Interview: Who is Gigi Perez? The Enigmatic Artist Behind the Viral Hit, ‘Sailor Song’

When you think of the most famous philosophers, who comes to mind?

Plato, perhaps, or another Greek thinker, such as Socrates or Aristotle? Or perhaps the first name that comes to mind is a Western figure, such as Descartes, Kant or even Nietzsche?

Unless you're an avid philosophy buff who keeps up with the likes of Singer and Nussbaum, we tend to think of the great thinkers as having lived hundreds or thousands of years ago.

There's an increasingly convincing argument, however, that we should consider today's leading artists the philosophers of our time. If an ‘actual’ philosopher publishes a 10,000 word thesis on religion that gets read by a few members of academia, while a musician offers an exploration of spirituality that gets streamed 400 million times, which of the two is shaping and influencing people's views the most?

Epitomising this is Gigi Perez, whose viral smash, ‘Sailor Song’, recently surged to the pinnacle of the Official UK Singles Chart, and, at the time of writing, sits at over 350 million Spotify streams.

At its heart, it's a sapphic ode to new love, but it also finds the New Jersey native reflecting on her relationship with God and religion in a way that few other artists are willing to. Gigi Perez's follow-up single, ‘Fable’, doubled-down on this intimate and deftly navigated self-examination, with Perez viewing spirituality and considerations of divine intervention through the lens of crushing, consuming grief.

Gigi Perez's keenness to dive into these thorny but universal questions relating to purpose and faith has earned her praise from many, particularly those in the queer community. Perez's defiant celebration of lesbian love in the face of Christian conservatism has struck a chord in the current climate, but it has not been without resistance. Certain US evangelical groups have criticised what they perceive to be anti-Christian lyrics, such as, “I don't believe in God, but I believe that you're my saviour”.

In reality, Gigi Perez has never positioned herself upon a soapbox, and her songs are not intended to be edicts instructing her listeners to renounce religion. Rather, Perez is doing what any good philosopher would do - probing, querying and refusing to accept anything as fact without dissecting all the permutations of the worldview first. Listening to ‘Sailor Song’, ‘Fable’ and the unreleased ‘Crown’, which Perez debuted during her London show shortly after our conversation, feels like watching an insightful, rigorous dissertation unfold in real-time.

During our discussion, Gigi Perez jokes that she's convinced she'll one day end up a theologian. She touches on the bittersweet experience of watching ‘Sailor Song’ grow, “It has lived so many different lives. The first part of it was watching the way the LGBTQ+ community has been enjoying it, and then there was the moment - or not ‘the moment’, it's still happening every day - with the religious commentators...”

‘Sailor Song’ has been heralded as an example of the kind of representation that is still lacking on the charts, with the intricate, haunting ballad pivoting around a passionate love story between two women. As Perez underlines, “When I wrote the song, it didn't come from a place where [my sexuality] was the thing I was really dealing with. I dealt with that in high school”.

It's her dynamic relationship with faith that drives much of the new music Perez is releasing, with the singer-songwriter observing how the dialogue around ‘Sailor Song’ is so much larger than she ever anticipated, “It's very interesting, because it's hit others in a way I didn't expect. I think its conversation continues to live, and I love being a part of that conversation, because outside of just being me as an artist, I love to talk to others. I feel like the things that I've been through can inform somebody who can be there for someone else”.

‘Fable’ was written in the aftermath of the religiously-minded backlash against ‘Sailor Song’, with Gigi Perez doubling down on her quest to be as candid and open as possible. As well as delving back into themes of spirituality, the yearning track tackles the loss of Perez's older sister, Celene - at the age of just 22 - back in 2020, with a voice-note heartbreakingly interwoven into the outro. That same recording serves as the introduction to Gigi Perez's live show, accentuating the sense that her sister, Celene, remains a prominent muse for Perez's next studio album.

“I was so excited about the song”, she explains, “I knew this was the way I wanted to share my grief. I've had years to really sit with the idea of being vulnerable about my grief...For the most part, I'm someone who does like to be open and cast a line out, just on the off chance there's somebody else that understands and also needs that".

"I've even experienced that recently where I was just telling my story and discussing my sister, and I left being like, ‘Oh, I wish I didn't say that’." Perez continues. "But then I got messages afterwards from somebody who was dealing with loss, and it meant a lot to them. That's the place it comes from, knowing it can help other people, and I'm just really proud to honour my sister in that way”.

Perez expands on how, despite accusations of proselytisation, all she strives to do is document the very human experiences she has been encountering, “I captured my struggle between grief, God and religion, because all of those things intertwine, but they're also separate things. So it's difficult to extract them from each other, but also put them in a song and feel like it makes sense why they're so tangled together".

"I don't know if I would have written ‘Fable’ had I not been receiving messages for months about what other people think about me saying I didn't believe in God. At a certain point, I did become desensitised to it”.

Even so, Perez outlines how the response to ‘Sailor Song’ instigated deeper self-examination, “I think it was different than someone just making fun of you...I think with something as specific as God and religion...it caught me off guard, because I thought for a long time I was okay with it".

"Then for some reason this year, I was like, ‘I'm having a real existential crisis, and it's not going away’. It's caused me to explore all these things, and I think, on top of that, seeing the community of religiosity...was the last stone that really toppled everything".

