For upcoming Sydney singer-songwriter tiffi, BIGSOUND is the next big step.
BIGSOUND is the southern hemisphere’s largest music industry conference and plays a vital role in launching the careers of Australia’s musical exports.
Every year, Australia’s best and brightest emerging musicians learn from the likes of Flume, Courtney Barnett and this year, Tones and I. A killer combination of star power and industry nous has made this conference a proven launchpad into the stratosphere of success.
BIGSOUND 2024
- Fortitude Valley | Brisbane, QLD
- Music Festival: 3- 6 September
- Conference: 3-6 September
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Back for its 23rd year, the current lineup is stacked with speakers and performances from Australian music luminaries. Recently announced keynote speakers also include Amy Taylor of Amyl and the Sniffers and R&B legend Kelis. Meanwhile, the festival element will also feature performances from Alex the Astronaut, Sly Withers, Hellcat Speedracer, Matahara and Dear Seattle, just to name a few.
Excitingly, it will also feature upcoming Western Sydney singer-songwriter, tiffi. Initially a bedroom-pop artist, tiffi has been releasing music online since the age of 13. Amassing over 50 million streams by the time she turned 20, tiffi is excited to use the conference as a stepping stone into taking her career to the next level.
“Every artist I like has done BIGSOUND, so I’m really excited for it!” she says of the acclaimed conference. “It’s definitely a really cool thing to put on my music resume.”
But, of course, tiffi already has a stellar musical resume, a career she fell into entirely by accident.
“I started on SoundCloud because I had a crush on a guy who only used SoundCloud,” she laughs. “So, to get his attention, I put some stuff up there and I forgot about him, but yeah, my stuff started to get a little bigger.” While she may not have won over her crush, she did end up with a fully-fledged music career.
Her music initially started off as a self-described “ukelele, lo-fi girl era”. Having no real-life experience, she wrote from her imagination and what she saw in movies. “I had a crush on the nerd [Anthony Michael Hall’s Brian] from The Breakfast Club. I thought he was so cute. So, I wrote songs about him. But he’s like an old man now.”
After her music gained a slight following, she was eventually encouraged by a friend to release her music on Spotify. Not knowing how to do that, she sought help from her older brother.
“At the time, I was 13. I didn’t have a Paypal Account or a card so, I asked my brother if I could use his account. It was $60 and he was like, ‘are you sure you’re going to get your $60 back?’ Rest assured I got my $60 back.”
Listeners suddenly began to appear in all corners of the world from Atlanta to Los Angeles. Eventually, after her music appeared on Sydney’s FBi radio, she gained a manager.
A few years after this, she started playing gigs. “My first gig was at the Fairfield Museum. I was so nervous, but a lot of my friends showed up for me. It was the first time I’d really done anything outside my bedroom.” After grafting on the live circuit, she then began to be booked for gigs. Opening for everyone from Milky to Telenova, her sound began to change.
Becoming influenced by the likes of Conor Oberst (of Bright Eyes) and Adrianne Lenker (of Big Thief), tiffi really started to hone her craft. She also began to develop a specific image. Greatly inspired by 90s aesthetics and slasher movies, she cites Carrie (1976) as being a big influence on her style.
This brings tiffi to the present, as a burgeoning young artist looking to take her career to the next level. Wanting to eventually headline a show, the 21-year-old singer hopes she can use BIGSOUND to leverage herself into doing so.
“I’ve never done a headline show. It would be cool, but I get a bit nervous. Opening for a bigger artist, I feel less pressure because people aren’t there to see you. I just worry no one will show up to a headline show of mine. The imposter syndrome is real.”
While she hopes she can do this through BIGSOUND, all she really wants out of her career is for people to hear her music.
“For me, I’m really bad at playing the game, whatever game there is. It feels unnatural to me. Really, I just want to get as many people as I can to hear my music, other than that, I’m not stressed. Meeting industry people is still nice and a lot of them have good insight. For me, I just hope they enjoy it, and want to listen to more.”
As a final aside, she tells me that she released a song the day of our interview, entitled “hell”. You best believe it, tiffi is bringing hell to BIGSOUND.
BIGSOUND will be held from 3- 5 September 2024 at Brisbane’s Fortitude Valley precinct. Tickets are available here.
This article was made in partnership with BIGSOUND.
