For Artists Like Sombr and Gigi Perez, Self-Producing Is ‘An Experiment and an Adventure’

Gigi Perez will never forget the first self-produced song that she wanted to share with the world. “Please Be Rude,” which she finished last year, was far from her first bedroom demo, but the strummed, slightly lilting meditation on intimate relationship moments felt different to Perez — “like I had cracked the code on my taste,” as she puts it.

In just five short years, the New Jersey-born, Florida-raised singer-songwriter had already experienced the highs and lows of the music industry: A viral moment in early 2021, when the grief-stricken “Celene,” about her older sister who had died the year before, landed Perez an Interscope Records deal. Yet her 2023 debut EP arrived to little fanfare, and Interscope released her from her deal later that year. When Perez sent “Please Be Rude” to her friends for feedback in 2024, she knew they were worried about her: “They hoped that I would be OK, and rightfully so,” the 25-year-old says.

While at Interscope, Perez worked with outside producers, but she felt disconnected from her songs during the studio sessions; newly independent, however, she decided to once again stay hands-on, setting up her roommate’s TV as a makeshift monitor, learning production tips from YouTube and Reddit and ultimately reigniting her creative spark. “It became my motivation every single day to get up and to get on Ableton,” she says. “And I found this obsession that I hadn’t felt since I started writing music.”

Perez credits that experience with solidifying her sonic identity — and it yielded a commercial breakthrough. After self-releasing “Please Be Rude” in May 2024, “Sailor Song,” an ode to queer longing that Perez had teased on TikTok, followed in July and became a top 40 pop smash, peaking at No. 22 and spending 39 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100. “Sailor Song” landed Perez a new label deal with Island Records and appeared on her debut album, At the Beach, in Every Life, which Island released in April; Perez is a credited producer on all 12 tracks and produced three songs, including “Please Be Rude,” by herself.

At a time when organic TikTok hits remain a fast track to major-label clout, countless unknown artists with access to production software and how-to videos are now using Perez’s blueprint. While plenty of pop acts discovered on TikTok are paired with professional producers once they join label rosters, others have stuck with the DIY approach that got them that far — and have scored crossover hits with self-made singles. Meanwhile, pop superstars from Taylor Swift to Gracie Abrams to Charli xcx have increasingly been credited as co-producers on their songs, scoring hits with their fingerprints on every part of their track.

“It’s authentic, straight from me,” says sombr, the 20-year-old alt-pop dynamo whose self-produced singles “Back to Friends” and “Undressed” have been concurrent top 40 Hot 100 hits for multiple months this year. Born Shane Boose, sombr was introduced to GarageBand at the end of elementary school, and figuring out how to layer tracks and harmonies quickly dominated his free time. As he moved on to YouTube tutorials and Logic Pro X in middle school and started thinking about music as a professional path in high school, he says he never considered relying upon another producer for his work.

“My songs will never be chasing something or come from a ‘hit-making factory,’ ” sombr adds. “It’s just me in my room, making stuff that I want to hear and based off what I feel. And that’s why it works in my mind.”

For his upcoming Warner Records debut album, sombr says he will write and produce each song at home, finish “50 to 70%” of the track and then bring them to Sound City Studios in Los Angeles for “finishing touches” with his co-producer, Tony Berg. For sombr, beginning a production in a bedroom and then taking it to a professional studio provides an expanded tool kit to accentuate his original idea. “When I first got into a real studio, I suddenly had access to so many different instruments, microphones, pedals,” sombr says. “I learned a lot about the more traditional way of recording music, and my whole world opened up.”

For artists to understand how to use that wider palette, it helps to have the right professional support, as sombr does with Berg. During her Interscope days, Perez says she felt compelled to help produce her songs but didn’t yet have the studio know-how to assist her collaborators. For At the Beach, in Every Life, however, she worked with two main co-producers, Noah Weinman (aka indie-rock artist Runnner) and Aidan Hobbs, as well as a mixer, Matt Emonson, who all encouraged her to ask questions in the studio and helped draw out her vision for the album.

“I’m really grateful that I have a team that’s been able to teach me — that builds your confidence,” Perez says. “I could be vulnerable enough to be like, ‘I don’t know what that is.’ ”

Of course, artificial intelligence is fast becoming a trusted studio collaborator, too. As modern music-making increasingly integrates AI, more artists will turn to tools that streamline their solo productions — from stem separators and vocal changers that can tweak existing tracks to sample creators and full-song generators that replicate the entire creative process.

Perez says she’s open to learning more about the assistive ways in which AI can be used, but she’s skeptical that production or songwriting can be one of them. “We already struggle with connection,” she says, “and I think the deeper that technology inserts itself into a part of human existence, it’s going to be harder and harder for us to connect to each other.”

“I know that I am considered to be a young person, but I think I am old-fashioned in the way I like to make music,” sombr says. “I like real instruments, real voices and a song with a bridge. I agonize over lyrics. I really have no interest in AI and how it relates to music.”

And even if shrugging off AI tools makes a production process more painstaking, Perez says the journey is just as important as the finished product. She looks back on her time between major labels and as a production novice as essential to her becoming the artist she is today. “It was an experiment and an adventure,” she says. “I feel grateful that I could commit to waking up every day and seeing it through.”

This story appears in the Aug. 16, 2025, issue of Billboard.