I’ll sometimes go on YouTube and throw on the soul food restaurant scene in Doug McHenry’s 1994 tragic romance Jason’s Lyric. The blend of Allen Payne’s sweet-talk toward Jada Pinkett with Eddie Griffin’s out-of-pocket thirst for Lisa Nicole Carson all while Brian McKnight’s “Crazy Love” drifts in the background creates this sort of chaotic mash-up of earnest infatuation and horndog behavior. It captures everything I want out of rap songs that have been bitten by the lovebug. Since the New Year’s ball dropped, there has been a flood of mixtapes that, with their own regional twist, capture that essence in different ways. I’m thinking of KP Skywalka’s 4 tha Freakas, which softens the free car sound of the DMV with R&B samples and bed-hopping. Also, OnlyHeaven’s KISS (Keep It Short & Sweet), a New Orleans bounce rom-com full of relationship anxieties and sweaty sex. And, most recently, Pig the Gemini’s Lover Girl, a tape that adds a teaspoon of sugar to the complicated romance of Southern pain rap.
West Orlando’s Pig the Gemini isn’t new to the melancholic pianos and wounded melodies that permeate the South. Her 2015 single “LaFamilia” has the heartfelt spirit of Rich Gang’s Tha Tour. Meanwhile, Long Live Curt, a tribute to a close friend who died, could fit on a DJ set with the heartbroken singalongs of fellow Floridians like St. Petersburg’s Rod Wave and Jacksonville’s Lil Poppa. There’s no question where she’s from when you hear her.
Lover Girl is nimble and fun, with pillowy vocals and cloudy beats. Pig sings about love in a way that’s real, leaning into both the irrational highs and lows that comes with the territory. On mixtape highlight “Even the Blind Can See,” she’s damn near clicking her heels together as she daydreams about her crush: “I know you gotta be tired, you been runnin’ laps all day through my mental.” The lush “Krazy Head” sounds like a lullaby, as her enthusiasm gets a little silly. Drake and PartyNextDoor should fire up “Change Your Mind,” if they want to hear how begging for your girl back is really done.
Pig has been catching feelings on wax for a minute. “Love me, then hate me/Somehow I end up under you,” she sang on 2022’s Fast Trax 3, the pitched-up, pluggnb-infused breakout mixtape by her older brother, the underground fixture 454. Together, they started making music when they were barely out of elementary school. Pig was the rapper, while 454 was the producer of the family. In the house, their mother spun Teddy Pendergrass and Teena Marie, and could hold a nice tune, though she never made music. And their late father managed a local Orlando rap clique. Pig can remember the sight of crumpled-up paper on the floor of the studio, as her dad and his crew wrote and goofed around.
A few weeks ago, Pig posted a slideshow on Instagram of music videos she made in her early teens, back when she went by the name Lil Echo. Draped in the Aeropostale tees that had high schoolers around the country in a chokehold, she sang-rap like a lost member of the Rich Kidz. In one clip, she goes in over the instrumental for “Banned From TV” and, in another, her brother whips a car around—he looks too young to be driving—as she gets in her So Far Gone mood. The snippets stuck with me because, even though they were filmed nearly 15 years ago, they didn’t feel far off from the swagged-out, sentimental melodic rap music she’s still making today.
In the fall, Pig moved from Orlando to Brooklyn, joining her brother, who relocated north over six years ago. Last week, she and I met up at a typically overpriced coffee shop, on the border of Bed-Stuy and Bushwick, where she was dressed in so much pink that it was like she was pulled from a vintage Cam’ron video. We chatted about Orlando rap history, jerk culture, R&B, and Lover Girl while the Brooklynites surrounding us typed away on their laptops, oblivious to the soft-spoken burgeoning star in their midst.
Pig the Gemini: I love my new home, but I miss sliding down the I-4 jamming music at night. In Orlando, we love our cars; you not gonna catch anybody walkin’ around or waitin’ for the bus; that can be kind of embarrassing. It’s different here.
When I came here, I was thinking that I hope I could still make the same music I been making without them expecting a New York sound from me. But I’ve been surprised, everyone has been fucking with it. And I feel like if anyone goes through my catalog, they’ll eventually find something they fuck with.
Not really in a sense, but I do listen to them heavy. I like NoCap a lot. I like Rod Wave heavy. I fuck with Kevin Gates. A lot of people I be around, Kevin Gates is not their music taste, but he’s just one of those dudes whose music you put on. Sometimes it’s ’cause of the beat; sometimes it’s ’cause of an ad-lib; sometimes it’s ’cause of a concept he comes up with.
Growing up, I was super, super big on Lil Wayne. The Hot Boys, Juvenile. But mostly a lot of R&B and soul stuff.
No, when I was growing up I’d say it was Boosie, or maybe Gucci Mane. Now, when you ride around you mostly just hear Boston Richey or Bossman Dlow. A lot of Hotboii, too, because he’s actually from Orlando.
