If you can’t handle the truth, don’t listen to Bibi Bourelly. The baddie from Berlin breathes an irreverent honesty which breeds a benevolent boldness we haven’t experienced since the timeclock ticked 2000. 1990, four years before the Moroccan/Haitian singer’s arrival on the planet, the infamous barrier between cultures known as the Berlin Wall was demolished. Fittingly that this fascist divide was removed prior to Bourelly’s arrival, because if not, it’s likely she would have huffed and puffed, written and rebelled, and blown it down anyway.
Bibi Bourelly is a storm. The sky is falling. Listen to her sound. Watch music’s weather change.
Born into the arts and entertainment industries by her ambitiously creative parents, Bourelly, 21, was songwriting with structure by the age of four and touring with her father, renowned guitarist Jean-Paul Bourelly who played with Miles Davis, had a role in Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Cotton Club”, and is a member of the Black Rock Coalition, by age 11. Bourelly’s mother, who passed away when the artist was six-years-old, headed House of the World’s Cultures in Berlin. In truth, the baby they named Badrilla and nicknamed Bibi was birthed to create art; was created to birth rock, blues, soul, and Hip Hop; was gifted with the responsibility to raise the new world her way. Seeking up and speaking out is what the artist lives to do. Singing our united experiences into existence over hard drums, ill strings, and chilling keys is what the universe determined she’d do for a living.
Bourelly wrote four songs for Rihanna’s chart eclipsing “ANTI” album: “Yeah, I Said It”, “Higher”, “Pose”, and most popularly the stadium shaking “Bitch Better Have My Money”. Her song “Camouflage” made the cut for Selena Gomez’s gold-certified Revival album. The hair-everywhere songwriter with the penchant for proclaiming profanity like prose also lends her thundering lyrics to legends. Bourelly’s reflective vocals can be heard on Usher’s conscious cry “Chains” with Nas, and Lil Wayne’s “Without You”, which showcases a sentimental side of the Hollygrove word-player. Bourelly seems to have a way of bringing the blessed out of the best, her words and ways compelling even the most safely pop of mainstreamers to grind against the grain, swim upstream; to pop off and rob the safe, if only to take back thoughts locked away by the joy thieves now commonly referred to as record labels; or what Bibi casually refers to as “the suits”.
Bibi Bourelly is half BB gun and half B.B. King, shooting the blues and gunning for freedom. An emotional activist fighting for her feelings. Her busy body of work includes the singles “Riot” and “Ego”, released last year, this year’s official debut single “Sally”, and empowered performances at the TIDAL X Concert, SXSW, and NBC’s Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. While we’re teased by the debut album-eluding hashtag #FreeTheReal and killer covers like “Trap N!99as”, we chilled out with Bourelly at the homie Jean-Pierre’s creative team studios in Queens to discuss the past, present, and #FutureShit for her exclusive DOPE MAG cover story.
Written by ToneSwep
Images by Jean Pierre
Creative Dir & MUA by eVe Chen for Melange NYC
Hair by Priscilla Jay
Styling by Justin Xavier
(Tone Swep: TS) You’ve performed at Columbia University, at South by Southwest, and on Fallon’s Tonight Show all in the last week or so. How does it feel to be this damn busy?
(Bibi Bourelly: Bibi) I have an incredible team behind me who is really supportive and believes in me. Incredible fans who request new things and ask for more content. They all want to see me win. I think that is what all this is about, really. Doing something real and doing it well, then people want more of it from you. I love that.
(TS) So far you’ve officially dropped Riot, Ego, and Sally. All have been embraced. Even the song you sang live, “Love Me Fair”, was well received. All this music from all these different artists floating around the world via the internet. Why is yours so refreshing?
(Bibi) I guess that would be for you to answer, right. I don’t know (Laughs!). I know that my intention is to be honest and connect with people. People realize that I really love them. I do this for the world. It’s my duty as an artist to interpret and translate, make the concerns we all share heard by the world. Make our ideas and feelings global. My intent is honesty.
(TS) Your sound, really your total approach to songwriting and singing, is raw and real. You’re honest about your feelings and you share your soul in your songs. How does a young woman, only 21-years-old, have the wisdom in her words to resonate with so many people?
(Bibi) I’ve traveled around the world my entire life. I developed this language that is kind of universal. I would be with people from fuckin’ Berlin, Germany. Then my dad is from Chicago so I would be around those people. Then I’d fly to Maryland and be around my preppy kids from the prep schools, then I’d go to my old school to talk to my homies from the inner city schools. I know people from all walks of life. Beyond that, my talent is emotion. I’m good at interpreting people and understanding emotion.
