Gigi Lamayne U-turns back to hip-hop with new album

When Gigi Lamayne announced she was cutting ties with hip-hop late last year she caused a stir with some people wondering what brought on the decision.

Fast forward to now and Gigi Lamayne has a new hip-hop album she has just wrapped up, titled Set In Stone.

With six albums under he belt, her seventh is one she is most proud of. If you are religious at all seven represents completeness or fullness and that's what the rapper feels about her project.

Speaking to TshisaLIVE, Gigi was excited at the prospects of people hearing her dabble in other genres.

“I've got some amazing features on it, so I'm really excited about it, I know people have been anticipating hearing Gigi. So much has happened in my life and I'm excited about it. We've been previewing this stuff online and people have been going crazy over it.”

The rapper said she abandoned her plan to quit hip-hop.

“I did a U-turn on that because I realised that people fell in love with me because of hip-hop. Because I could battle and I knew all these hip-hop elements. I had to understand myself and at the end of the day I am a pioneer of something and not all is going to be easy. Even my ideas about leaving hip-hop was to do with how difficult it was to sit at the table with the boys.”

In the album she featured  the likes of Makhadzi, Busiswa, Aux Cable, Anzo, Vugar and 031 Choppa

“I fell in love with dance music I don't even wanna lie, Fufa with King Monada was one of the biggest songs in my career, and its something I'm not willing to give up. Instead of changing my name, then doing dance, I'm going to remain Gigi Lamayne, but people know there'll always be that wild card. I can do hip-hop on the one hand and on another I can do amazing collaborations with amazing artists.”

Gigi's musical influences are from American pop icons Janet Jackson, Beyoncé, the late trailblazer Brenda Fassie and with this new album she said she was acknowledging who she is and it was a full-circle moment for her. 

“This new album is telling you I'm the baddest female rapper in the continent, that's all this project is, you can call it gloating or boasting or whatever, but take a listen and decide for yourself. I write my own music, you'll see I've grown a lot, there's a lot of singing and rapping “

The rapper made headlines last year when she was in a public virtual spat and everything that unfolded after that she said helped create Set in Stone.

“I had to go through all those different things while I was creating this album to be able to embody and encompass everything that I was going though at the time. So everything from the little hype, the slay queen was trying to get from me to whatever else you read, it could [be] my time at Temptation Island, and the island was a humbling experience. All these different things were challenges I was going through. With the album wrapped up, I can proudly say I have conquered, I have overcome and knowing one thing, life is so short, knowing one day I'm going to die, I want people to know me as the girl who got up every time she was hit.”