I remember seeing Griff perform at a festival last summer: sun shining, Diet Coke in hand and the sonic sounds of Black Hole flowing into the crowd. This is what pop music should sound and feel like is the consistent thought and feeling I had throughout the set. It felt cool and refreshing, especially in a world where the pop genre still has so much judgment and shame attached to it. “I always found the term ‘pop’ a bit of a dirty word growing up, but I’m proud of it now and have reclaimed it a lot more in recent years,” Griff tells me over Zoom.

It’s hard to believe that Griff (real name: Sarah Griffiths) is yet to release a debut album, considering the many accolades she’s achieved during her young career. Her seven-track mixtape, One Foot In Front Of The Other, charted in the UK album chart at number five despite not officially being marked as an album. Griff has opened for acts such as Ed Sheeran and Coldplay and won the Brit rising star award in 2021, following in the footsteps of Adele and Florence And The Machine. At the same awards show, the singer got a shout-out from Taylor Swift herself during her global icon award speech and, after the ceremony, the pair posed and shared a selfie from backstage.

Since then, Griff has been confirmed as one of the opening acts for Swift’s Eras tour at the Wembley shows.

“I bumped into Taylor at a Kendrick Lamar show, and she was sitting in the box next to me and we had a chat and she mentioned that she’d love to have me on the tour. I didn’t know if it would actually happen, but we got the confirmation a few months ago and I’m so excited,” Griff says.

Griff’s upcoming debut album, Vertigo, has similar sonic undertones to the singer’s mixtape but it feels more mature and reflective. From the synth and electronic feel to Cycles to the heartbreaking and deeply relatable lyrics of Into The Walls, the record has something for any mood. A couple of songs have already been released from the album, including the boppy, emotional title track Vertigo. “The word ‘vertigo’ resonated, not just because of the song itself, but because of this idea that all the songs are coming from an emotional place of vertigo – heartache, pain and growing up often feels like the world is spinning and it’s very disorienting.” There’s a big spectrum of emotions on this record and Griff explains that emotional vertigo is the common thread that ties it all together.

Does the singer-songwriter have any favourites from her debut? “It changes every day! Today, it’s Vertigo and Tears For Fun. The first really sums up the album and makes me feel good and then Tears For Fun is just euphoric.”

The creative process tends to differ for many artists, but Griff felt she needed to remove herself from the world and switch off – especially with the stress and intensity of creating a debut record. “I would book an Airbnb, pack up my music equipment, drive a couple of hours into the countryside and then convert the place into a studio for a week. I must have done that across around eight different Airbnbs,” the singer shares.

Because Griff also produces a lot of her music, it means the whole record is hers. According to a report from Fix the Mix, women had less than 5% of producer and engineer credits across the top 50 streamed songs of 2022. It’s something the Black Hole singer is painfully aware of in her industry.

“There’s an easy thing that happens in music where everyone around you encourages you to work with lots of people in the industry – like a game of speed dating. Whereas, actually, I just want to do this myself.” Griff has had to wrestle with this notion and pushed to produce her own work, but for her, it’s one of the “privileges of being both a producer and an artist”.

Images: Javier Castan