"I'm grateful for that," Perez adds. "I think it's such a deep reflection of what is wrong with organised religion, and I think no matter what conclusion I ever end up coming to, I would look back on this 24-year-old version of myself and be like, ‘Yeah, that's how I feel about organised religion, and that's okay. That's just my feeling on it’”.

This seemingly hits the nail on the head when it comes to Gigi Perez's music. She is merely expressing how she feels - and in the past few months, it's become resoundingly clear that there are a lot of other people out there that can relate. Rather than being an instrument of division - as it has been framed - Perez's burgeoning discography continues to act as a comforting, welcoming space for anyone feeling burdened by tussles with grief, sexuality or their religious identity.

Despite the fact that ’Fable’ was, in many ways, an instant, of-the-moment reply to the splash made by ‘Sailor Song’, both offerings still feel unmistakably woven from the same rich fabric of Perez's forthcoming debut album. From the thematic parallels to the stick-figured-inspired artwork, all of her recent singles feel as though they are part of a larger, vibrant tapestry that, at present, is obscured from listeners’ view, something that will become clearer when she releases the full project in 2025.

This interest in piecing together a broader narrative appears to stem from her love of musical theatre, “I feel like I really did it because my older sister did it. I loved music - I grew up watching the VH1 Top 20 Video Countdown. Then, Celene got into theatre. I didn't make the soccer team, so I was like, ‘Okay, I'm gonna do theatre!’ I remember one day after practice, I saw the director's piano, and I taught myself the C Major chord. Then I went on to learning covers. I felt this immediate spark”.

“I had been given instruments before, but I remember my grandmother got me a guitar when I was six" Perez reflects. "I wanted to learn and I was so drawn to it. I really locked in when I was 15, and it just never stopped. Songwriting completely overtook my heart. It helped me survive high school, and it's been helping me survive ever since”.

Fast forward to 2021, and Perez was enjoying break-out popularity with the self-written ‘Sometimes (Backwood)’, which earned Perez a record deal with Interscope and a spot on one of the biggest tours of all-time, Coldplay's Music of the Spheres run. Yet, just a matter of months after the arrival of her debut EP, How to Catch a Falling Knife, in April 2023, Interscope released Perez from her deal in November. Two days prior, Perez was performing her first show in London, UK.

“The last time I was in London, it was quite literally the breaking point of my career”, Gigi Perez recalls, “I just found out I was leaving my first record deal, and I was devastated. The people of London, the community, Sofar Sounds and everybody that was around at the time really helped me through something that could have ended up with me rotting in my bedroom...But things are very different now”.

Now, nearly a year to the date, Gigi Perez has made her way back across The Pond, armed with a new label, Island Records, and her first ever UK No. 1 Single plaque. On TikTok, Perez attributes this feat to an enigmatic “divine power that intervened in my life”, again demonstrating her penchant for exploring the nuances of spirituality, rather than speaking in categorical, black-and-white terms.

Gigi Perez is cementing herself as not only a future star, but a bold, much-needed voice in the space. Unfortunately, as any philosopher knows, presenting your ideas in the public arena, whichever medium you choose, is never without criticism.

But as Perez navigates the onslaught from those who malign her admissions of religious doubt, she can find assurance in the words of one of the most impactful thinkers in history, Descartes, who sagely advised, ”Doubt is the origin of wisdom” - a cri-de-coeur that should perhaps drive all great philosophers and artists alike.

In conversation, Perez spoke about her forthcoming debut album, her unreleased song, ‘Sugar Water’, and more:

On her debut studio album:

“I have so many songs written that are in the process of being recorded, or have already been produced. And I think it ultimately comes down to, when I get back home, what I sit down and feel is really important to the rest of the story. Because I feel like ‘Fable’ tells a really important piece of what I've been dealing with this year and for the past four years...Right now, I need to think a little bit more.

I think it's going to be a continuation of the story that's being told already. It feels very sure of itself. It's so weird to truly feel like the author of it, and I think that was very much informed by learning how to record my music, my vocals, my guitars and then produce it. I think that it's going to continue to encapsulate the way I have lived my life, and also how I've been able to love someone else with the ankle weights of grief and my struggle with God and modern religion. Ultimately, this person is like my muse, and they're the outlet of expression, of frustration, of fervour, of anxiety, of gentility, you know what I mean? You can only really express that towards a person, or find satiation in something that's so insatiable”.

On her community of fans:

“I think they are why I feel so okay with allowing people that I've never met to make assumptions on me, because there are so many people who know this specific feeling - the feeling of ‘Fable’ and the feeling of ‘Sailor Song’. I want to hear about these people's lives, and I feel like I've spent a lot of time in the past few months getting to know amazing people who understand and let the music help them. That's an honour to me.

We're all sitting here looking at the other side, and that's why I wrote the lyric [Feel when we argue / Our skin starts to rot], because there shouldn't be sides. But when I look at it, I see there's these people that just get it. They understand the complexities of something such as a belief or worldview, and of spirituality, and it's not this black and white thing...Whenever I hear from somebody that is experiencing that too, I'm like, Okay, girl, we're in this together’. It helps me feel safe as well”.

On her unreleased song, ‘Sugar Water’:

“I really love that song. I definitely think that it's highly likely [that it'll be released soon]. A lot of what I like about the song is that I don't really know what it's going to be yet, but that's how I felt about ‘Sailor Song’ and ‘Fable’ before I recorded them. It's always a nice surprise. I feel like it's going to be good...I've had it for a minute, but I shared it recently, and it's one of those ones I'm being slower to approach”.

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