties, and company parties. The karaoke room rentals have recently gained popularity for kids’ parities, too.

“When you order a themed shot like a Wicked shot or the Heated Rivalry as examples, you’ll receive a costume or prop piece, and we pause the karaoke to play music associated with your shot, and you get a lot of interaction from the bartenders and the DJ,” Barefoot says. “This might include funny quips from the bartender, a bubble gun in your face, flashlights swirling, but really the possibilities are endless.”

Tebo Faina admits that the idea of opening a karaoke bar and having it operational seven days a week “seemed like an overwhelming idea” at first. When all is said and done, she describes karaoke as having “been in my blood forever” and describes it as a family business of sorts, having an uncle and father who’ve worked as karaoke DJs.

As the one-year mark approaches, K-Town Karaoke has been a hit, and multiple customers have inquired about the bar possibly expanding to other locations in North Carolina, too.

“A lot of karaoke bars are really high-end and have a lot of fancy lights,” Tebo Faina says. “I didn’t think that that fit the Wilmington aesthetic. I think a lot of people go into K-Town, and it feels so comfortable. They’re like, ‘OK, yeah, I’ll sing.’ It ends up feeling like you’re just at your friend’s house. That’s how I wanted it to feel.”

Some of the biggest feedback that Tebo Faina is receiving is the desire for another location toward Raleigh and the universities that are situated in that area.

“Because it’s working so well and because there aren’t that many of these, everybody that’s been to K-Town and loves it, they’re like, ‘Why isn’t there one of these in Chapel Hill? Why isn’t there one of these in Raleigh?’” she said. “We’ve had several people email us about opening one in Raleigh, and I want to, so we’re looking right now at spaces.”

To view more of photographer Madeline Gray’s work, go to madelinegrayphoto.com.

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