Bossy Hottiez and Dirty Pop Babies: Talking w/ Siena Liggins
After gifting the world with her highly anticipated album FLOOZY, Siena Liggins takes the stage at Chicago’s iconic Schubas Tavern on her first stop of her headlining tour. The “pop baby” has made a name for herself after the success of her debut album Ms. Out Tonight in 2021. She’s covered Tidal’s Pop: Rising playlist, amassing a large audience of pop lovers and women-loving-women alike. Her blend of genres is rich, culminating into her love of Pop. As a Black woman in the Pop space, she remarks she almost always sticks out. The creativity to fuse genres is overlooked, yet wanting to just be considered Pop isn’t granted.
“Sometimes I feel like the biggest challenge that I face is that people don’t know what box to put me in and so it’s really difficult what to say or what to do next.”
What Liggins does know is that she’s always going to write songs about her experiences; the love, heartbreak, and the sneaky links. Her sound has grown to be the provocative, yet beautiful quality she sought to create. And as a Black female pop artist, writing songs about falling in love with girls in rocky relationships… is there anything more beautifully provocative? That is the question Liggins begs on “FLOOZY.” The sophomore album finds her vocals darker and more electrifying. The overall sound is louder with more kick, and more bite. I hear this the most on “HOTTIEZ,” which was a certified crowd favorite on tour! I got to talk more with Liggins before she performed at her first show of the tour:
Is this your first show in Chicago?
Siena Liggins: Yes! And it’s the first show that kicks off the tour. I’ve spent so much time anticipating this, it’s been in the works for at least a year from the time I mentioned a tour to my team. I didn’t know how it was gonna come together. I’m a little bit nervous. I’m stressed out. I’m like, what did I get myself into?
You mentioned you started music because you were writing songs about crushes you had on girls. What was your earliest crush like, if you can remember?
SL: It’s so hard to say because I really didn’t know that I was having those crushes while they were happening. I just remember I had an infatuation type of thing. When I finally did come out, my grandma was like yeah… I kind of always knew because you always were so “passionate” about your friendships, haha. Like I remember the girls on my basketball team who I would feel such a way about you know? Such a lesbian trope. And so I don’t know that I can remember the first one, but I remember the early memories I have of these friends that looking back I wanted to be more than friends with. Like no, I didn’t just want to be her friend, I wanted to be in her skin.
So what was the first song you can remember writing about it? Like about the feeling, when you realized it was more than a friend thing
SL: I wrote Flowerbomb, and that was the first song that I put out. I wrote this song about this girl who had a partner, and they were having issues. She really came on to me, and I really liked her. She was stunning, she was beautiful, she was smart, really witty and she understood me. And so we started hanging out, and she just started confiding in me about all of the stuff going on in her relationship. And that just made me yearn for her more to be honest. I wanted to see her happy and fulfilled, but like with me.
And yeah, so I wrote that song about her because I couldn’t really tell her how I felt. I knew she wasn’t going to choose me at that time. At the end of the day it was so painful because I was just like “I’ll love you the right way.” It was never gonna work out but I sat on that song for a long time.
Who were you writing for before you started releasing your own music?
SL: Some of my early collaborators were really like people out of Detroit or who I was working with. I worked with Jax Anderson, who used to go by Flint Eastwood. I wrote a lot of stuff for them. I wrote with Tunde Olaniran, who’s still one of my closest collaborators and friends, and wrote for their project. I used to like just show up and pop up in studio sessions all over Detroit. One of the people that I’ve really looked up to and was so thankful that I got to write with, and be in the studio with was Supakaine. Who’s like, you know now he’s on Doja, Latto, Saweetie. So I’ve been around, you know, I’ve always just been trying to figure out how am I going to get to where I want to go?
I heard through the grapevine that you started with choir and theater. Do you remember what your earliest or performance was?
SL: Yes! One of my early plays was Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. This one sticks out in my mind because I just had no business in it. It’s like such a white play, there’s no black people in it but they gave me one speaking role in it. And yeah I did that. I also did Grease which was fun too but I didn’t really have a big role in that.
Born in Saginaw north of Detroit, Siena Liggins started out in Michigan, and moved to North Carolina to Vriginia to California to Atlanta and back to Michigan at certain points. Growing up a military kid, she’s lived everywhere, but it was Detroit that really embraced and raised her in a lot of ways.
SL: I grew up on Motown, TLC, Destiny’s Child, Brandy. And then like the Gaga era and Kanye. I feel like there weren’t a lot of queer musicians for me to look up to when I was getting into music and growing up which is why I felt the need to really pursue what I’m doing. I feel like a lot of queer musicians were either behind the scenes or like in the closet during the time I was deciding to become a musician. Now it’s like so many artists are openly queer and LGBTQ+. A lot of them are my peers now.
Since FLOOZY is your second album, what was the experience between your debut versus this one? Performing it, making it; was it easier? Was it more daunting?
