Foto-© RCA Records

Die irische Künstlerin Biig Piig wabert schon seit einiger Zeit durch die Blogs und blickt auf über 200 Millionen Streams zurück – wohl gemerkt, ohne Alben-VÖs oder ähnliches! Ein richtiges Debütalbum ist auch erstmal für 2023 noch nicht angekündigt, aber das Jahr steht trotzdem in Form des Debüt-Mixtapes Bubblegum im Zeichen Biig Piig, was auch die Aufnahme der Künstlerin auf der prestige-trächtigen BBC Sound of 2023 Longlist widerspiegelt. Diese gewann zwar letztlich die Londoner Girl Group FLO, doch auch so glauben wir, dass Biig Piig in 2023 einiges für den musikalischen Zeitgeist tun wird! Für uns hat sie ein Track by Track zu ihrem just erschienenem Debüt-Mixtape geschrieben!

1. Only one 

Only one is the intro to the mixtape, it’s about doing anything to hold onto the love that you get from someone. The idea that you’ll change and adapt if they need you to in a desperate cry to get them to stay. I remember writing this in LA with producer Aaron Shadrow, he played me this beat and I fell in love with it so quickly and got on the mic. It was one of the first times I played with the idea of finding melodies through auto tune and pitching up my vocal whilst jamming which was so fun. It’s weird thinking about it now cause as the lyrics came out about wanting to change for someone, my vocals are pitched slightly and almost sound like someone else too. The song came together pretty quickly, I remember sitting in the car when Aaron was driving me back home after the session and blasting it out of the speakers as the sun set it was a really blissful feeling then. 

2. Liquorice

This song was made in New York with a producer called Hazy Eyes, he had these beautiful synth lines he was jamming on and it really sparked a dreaminess which i think comes across in the song. This track is almost a follow on of the previous song like the honeymoon, delusion love soaked stage when you’re besotted by someone and daydreaming of them.

3. Kerosene 

Kerosene is where the heat starts, it’s a track that feels bouncy and passion filled to me. I remember writing this in London with producer Zach Nahome and Maverick Sabre, initially I started jamming some melodies and lyrics that sounded completely different. I remember Zach chopping that vocal jam up and making a sample out of it which to me sounded like the lyric ‘Daddy’ for the chorus which ignited the passionate tone of the tracks lyrics, after that we played with some baselines and one really hit, the vibe reminded me so much of Daddy Yankee – Gasolina for some reason and so that inspired my first lyrics ‘He’s pouring gasoline, two steps ahead of me, I told him baby please come set it all alight’. Me and Mav bounced more ideas through the verses and it came together so smoothly. I was thinking I didn’t wanna call it Gasoline so figured Kerosene was the closest thing and sounded sick as a title. Carrying on from Liquorice this is the point where the heat in a relationship kicks in. 

4. This is what they meant 

This track was made in LA with producer Andrew Wells shortly after my trip in New York where I wrote Liquorice. I remember writing from a place of imagining a relationship with someone I wasn’t with and falling in love all over again, seeing the city through their eyes. In context to the project I think this is the point where it’s realised that the love we so desperately wanted in Only One seized to satisfy, it’s like realising you’re not fulfilled, have reached peak and wanting to find something else even in a dream to escape into again. ‘Love can be selfish, I couldnt help it’ being the lyrics in the chorus. This is where things take a turn. I love Andrews baseline in this track and the way the synths sneak in and out like lingering thoughts in the verses before taking over in the choruses, feel like it describes what’s going on so well sonically. 

5. Ghosting

Ghosting is the point in the mixtape where things get lonely. Unfulfilled by love and hit with the reality of having messed it up again, isolating and ghosting the world is the next stage. The lyrics in this I feel like tell the story better than I can in a way, ‘I get out of bed the same way, a new day and old thoughts’ in verse two even when Spanish came into it. ‘Ahora no hablamos pero en mis sueños pasas, ahí es donde vuelo, con ti crecí mis alas’ I feel like Spanish only ever makes it’s way into my music when it’s almost like a secret conversation I’m imagining with the person the song was written about. I made this one with Aaron Shadrow on production, he’s got something about him that really makes it easy to open up in a session. 

6. Picking Up ft. Deb Never 

I was in London when I got a call from Mac Wetha an old friend and a long time collaborator of mine, he told me Deb Never was in a session with me if I wanted to roll through. Me and Deb had been trying to meet properly so much that year after messaging on insta and kept missing each-other like two ships in the night so I was so excited to go and see them both. I remember Deb and Lloyd laying down these sick alternative guitar lines and the energy just clicked. Again I used auto tune on this track on the chorus to find the hook, I jammed one melody over it and loved it so much I just wrote to that melody once that was in the track made so much sense to me. Writing the verse I felt like it was a diary entry, the whole track is about chaos and following that adrenaline til it almost kills you. We only do very light stuff here obviously haha. But it felt raw and honest and Deb came through with her verse and it fit so well and then Lloyd brought in the drums almost like a heartbeat in the context of what we were writing about and it laid the mood to it all. This song carrying on from Ghosting is that stage where isolation gets too much and so the run for a feeling that will make time stop is next and I feel like this song is that stage. 

7. In the dark 

In the dark is the last track on this mixtape, the last scene. ‘Yeah I laughed it off cause I had to love, all jokes aside I’m tired of feeling this way.’ Is what the first line of the first verse and remember writing it with the realisation of I can’t keep running anymore I’m really tired. Being the last song on this mixtape it’s like when you’re still going but the party’s over and it’s just you. And you’ve accepted the reality you’re in. Sounds sad but actually it’s a turning point. Andrew Wells did the production on this track too, his guitar lines hit so hard I remember this coming together so quick. Like the lyrics and melodies just poured out like they couldn’t stay in. Overall I think this is a track that says I’m ready to accept where I’m at and that’s a start.

Biig Piig Tour:
14.03.23 Berlin, Säälchen
16.03.23 Köln, Luxor