(TS) In large part the discussion about you starts with the four songs you penned for the ANTI album, but your collaboration with Lil Wayne, “Without You”, is to me some of your best work. You also killed the vocals on “Chains” with Usher and Nas. Seems like you only jump on a track if the song has meaning. Is that an accurate assessment?
(Bibi) They all have meaning to me. I wrote Without You, and sent that to Wayne with me on it. I wrote Chains with Usher. I’ve written ignorant songs too (Laughs!). Really ratchet things. I’m only going to get on something that I really actually feel. It doesn’t all have to have this deep, deep, deep meaning. The anger you hear in Bitch Better Have My Money is how I felt at that time. But I also have the silliest moments, the happiest moments, my shit talking moments. I write and sing what I feel. If I’m not feeling it, I’m not doing it.
(TS) The song you penned for Selena Gomez, “Camouflage”, was like the hidden gem of her gold-certified Revival album. A lyric that stands out is: “Who would have thought you’d feel so cold / and all these memories feel so old.” Why does your voice project so well through other artists? Are you speaking through them, or is it more like speechwriting, where you know what they need to say?
(Bibi) I didn’t know Selena Gomez had cut Camouflage for her album. I didn’t know she wanted the song. Somebody sent it off to Selena and she liked it. I didn’t want to be a dick and take a song off her album. But I never go in and write songs for another artist. I don’t enjoy going in and writing for someone. I don’t think that’s the way to get a good song. I don’t sit in the studio and interpret what they do, writing about whatever is hot or popular or whatever. That doesn’t make it about the song anymore. I write songs for myself, and a lot of the times it’s like maaaannnn! I wanted that song for my album (Laughs!).
(TS) Your father is a lead guitarist who has toured the world. You were writing songs as early as the age of four and toured with him as an elementary school kid. Were you destined to be a writer and vocalist, a global performance artist? It certainly appears that way.
(Bibi) Absolutely. It’s in my blood. It’s what I do. I’ve done it since I was a fucking baby. The same time I was learning to walk and talk, I was learning to write and sing. It’s a way of life. I live it. Me being an artist isn’t a decision I made. I was born to be one. You don’t decide to be good at math. You either get this shit or you don’t get this shit. I found what I was born to do at an early age. Some figure it out later in life. Others never do.
(TS) Your mother passed away when you were very young, Bibi. She headed the art department at Berlin’s house of the world’s cultures. How do you feel your mother lives on through her daughter and her daughter’s artistry?
(Bibi) … (processing)… My mom wanted to be a singer. She encouraged me to sing. It’s one of those things she wanted to do but really didn’t know how. Like I want to dance but don’t really know how (Laughs!)… My mother died when I was six. That was the first time I understood pain on an intense level. Me understanding that emotion, and trying my entire life to understand that emotion, it made me empathize and understand people. It made me feel and understand hopelessness. I suppose that’s how. Every time I open up my mouth to sing I revisit that pain, that emotion, go to that place. Every time is the first time all over again. I will add that making music is my form of prayer. God, whatever God is and I’m not specific on that, but I am connected to God through my music. I pray out loud on stage, I guess.
(TS) The demolition of the Berlin Wall began in the summer of 1990, a few years before you were born. It’s like that barrier had to come down before your arrival – or you would have torn it down anyway. Isn’t that sort of why Bibi Bourelly is here, to tear all the proverbial walls down and encourage people to move and feel freely?
(Bibi) Absolutely. I would do it at any cause. By any means necessary. I won’t be restrained, quiet, timid; none of that. I’m not letting anyone do that shit to me. I care about the people. I really care about the people. I want to help guide us and connect us to be more triller through art, music, culture, clothes. Through fuckin’ words. Whatever I can do with whatever influence I have. However I can use my gifts to better the world and strengthen the people.
(TS) Being of Moroccan and Haitian decent, and hailing from Germany, how does your multi-cultural heritage inform your work? Each of those three places are different, very unique from one another, but each is deep in culture and rich in art.
(Bibi) When you travel the world and see all these different people, you discover that there are people that you love, and people you don’t love. And that’s from all over the world. You experience different races, different genders, different classes of people, but you encounter the same problems. Through this I realized that all people are the same, so I’m able to formulate a language that will connect to all people, apply to all people. I’ve experienced all types of people from all different places and discovered they were all the same person from the same place. People. Humans. Same planet.
(TS) Talk a little about growing up in Berlin. A third of the city is comprised of parks, forests, gardens, lakes, and rivers; beautiful. And it’s also a world city, a high-tech hub.
