Griff is turning up the energy on the second instalment of the emotional, euphoric tale she's telling. The UK artist has recently release 'ver2igo vol. 2', comprising of four new tracks that explore a more electronic world with production primarily by Griff herself, as well as Mura Masa and Lostboy. Melancholic, instrospective lyrics dance over beats that signify a daring new era for Griff. We spoke to the artist about she crafted the new body of work, songwriting and being a woman in music:

Let’s talk about Miss Me Too. Your voice just sounds incredible and so vulnerable on this track. It's such a great song because it makes me want to dance but it makes me want to cry. What was the catalyst for this song?

So with a lot of the new music, it's been written in a bit of a way I've never written before. Being on tour meant I couldn't really write songs. So every time I'd come back to the UK in between touring, I would book a random Airbnb,  pack up all my music equipment and take myself there alone to the countryside. I’d try and write songs and convert the kitchens and living rooms into some kind of studio setup. I did that with Miss Me Too and I invited my friends Zebra and Lostboy, who I actually wrote Black Hole with. They came to find me and then we wrote this song over those few days. I'd been wanting to write a song for a while about the idea of missing yourself. I actually miss a version of myself that wasn't really heartbroken and wasn't sad and did trust people and did trust the world. That's what the song was about. It just naturally happened that it ended up being this super euphoric driven song, which I think suits the concept. I hear all the upbeat-ness of it, while you’re on a desperate search to find yourself.

I feel like that sense of adrenaline carries throughout the EP as well, which is cool. What do you think then that being in like new writing environments brought out of you?

I was mainly just trying to almost trick my brain into feeling as little pressure as possible. It was almost like there was so much pressure I I felt over the past couple of years and it really blocked me writing and it. I’m so used to writing more in a bedroom home environment. So it was like I was trying to trick my brain into that. I think being in big studios felt stressful because I felt like, ‘Oh my God, the record label's paying for this big fancy studio’ and it's a lot of pressure to write something. I was just trying to like recreate almost that COVID-time environment when I wrote the first mixtape, which was just like a lot of solitude and a lot of time with my own thoughts. I think it did make me lean in lyrically. I think the lyrics on all of this new music is something I'm really proud of.

Pillow in Your Arms is my favourite right now. I love that these songs have that sense of adrenaline with such raw lyrics. What was your intention overall with this EP?

Oh yay! The way I release music at the moment is almost in phases to me. I dropped phase one last year, which was volume one. That started at a really melancholic low place. It was quite moody and insular to me and very lonely, with Vertigo and Astronaut and Into the Walls. I wanted to kickstart the new year with this phase two, which is more euphoric and has more of a major sound but it's still desperately heartbroken. The themes in it are still loss and loneliness but with a real uplifting sound.

Which side of yourself do you think that your fans and audience will hear on this that they haven't heard before?

I think the sonic stuff this time is almost like a step further than I’ve ever taken it before. I think before with all of my early music, I really was that bedroom producer. I think there's a real beauty in all of the rawness of that. I didn't overcomplicate things. I didn't work on things for too long. It was just like: this is the song, put it out. I've had a lot of time to work and I've had time to think and construct these new songs and really make them feel right. So production wise, they're a lot fuller and I've taken a lot more time in making sure that they like hit all of those emotional points. Lyrically, I hope that they continue to like the way that I like to write, which is in metaphors and quite visual as well. It's almost like very nursery rhyme-y metaphors for heartbreak.

How do you think that has all then influenced your live show? Are you performing in a different way with a bigger sound?

Yeah, I think so. Being on such big tours for so long like going on tour with Coldplay and Dua [Lipa] and Ed [Sheeran], really did influence my writing. When I was finishing these songs, just wanting them to feel like a scale to them. Just being inspired by how anthemic a Coldplay song is, and how easy it is for people to sing along. think that's where I was going with Miss Me Too and stuff. I want it to feel really choral, and I want to hear everyone scream it from the top of their lungs.

It's incredible when you say those names, all these people you've been on tour with.

It's wild and it's silly. Isn't that crazy?

Do you have North Star artists that you you really look to in terms of their journey? Not even just their music, but how they've handled everything?  

Yeah, definitely. I think obviously Taylor [Swift] is one. The thing I love about Taylor is that she still writes all of her music. I think it's so easy to get to that scale and to be taken further and further away from the studio process. But still, when you look at the credits on all the songs, it's two people in the room. Lorde, too, has walked that line of pop, but built a world around her pop music. So I always look to her. I love Haim, I think they do a great job. Charli XCX too, her ‘I don't give a fuck’ attitude is pretty amazing. Yeah, she's great.

