Artist To Watch: tg.blk
tg.blk is an underground hip-hop rising star. The young rapper and singer saw a meteoric rise in popularity after the release of her hit single “love being used” in 2021. However tg.blk or simply tg as most know her, has been working at this music thing for awhile.
I sat down with tg on a cool Tuesday afternoon at my home garden and had an interesting chat with one of my personal favourite artists. tg and I snacked on tortilla chips and guacamole as she shared with me stories of her life and journey. We chatted about her start in music, her greatest supporters, finding space for yourself in private corners of the internet and the strength to pursue your passions.
tg.blk was born and raised in Mombasa, Kenya. A coastal girl through and through, she views the time she spends in the country’s capital of Nairobi as a holiday. Quick stints in and out of the city are her favourite way of interacting with this creative hub. Work and time spent with her fellow artists will usually bring her inland;and this brings with it the opportunity to network and collaborate before she is ready to return home, where she feels like she creates her best work. Away from other’s opinions and judging eyes, tg finds solace in warmth of the coast and the quiet of the night, when she finds her time to create.
The reserved rapper shared with me stories of the time she spends recording. A time for experimentation and innovation, she tests out new recording setups and arrangements, at times hanging her microphone from her bed posts, and using different voices to achieve the variety she searches for in her music. Inspired by the 2015 American biopic “Straight Outta Compton” tg began writing raps and making beats on garageband.This movie functioned as the tipping point she’d been building at the idea for awhile While in highschool emboldened with a new fire to make music she and an old friend started a rap duo called, “Butterscotch”. tg was Butter, her pal was Scotch. The group’s only project still exists on Soundcloud, the small 6 songs EP consisted of cover songs performed by tg all changed to fit the theme of butter. Think Katy Perry’s “Fireworks” but butter. “Do you ever feel like butter?” While the project is available online, I cannot provide a link. tg says, you’ve got to go looking for it.
Making music with her friends in highschool was cool and the running theme for much of her early career. But the young artist needed a break. It wasn’t until her uni days that she was reignited with the passion to create. She, like many artists and producers in their early days, ripped a copy of Logic onto her computer, to start getting serious about her production. It was at this point, she realised the little headphone microphone she’d been using to put her music together wouldn't cut it. So she begged her mother to get her a proper microphone set-up so she could step up her game as far as recording her raps went. That same year she made friends with Keerit, another rapper in her neighbourhood in Maryland, USA where she went to school, who wanted just as bad as she did to write and explore the world of hip-hop. The two would push each other, giving healthy critique and feedback after they’d gone their separate ways to write, and come back to perform for the other. tg sites Keerit as being a major inspiration in her journey to improving her rap skills.
Up until this point the two would scour the depths of Youtube to find beats that resonated with them. They discovered beats that were inspired by their favourite producers and rappers and used them to perfect their skills. The two started working with a third friend, Riley who was more advanced in his production journey than they were; and he encouraged them by making free beats for them to freestyle over. The trio would spend hours, freestyling, practising their flows, expanding their vocabulary and simply celebrating in the joy of creation.
Over time she began improving, getting to the place where she had multiple unreleased songs, ready and recorded and Keerit tried to encourage her to release them. But tg wasn’t ready. She took a considerable amount of time before putting her first song up on soundcloud and even then took her time with her follow-up releases. Riddled with self-doubt and criticism, she was always worried that what she had made was not good enough. It wasn’t quite what she wanted out there. She felt afraid of her words being seen, heard and experienced by those she knew. And it created a discord between her desire to share the work and be perceived “trying” at such a subjective artform. So she found anonymity in a name. tg.blk is a moniker she came up with inspired by hip-hop great MF DOOM, and phenomenal producer bsd.u as well as many lofi artists from that time combining the lack of consonance from her first name Nyathigi and switching out the all caps of DOOM for lower case, and adding black, “Because it sounded cool.”, and tg.blk was born.