[Laughs] No, that’s facts. Those are the real OGs of the Orlando music scene. They’re the ones who really paved the way for what Orlando sounds like today. Basically, they came up together. They used to be homeboys, did dirt together, all kind of stuff. Then, they had a falling out; Armstrong made a diss song; Mook Boy made a diss song; and then people accused Armstrong of being a rat. When that came out the people stopped fucking with Armstrong, and Mook Boy really took off. Recently, Armstrong popped back up on the internet dropping music and still talking shit. They started talking about having a Verzuz, but nobody thought it would actually happen without the club getting shot up, but it was successful.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Mook Boy did another Verzuz with this artist I really fuck with heavy, Woop. Another real beef and that went fine in the club, too; I fuck with that.
On a Friday or Saturday, you’ll see everybody downtown at Tier or Beacham. It’s so many clubs and bars, the streets will just be packed. For a long time, the number one club in Orlando was Gilt, on the east side, but they closed it down to put up apartments or some shit. But I don’t really go downtown; there’s so many people and it’s moving so fast that it gives me anxiety. I think there was a shooting there a couple months ago. I don’t really like being in places like that.
When I first started rapping I was listening to a lot of the futuristic, upbeat shit out of Atlanta. You know, Travis Porter and Rich Kidz.
I used to be a jerker. I was in three different jerk crews. We’d just link up at malls and have functions where everyone would get into circles and battle each other.
This is when I was livin’ in Altamonte Springs. That whole culture took over. My first rap name, Lil Echo, was a name I got from being in a jerk crew. I remember there was this one huge function we hosted with these people called GetGeekedGear.com; they, like, sold clothes and stuff. It was the most people I ever danced in front of. I was jerkin’ against this guy, and he Dougie’d his way up to me and knocked my hat off. I was so mad, I was like, Oooh, wait until it’s my turn.
Basically. We’d do little freestyles over beats on the radio. Then he stopped rapping to focus on producing, and I’d rap over it.
He’ll tell you it was always me. I just kept doin’ it, but he had a lot of other stuff going on. He fell in love with skateboarding; he picked it up not long after we lost our pops, maybe it was a coping mechanism. He was skateboarding every day and had skate competitions, so he was never able to go 100 percent with music for a long time. But I was always tellin’ him to drop music, he was too talented not to.
At first I was kind of like what made you want to do this? [Laughs] Because it wasn’t just one song, it was all his music. You’ll probably only hear my vocals sped up when I’m featured on his songs. But it’s a Florida thing. We always had slowed down music in Orlando and the fast music was more of a Broward thing, but, at some point, it hit Orlando to the point that you’d even hear fast music in the club.
I feel like slowed down music is pretty popular in Orlando, I remember this app called Slow Down Music Player I fell in love with because you could slow down and speed up your own music, so the first thing I would do when I leave the studio is slow down all the songs I had just recorded.
DJ Screw was the guy that I knew who started doing the chopped-and-screwed slowed tracks, so I’m not sure how much truth that holds.
Young Thug’s “Everybody (To Me).” I think it was the Fastmusic 954 version.
I really think my melodic stuff comes from me wanting to be an R&B singer, for real. I’ve always wanted to take vocal classes, but I’m not a singer, so I find a way to do it in rap.
I’ve been telling myself for years I was gonna drop a project on Valentine’s Day. I recorded Lover Girl, like, two years ago and been sittin’ on that, but I hold on to too much stuff and been tryna’ change that now that I’m in New York. But the inspiration comes from everyday relationships, the good and the bad. I’m the type of person that will just pull out my Notes app and write a line that’s in my head as soon as I think of it. I’ll be mid-shower and hop out the shower and run to my phone if it comes to me. That’s why I like writing more than freestyling, the thought process feels more like me.
Disagreements. Communication.
Probably Nivea’s “Complicated,” because she’s basically singing about how it’s actually not that complicated.
I love Summer Walker. Sade. This group L.T.D. Luther Vandross. And… Frankie Beverly and Maze. Frankie was super big in my parent’s life, too. They were cool. My mom even got an invite to go to his service. I saw him play live a few years ago at Soul Fest at the Central Florida Fairgrounds. It was a lot of old heads there, but I saw some of my younger friends there, too. Even then, you could tell he was struggling to sing some of his songs, but he was still getting the job done.
That’s what I’m on right now; I’ve been jammin’ that shit for a couple days now. I know a lot of people not fucking with it, but I fuck with it.
I feel like I’m in that right now. I’m more of a huge Drake fan, but I always liked individual songs like “Recognize” and “Persian Rugs.” Remember that video of him in the club throwing up the gang signs?
[Laughs] I dunno about that. The singers, gotta stay the singers.
Probably the stuff on Lover Girl. But, next time, I want faster beats; I want to turn up. I want to make upbeat music, shit like my brother.
It starts with yourself.
What I’m listening to:
This post was originally published on this site be sure to check out more of their content.