(Bibi) I was just a city rat. I wasn’t concerned with anything. We would go to the park and sit on the grass and smoke our weed. We would climb up hills to be at the top and smoke our weed. The city was ours. We went up to roof tops and hung out with dozens of other kids, just hanging and talking about life and listening to the best music. When we tagged on the city busses, we did it because we felt like that shit was ours. We were the ones fucking riding them all the time anyways. In Berlin I went to an international school, so all of the students were super close. Like a family of like 500 students. We were all very close. So even when there were fights, there wasn’t like bullying. It was a fight about something, over something. I talked a lot of shit. Same thing as now (Laughs!).
(TS) Why do you think Berlin isn’t discussed more popularly here in the states? Like Dubai, London or Tokyo?
(Bibi) It will be. We’re going to put it on the map. Berlin has incredible art, people, fucking phenomenal fashion, food, and culture. You walk down the street and the city is painted with art. Berlin is beautiful. An amazing city.
(TS) You signed to Def Jam last year, and with all of the momentum from your early releases, these big features, all this song writing, there’s got to be an album coming. Can you discuss your debut project?
(Bibi) My album should be coming soon. But it’s basically like… I’m a crazy person. I have over 400 songs recorded. Ya’ll n!99as cannot stop me from being me. I’m not letting that happen. The shit that I ask for is not unreasonable. The shit I ask for is not unreasonable shit to ask for. I want people to accept people for who they are. You’re not going to pressurize me to be perfect. I’m not a prissy bitch who’s going to be on TV screens nodding in agreement for you. I work for the world. I’m not here to work for you.
(TS) Why is music of such great importance, of such tremendous value to you?
(Bibi) Because music is of such great value to the world. It’s a universal language. You can ignore what I say, like if I’m speaking in words right, but if someone opens up their mouth to sing people listen. Music tells you when to be afraid, to prepare to be frightened by an upcoming scene in a movie. Because they hear it, feel it. When kids don’t listen to their parents or teachers they put their earphones in. They tune them out by listening to music. The language they understand, the language that understands them.
(TS) Besides music, what are you passionate about?
(Bibi) People. People. People! I’m passionate about making a mark on this earth; trying my best to be the best person I possibly can. Connecting people is the best thing to do. I don’t care where you are or who you are, if you don’t think connecting people is the thing to do then you are dated as fuck. You live in 19-fucking-45. You should go ride a horse down the road or some shit (Laughs!). If everyone just did what the fuck they were good at, do you know how DOPE the world would be? The world would be so amazing if everyone could just be themselves, do what they loved, love each other, and do what they loved to do.
(TS) What is the meaning of life in your opinion? A purpose-driven life seems to be the hope and dream of many, yet it’s seemingly grasped by so few.
(Bibi) To be. To exist. And to be open and to be free. You’re not always going to be happy. You’re not going to avoid pain, ever. Ever! You’re not always going to have control. Every decision you make isn’t going to be the right one. So take the pressure off of yourself to be something you’re not. If you are spending your life pretending, you’re unconscious, you’re jailed inside of yourself like a bird that never spreads its wings to fly. For every human fucking being it’s in our nature to fly, to become everything we’ve ever wanted to; do things we’re good at. Somewhere along the line we lost that and became disconnected from our desires. Then it’s ‘why am I unhappy with my life?’ Because you’re not doing what the fuck you want to do! We run society. We run the world. The people. If today we said ‘fuck you’ would now mean ‘I love you’, then that’s what the fuck it would mean. The world belongs to the people. All this shit is ours.
(TS) Lastly, let’s take a look at a few famous quotes and get your interpretive perspective on them. First, painter Salvador Dali said: “I don’t do drugs. I am drugs.”
(Bibi) It could mean several different things, could have many meanings. For one, it could be like, I’m addicting. I’m something people crave. But it could also be destructive.
(TS) Steve Jobs said: “Simple can be harder than complex. You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple”.
(Bibi) Yes, I agree. I think that’s even true with songs, you know. It’s so hard to just say it, or just sing it, or just express it. Even with human instincts, they’re all so basic when you think about it. Jealousy is jealousy. Anger is anger. Hate is hate. Love is love. But the things we want to say, we never say. I miss you. I’m jealous. I love you. I don’t like what just happened. Those types of simple feelings we don’t share. People just want to see things for what they are, but because we have our guards up and we’re scared to do shit, we complicate things, we overthink things. It’s super easy to make something that’s superbly difficult, it’s harder to create something that is perfectly simple.
(TS) On Instagram you posted: “Sometimes knowing how much I could potentially enjoy a person’s company makes me stop talking to them all together. Backwards, I know.”
(Bibi) (Laughs!)… To say it simply, we get scared of love. I do. You do. We all do.