Which song are you most excited for everyone to hear?

I'm pretty excited for everyone to hear Pillow In My Arms, actually. This one was just me on production as well. I ended up producing all these tracks and then getting my friend Sam to help me finish it, but Pillow In My Arms was really just my baby. I'm excited for Cycles because Mura Masa produced it and he's my favourite.

No way. That’s so cool. That makes sense hearing that song.

He's my favourite producer, like ever. I've never told him this, but he really inspired me when I was getting into beat making because he had an interesting way of producing. Then I wrote the song Cycles and just sent it to him to see if he had any ideas to help produce it. The inner 15 year old in me is really starstruck and it's quite surreal that he's done that.

At this point in your journey are you more excited about producing or writing?

I think it's always been writing. I think I only really got into production as a means to write songs and I didn't realise it was such a rare thing for girls to produce at all. It was only when I started taking meetings with publishers and record labels, they were like, ‘Oh my God, and she produces’. And I was like, why is that a thing? I realised that girls just don't really produce at all. I started making beats because I just had songs and I didn't want to wait on producers to make them for me and I wanted to make them sound how I wanted them to sound. I found that it's a harder process to articulate to someone else how you want something to sound than for me to just figure it out and do it myself. I really love songwriting. That's always going to take priority. It's meant that I'm more in control. People respect me a bit more, peer-wise and musician-wise. when I walk into the room - usually it is a guy on the desk - I can be like, ‘oh no, I can count my vocals or no, could you move that there?’ Talking their language so it’s almost like suddenly there is a shift because I'm not just some top liner in the back of the corner who doesn't know anything technical about what they do. It’s definitely been a bit of a weapon, in that sense.

Weapon is a great word for those skills. I’d love to talk to you about fashion as well as your world is so enhanced by visuals and clothing. I know you make a lot of your clothes, which is just so cool, you perfectly balance that line of music and fashion. What does that side of your creativity fulfil in you that perhaps music doesn't really touch?

I think making clothes to me is a lot more instant and tangible. With music, it's such a head fuck (for lack of a better word) where you can make something and in the moment you feel amazing, but the next day you listen to it and you're not sure. You sit with it… it sits on your laptop for a year. Do you put it out? Do you not? It’s almost so many other factors are involved, and will it do well, is it commercial enough? There's so much overthinking that happens with music for me, that with making clothes, I make something and in a couple hours there's something tangible to hold and it's quite gratifying in that sense. It’s also helped with music and just me styling myself. I remember just after COVID, 10 Magazine UK came over to my house to do a shoot. Sophia [Neophitou, Global Editor of 10 Magazine], she’s amazing, she’s such an icon. She came to my house, looked at all the stuff I was making. She has such a great creative vision. She can just see what's gonna look good in an image.

She’s the best. Are there any designers who you've had your eye on or anyone you're really excited by at the moment?

Oh, that's a great question. I always love Simone Rocha. Like I live only in Simone Rocha. What else have we been going to at Fashion Week? I think Susan Fang is probably my favourite most underrated designer. She's Chinese, but I think it's based in the UK now. Her designs are so sculptural and it's so unique. I haven't seen a lot of stuff like that where it's like very delicate and I guess has the femininity of Simone, but has a bit more like texture and architecture to her work. I wore this big [Susan Fang] crown, almost like netted crown, at the Brits. It was like made out of these clear pearls. It’s just very beautiful stuff.

What has been inspiring you lately aside from music?

What's been inspiring me aside from music? Such a good question. It's hard because I don't know if I'm consciously inspired by anything.

Have you been reading anything?

Yeah, I've been reading. I've been trying to read more because I never really read, ever. Because reading does take up time and I guess with any spare time I had, I would always just make music. Then I was like, you know what? No, I'm becoming an adult now. Adults seem to read. Actually there's a book, Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. That book inspired the idea of Pillow In My Arm. There's a scene where I think she's holding a pillow and I remember really resonating with that. I read a book recently called Cobalt Red, which was really impactful for me. It’s not fictional at all, but it's about just how the whole of the Congo is digging up all of this cobalt and it's all in our phones.There's a whole nation essentially that is basically subjected to slavery right now. Just so that we can all like power our cars and power our phones. So that's the latest book I read. It’s really severe. I don't think people realise how severe it is. So yeah, I really think everyone should read Cobalt Red.

Yes, it’s so important and the images coming out of the Congo are so intense. Thank you. If you had one word to define this next phase of your music, what would you choose?

If I could choose two, I'd say it's like emotionally euphoric.

Yeah, I love that. That's the perfect phrase for these songs.

Listen to the Griff HERE.

@wiffygriffy

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