SL: It was definitely easier and harder in some ways. With making the first project, I was really just used to making and putting out singles. And so I kinda got pushed to make a project. They’re like, hey, it’s kind of time that you do something that’s more cohesive, full-length, that sort of thing. And so I had all these songs in the bank, and I kind of just put a playlist together and was like, this is my album for my first project. And it had such amazing success for like… an independent debut from an artist who nobody knows. I don’t have a lot of followers, and I don’t have a lot of money. Like people think I’m a plant, but I’m really just like a girl with a lot of ambition. With the first one, I premiered in Paper Magazine and got on all these amazing playlists. There was all of these amazing co-writers and collaborators on the first one that going into the second one, I was like well how do you top that? The sophomore album thing, it’s yeah… it’s the silent killer. How do you do better when your circumstances haven’t really changed?
SL: Despite all the success after the first, i didn’t get a big deal, i didn’t become more famous. I mean I grew gradually, and was doing more shows but it’s not like my life changed so much from the first one. So certain things about that made it harder. It was also easier because now know what I want to say, I know how I want it to sound, and who I can work with visually.
As a Black woman in your specific lane/ sound, do you think you kind of stick out?
SL: I feel like all I do is stick out. I don’t feel like I fit in anywhere. I feel like that’s part of the challenge. It’s probably not good for me to get in a space of comparison like right before I step on stage, but sometimes I feel like the biggest challenge that I face is that people don’t know what box to put me in and so it’s really difficult what to say or what to do next. You know, I’ve had people tell me like, “You know thicc, you need to do 15 songs just like that and like then you can cross over.” Or I’ve had people be like, “Just be as different and alternative as possible so that you stick out and you’ll be the ‘alt-Black girl’ and you know, that’ll get you there” It’s a lot of voices. A lot of voices, a lot of people, you know. I used to think maybe I’m doing the wrong thing.
SL: I’ve had people tell me that my project is too expensive to break because I’m a Black girl trying to do Pop. And hey might be right you know, like I don’t doubt those people know what they’re talking about but I don’t think anybody knows my fans better than I do. People who have opinions on what I do, they have data. They have Instagram, TikTok insights. But when I do these shows, I sit and I talk to the real people. I talk to people like you, and I hear other Black girls say, “I need you in music!” Like they tell me nobody else is doing this for them. I hear queer kids of all different backgrounds say they came out to their parents because of a song. Or that my songs exactly express the experience their going through. Lol, I get couples who DM me and be like, “We finally have music for our sex playlist!” I’m like what a blessing.
SL: The main reason why I went from being a behind the scenes songwriter to someone who puts original music, was because there was no song talking about exactly what I was going through. There was no other dark skinned lesbian girl talking about like my clothes and my pillow smells like you when you leave. I’m not the only girl out here living that experience. Even though there’s still all these voices and opinions, I always feel like I’m doing exactly what I should be doing. I mean, I would be lying if I was like “Oh I don’t want to have the most viral moment” or the most followers or biggest deal or you know giving my Grammy speech.
They all started in the same place too
SL: Right — I don’t think that I won’t get there, but sometimes I’m like maybe if I did what these people told me to do, I would get there sooner. But I want to get there doing it the way I want to do it. I want to get there doing the stuff that I care about. What matters to me. Knowing that, like, the people who even bought tickets to the show tonight will be, “I was there at the beginning. Like, I held her down. She wouldn’t be anywhere without us.” I want them to say that. Yes.
So off FLOOZY, what do you say is the top song that you’ve been either listening to a lot or you’re most excited to perform?
SL: As of the past 24 hours I’ve been very focused and fixated on POP BABY. Which is maybe like a shocker, cause it wasn’t a single and…
The best ones are never the singles.
SL: Oh, you already know. You buy CDs, so you already know. The best ones are never the singles, but yeah. Pop Baby, I wrote that. I like to write a lot of like “fuck you songs” to the industry. But like respectfully, you know? I don’t usually say fuck you to the industry. POP BABY is really my ‘I make pop music song’. Like I can make all genres, but like that’s what makes me “pop”.
If you had to put that one song in a playlist of 3 to 4 others of the same vibe, what would you put? What feels like POP BABY?
SL: Anybody? I would put Formation on there. Okay. Y’all haters corny with that Illuminati shit. Yes, and I would put Dirty Pop by NSYNC on there too because that heavily inspired Pop Baby. Like if you go back and listen to Pop Baby, I basically just rewrote the chorus “Dirty Pop”. And then I would put maybe Delilah (pull me out of this) by Fred again on there too because I just feel like that’s a good transition. Lastly I would put probably a Meg song and a Nicki song right next to each other just for the shits and giggles. Definitely an old Nicki. Did It On Em.
Keep up with Siena Liggins: @ sienaliggins | sienaliggins.com
