In 2006, a diminutive white MC named Lady Sovereign burst out of the UK housing projects and onto the music scene with her debut album, Public Warning. The rap world had seen white, female, and British before, but never all three in the same package. Lady Sov, the first success story of her kind, was lauded as a rap pioneer by the media. Then came the backlash. Though her rhymes were unquestionably decent, insinuations started in the press that only time would tell whether or not the attention was fully deserved –whether Sov’s talent would still impress once the initial hype had died down.

Two years later, the self-proclaimed “biggest midget in the game” is back with her second album, Jigsaw, and guess what! Her lyrics are more clever, her beats more intricate, and the album, as a whole, is better than her first. Sov is even more impressive without all the British-white-female hype — possibly because it has worn off for Sov herself. She has transitioned from success-hungry, naive teenager into emotionally informed adult. After the massive success of her Def Jam-helmed debut, Sov did what any creative person with a soul would do: she had a bit of a break-down and did some self-examination. She also did what any savvy recording artist would do: she laid low for a while and started her own record label. Jigsaw (which comes out April 7^th on her new label, Midget Records) presents an older, wiser Sov: an artist who has gathered enough life experience to write lyrics that mean something, and a rapper who has gathered enough confidence to actually sing (which she does).

But don’t let all the next-chapter, grown-up talk scare you; Jigsaw is still classic Sov, with genre-defying musical mash-ups and freaky lines, like “You like monkeys, I like monkeys…let’s be mates.” On her sophomore album, Sov is still herself, just a more evolved version, or, as the Lady herself said during our interview last week, still “pretty much epic Sovereign.”

Kelly Wiles: Has dealing with the press gotten easier for you, or is it as big of a pain in the ass as it ever was?

Lady Sovereign: Well, obviously it’s a bit of common knowledge that I don’t like doing press, and this time around people are asking me that question a lot more. I just play with it now. I don’t mind it. I’ve only just gotten back into the swing of things, so everything’s cool now, but I’m sure it’s going to start annoying me soon. [Laughs]

KW: I’m going to see you play at The Echo. The last time I saw you play was at Coachella in 2006. How have things changed in the past two years, in regards to your stage show and performance?

LS: I’ve gone back to basics. It’s just me and my DJ at the moment. Up until this week, I haven’t performed for a year and a half, but it’s pretty much the same: drop a little joke, drop a little song, get wasted, and all that business. It’s pretty much epic Sovereign. [Laughs]

KW: You recently started your own label, Midget Records. Has that changed the way you feel about the music industry? Are you more sympathetic toward the suits?

LS: Kind of, but the whole business side of things is not something I’m exactly 100% clued-up on still. It’s all good to be running my own shit now — definitely less pressure. I would never ever dream of signing to a major again.

KW: One of the surprises on your new album, Jigsaw, is that you actually sing on it. How was that experience? Did it make you want to stick to rapping or maybe sing more on future albums?

LS: The whole singing thing came about the same way that my rapping did really. I just sat there on my own, just singing, and then singing a bit more, and then I sort of nervously recorded something in the studio, and [when I heard it] I was like, “Woah, not that bad.” And I’ll keep doing that; I won’t force myself to sing, but if I write a song that requires it, I’ll just go in and do it. It’s gonna keep changing. I’m sure I’ve got about twelve different singing voices, but I just haven’t found them all yet. I can’t stick to one style. It just keeps changing and I can’t help it.

KW: So it did come as a surprise to you that you just started singing?

LS: Yeah. I was getting compliments from whoever was around at the studio, so that made me feel a whole lot better too.

KW: In the song “So Human,” you sample “Close To Me” by The Cure. Are you a Cure fan, or was it your producer’s idea? How did that come about?

LS: No, it was totally my idea. I love The Cure, and I like a lot of their other tracks as well, but that particular sample always bounced out at me and I thought, “I need to do this.” [“So Human”] has been leaked a bit on YouTube and I’ve been reading a lot of comments that are like, “Oh, you totally ripped it off,” because someone else sampled it as well, and I wrote back on there (I wasn’t writing as though it was me) and said, “Listen, Lady Sovereign used the sample and did her own thing with it and, if anything, the other guy who sampled The Cure jacked their fucking thing.” They were trying to say how I jacked this other guy’s idea, and I didn’t jack [the sample] — I just did my own thing with it and it’s just different.

KW: When you first broke into the scene in the U.S., the press was a bit “Ooh, there’s this crazy thing called ‘grime’ over in England, and she’s part of it!” Would you classify your music as grime? And also, would you say that grime, as a genre, is still around, or has it progressed into something different?

LS: I’m not a grime artist. I never really have been. I’m not really anything, I’m just Sov. People slotted me into that category because, when I first came out, I did a couple of grime songs.

KW: Like the song you did with The Streets?

LS: Yeah, but that wasn’t even really grime. You know what? I don’t think I’ve never really done a grime song. I mean, I’ve messed with it, but I’ve made it my own. I’ve kind of gotten stuck with that label and I always get questions that are like, “Tell me about grime.”

KW: I guess the press needs some label to categorize you.

LS: Eh, yeah. But yeah, grime is still around. It kind of comes and goes; just when you think it’s going to take off, it doesn’t, and just when you think it’s gonna go, it sticks around. I think now people are starting to shy away from it because all the grime artists are evolving, finally.

KW: What’re you listening to right this second?

LS: Oh anything, everything… I couldn’t even name stuff because I’m so compulsive with music. I need to have everything.

KW: You were suspended over Times Square in a crane for the release of your album. What was that like?

LS: Yeah, the whole street got shut down for a half hour, which is pretty fucking epic, and the idea was to put me in a crane, hoist me up in front of my billboard, and have me spray paint “Buy my album” on it. And there were all these fans wearing Lady Sovereign masks, so that was pretty crazy. I flew my mum over and she’d never been to America before, let alone New York, and she sees me hoisted on a fucking crane.

KW: Hopefully you’re not afraid of heights, then.

LS: I guess I am, actually, but I was safely in a crane. I wasn’t going anywhere.

KW: If you could go back in time right now and give one piece of advice to you as a twenty-year-old, what would it be?

LS: I don’t know. It’s kind of a no regrets thing with me. Everything happens for a reason.

Get videos, pictures, free downloads, tour dates, and more on Sov’s MySpace page.