To say that, thanks to our transatlantic conversation, it’s gone midnight where Tiggi is, she’s remarkably enthusiastic over the phone. In fact, she’s just as perky and upbeat as her latest drop, “Dangerous Behaviour”: a collaboration with electro house extraordinaire, Mike Mago, that’s bound to get your toe tapping.
A master of both the pen and the voice, making floor filling bops comes as natural to Tiggi as breathing does for the rest of us. After her EP “Burn Notice” made waves last year, the effervescent star on the rise acquired a taste for being in the studio and has been writing ever since. “Honestly, you know what, it’s now become such a regular free therapy session, that if I stop, I have no idea what will happen,” she laughs. That’s some incredibly productive therapy.
With her new single out right now (run and get it, folks), and her yellow brick road to stardom neatly laid out, we caught up with pop prodigy to chat puzzle pieces, teamwork and air drum solos.
Can you start by telling us a little bit about how you got into music?
So as with every awkward teenager, you’re always going to need an outlet, and I completely found writing. So I started writing poems and only when I was about fifteen did I start putting them to music, and I’m pretty sure they were awful. I don’t even dare to listen to what I wrote back then, I don’t think I ever will. I think that’s just a Pandora’s box that will just never be opened. Then I started working with a company in London and it just kind of snowballed. I was writing mainly for myself, but I never thought that I would really go into music. But then it got to a point where I literally just couldn’t imagine doing anything else. I know that sounds like a really happy accident, but I can’t imagine doing anything else right now at all.
You started writing at fifteen, how did you get into singing?
I did it at school. I definitely did it in the shower! But no, I took lessons, I actually studied classically. I started singing classical music first, but I just found that I couldn’t quite get the expression that I wanted. I connected with the songs, but I couldn’t kind of make them my own. So then I went from that into more of the pop side of things, which actually took like a year to cross over. We kind of did Broadway stuff and then I realised how much I love that kind of storytelling aspect. That really kind of basically led straight into writing my own stuff and I haven’t really looked back.
Cool. So what’s the creative process like for you?
I’m a really visual person, I need to really connect with the subject, so often I write about stuff that’s happened to me, or that I’ve experienced as a bystander or something like that. That can literally be like a feeling that I had when I was driving through London at night, which I love doing. I love night time in general. It’s strange, there’s really weird stuff that you do where you’re suddenly like, “this feels great,” and then, obviously, conversely, the moments in your life where you’re like, “oh, this is shit.” And then I get a free therapy session when I start writing.
So do you usually do the music after?
Yeah. I can come up with a melody absolutely, but I really like getting subject matter and usually the main hook first, because it really is a solid foundation and, it sounds really odd, but in my head, it’s kind of like a puzzle and those are the four corner pieces. You need those corner pieces; otherwise, you’re just kind of going blind. Literally, where do you start with a puzzle? The first thing you do is find the corner pieces and that’s my corner pieces.
Who would you say your main influences are as an artist?
Well, I grew up with quite eclectic music. My mum loves rock music, so that definitely filtered down into what I listened to as a child and a teenager, and then my dad is a fan of American classics, Don McLean, Marc Cohn and stuff, so I really got a complete blend. Personally, my kind of go to is like Johnny Cash. It’s the storytelling aspect of his music, every song is a story. Also, without wanting to sound like a nerdy musician, some of the rhythmic qualities and just some of … you know when you listen to a song and you have a favourite bit in the song? I suppose it’s like during your air drum solo or whatever, I find that I want to incorporate things like that. I want to look forward to doing a little drop or something in my song. I want to be driving along and then, you know, finger drum on the steering wheel.
What inspired your new song “Dangerous Behaviour”?
So, it’s based very, very heavily on a personal experience of mine. It’s a good experience, it’s a really positive experience, where someone kind of gently takes you out of your comfort zone and helps you to act out positively, like maybe do something you haven’t done before. You know, whether it’s completely going for a relationship or anything. Even something as mundane as, “you know what, I’m going for my dream job, I’m going to do it.” Like, it’s pretty dangerous, but it’s ranging from literally that to, “do I like this person?” In my case, it was, “I like this person, I’m going to do something about it,” which is not something I’d usually do at all. But also then saying, “okay, well I now wave responsibility. Everything that happens now is on you and I really hope you can deal with it.”
So it’s that risky sort of feeling?
Yeah, but definitely in a positive way. He’s going to make me go kill someone – that is not what we’re going for!