tg.blk gave her the confidence to share her work online, subreddits and youtube comment sections saw the young rapper/producer thrive in her work. Unbounded by the weight of expectation she shared her work freely and received meaningful feedback and gained friendships that have lasted her to this day. tg credits the youtube comment section of a really good beat as introducing her to her closest music friend. These online communities offered her the space to share her emotionally charged, angsty, deeply personal music with the world. This encouraged her artistic expression but also functioned as a training ground for the spaces she would occupy later in life.
tg describes her music as being “a little rough around the edges”. She characterises it as being very “DIY”, she says she appreciates a “crunchy sound”, when “You can hear that an artist was sitting having fun in their bedroom”. This DIY approach has served her well as that is what ultimately brought her success with her biggest track to date, “love being used”. A song that, true to her roots, was written in her bedroom over a beat she found on Youtube. And despite the beat having already been sold to another artist, she begged the producer to let her have it. The pensive rapper sat on the song for almost a year before releasing it on streaming platforms for this and a few more reasons. Immediately it was done being written and recorded, she didn’t even like it.”It was the first time I was really singing and I didn’t like my voice. I felt it was too nasally and the song was too sad and corny at the time.” She allowed the song to stay in her harddrive, which at that time was really a beat graveyard where many beats she shared she’s not going to release lay waiting for their turn which will never come, to be released into the world. But after having enough friends listen and love it, she was convinced to let it go. She pleaded and managed to get the original producer to give it to her and the rest is history.
It was a surprise to me to hear, she got the majority of her beats online in this way. Especially from this talented producer. Even though her Soundcloud boasts many a track and feature where she displays her rap skills but only two that host her as a producer, those 2 songs are an incredible intro into her sound. I asked her about this and she claims she feels more confident in her abilities as a rapper, production is where she started but not where she has landed completely. So she relies mostly on beats found on Youtube. She has her favourite youtube beat pages and like her uni days spends hours searching for just the right beats to write out her thoughts.
I asked the artist how she feels about collaboration and what places it holds in her career. And it came with a mixed answer. tg.blk’s music career post uni existed in a very insular world. It was just her and her mic, and upon returning to Kenya from the U.S where she went to study, she found that there was a lot of pressure to collaborate, and really show up in the studio. She found being in the same space as a producer she’s going to work with could be nerve-wracking, because the process is so personal.”I feel like I’m kind of introverted and I’m used to working alone, and it’s hard to get into the zone. I find myself getting too into my head.” It’s harder to tell a producer in person that you don’t like a beat or another artist that you actually don’t have anything for that verse. She felt the pressure of having to deal with other people’s feelings and that would put a damper on her creative abilities. However she says she loves it when people send her beats. When she has the space to pick them apart, and work on them on her own time void of emotions and feelings, it creates an environment where she even feels excited to create.
In her own room, in her own world she is free. Free to follow her zany, wacky ideas, free to experiment with her voice and range, expanding into the realm of singing using her voice in ways that stretch her and her music. tg says that, “In front of others the process is ruined.” She often starts by simply mumbling into the mic over the beat. Creating sounds that inspire rhythm and flow, giving her brain something to follow as the words start pouring out of her. She cherishes the moments spent with herself, often late at night when the world is silent. When the crows in Mombasa aren’t crying out and her many dogs aren’t howling in the background. tg makes music for herself. Inspired by many, Earl Sweatshirt, Lucki, bsd.u, MIKE, MAVI, The Alchemist she makes music that she wants to hear. She is her biggest fan and in that, her creative process is special.
tg.blk is definitely one to watch with her growth as one of Kenya’s underground giants only getting bigger. The rapper just released her first single of the year, “gin+wine” on the 21st of February. A song for the lovers, “gin+wine” is a confession from one partner to another. tg croons over an electropop beat, venturing a little further out from where her fans may know her. The track has the young romantic singing about the girl that has her heart, she sings of the amazing woman that’s “90’s fine”, the “moon to her tide”. tg takes this opportunity to give us a pure old fashioned love song.
Keep an eye on all things tg.blk here.
