From Kanye To Rita Ora, Sigma Talk An "Insane" 18 Months

Early last year, underground DnB duo Sigma burst into the mainstream consciousness with their cheeky 'Bound 2'-sampling 'Nobody To Love'. Two No.1s, multiple festival appearances and a couple of BRIT Awards nominations later, this week they release their debut full length album Life.

Speaking to Cameron, one half of the 'Changing' producing pair, he told us they're just so excited to have it out there that chart positions really don't matter that much to them:

"I think all of us were concerned about the way the whole music industry is shaping up in terms of if it's an album industry anymore, ‘cause I think unless you’re a big name like Bieber, Adele, One Direction who’ve got huge fan bases and stuff, there’s always that kind of concern that it might not connect as well as you would like. But at the end of the day we always wanted to do an album – we’re not really that concerned about chart positions and stuff, for us it’s just about having a bulk of work out there that we’re really proud of." 

The past year has seen Joe and Cam embark on a headline tour, multiple festival slots (including Glastonbury) and a performance on the BBC Music Awards - so what can die-hard Sigma followers, who've been with them from the very start expect of the LP?

"There’s a few tracks on there which we catered for the clubs and although we’re writing tunes for radio at bit more now and a bit more commercial stuff…we still like to write music that when we do play club gigs we start our sets with [them] and you know stuff like that – so there’s a definitely a few tracks on there that should hopefully keep the heads happy."

Their latest single also features X Factor babe Rita Ora, who last ventured into DnB with DJ Fresh's 'Hot Right Now'. Speaking of getting her on the record Cam revealed: "We didn’t think it was really going to happen because she’s so busy with everything that we thought it might just be one thing too much for her but she loved the track apparently.

"Funnily enough the first vocal we had on the tune was a male vocal, and it sounded amazing. We kind of got ‘demo-itis’ on it – you get so used to hearing something in a certain way that neither of us were really that sure how it would sound but when she came in and she did her first kind of take on it you could tell straight away that she had it and it sounded amazing."

Looking back on their road to Life's release Cam recalled: "There’s been a lot of highlights, we’ve been so blessed with so much stuff this year – we did the BAFTAs, we got nominated for BRIT awards we had the two No.1s which was just insane. Performing at Glastonbury with Paloma was insane. I wouldn’t really say there’s been one highlight as such, there’s just been a lot of really good experiences that will stay with us forever."

But of all the highlights, it's still the breakthrough moment with 'Nobody To Love' that still seems too surreal to be true...

"I think the most surreal moment was the first No.1 because we didn’t even know if we were actually gonna release it, even up to the last week of us doing the campaign for it. Obviously we’d replayed everything and done it legitimately and stuff [but] we just thought Kanye West was suddenly going to send his lawyers around saying ‘you’re ruining my artist integrity’ or something like that you know, and we just thought we were gonna have to pull it.

"I think I’d gone to do a gig somewhere in America but because we had the chart show on the Sunday, I had to do the gig literally go back from the venue to the airport and fly straight back home and I remember the whole experience thinking ‘have I just gone to America and back in 12 hours?', then woke up the next morning and got the sales figures and then we had a No.1. It was all a bit ‘what is this weird dream I’m suddenly gonna wake up from?' and kind a of pinch myself [moment] but that was definitely the most surreal moment so far."

We're sure there'll be more to come!

Sigma's debut LP Life is out now.

By Michael Pell