The BRIGGS tale; everyone’s talking about it. Indigenous kid from regional Australia (Victoria), as funny as he is deep, his music powered by a rapid-fire, melodic, direct approach. Growing up in the small country town of Shepparton, gave him the power to see life from a different angle – the BRIGGS angle.
BRIGGS dropped Homemade Bombs in 2009, his groundbreaking self released debut EP, which marked the arrival of a powerful and unique voice on the scene. He was quickly embraced by local regulars; Adelaide’s Funkoars and Perth’s Drapht, then the Hilltop Hoods gave him his first major injection into the industry – the opening slot on their sold-out national tour.
The Hoods were so impressed by his performance they took him along on their 2009 European tour, and eventually offered him a home at their fledgling label, Golden Era Records.
All this paved the way for the release of his debut album, THE BLACKLIST. While Homemade Bombs gave us a taste of what he can do, THE BLACKLIST was nothing short of brilliance. A genuinely unique symphony of words, thoughts and sounds.
Briggs toured tirelessly around the country with Hilltop Hoods, solo and supporting international tours with the likes of Ice Cube, Yelawolf, DOOM, Ghostface Killah and Pharoahe Monch. BRIGGS then had a kid and took time off to reflect. In 2013 he went back to writing and recording. The result was SHEPLIFE.
SHEPLIFE is the culmination of generations of observations, experiences and stories. The aggression is there but it’s tempered with a thoughtfulness that is always the separator between the good and great artists. As he said himself: “If The Blacklist was the punch in the face, SHEPLIFE is why I punched you in the face.”
With appearances from Ill Bill, Joyride, Sietta and Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu SHEPLIFE is the album by which Briggs will compared to for his whole career and he likes that, the good ones always thrive on pressure. The album won the 2015 National Indigenous Music Awards Album of the Year and the Bad Apples film clip, starring his closest family and friends took the gong for Film Clip of the Year. Only 12 months before, BRIGGS was named the NIMAs New Talent of the Year.
In 2015, BRIGGS again collaborated with Gurrumul and Dewayne Everettsmith to release ‘The Children Came Back’, an awe-inspiring, upbeat interpretation of the Archie Roach classic ‘Took the Children Away’. Originally created for triple j’s Like A Version in 2014, the track celebrates Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander achievement, culture and progression as seen through BRIGGS’s eyes.
Musically and personally, BRIGGS now recognizes that his legacy from this point onwards is about black excellence, supporting younger artists to achieve all the successes he has and wants to achieve. He has founded Bad Apples Music, Australia’s first all Indigenous national record label to create sustainable and meaningful pathways for emerging Indigenous artists – starting with young MC’s Philly, Nooky and Birdz. Bad Apples will not only out class rivals, it will use hip-hop as its founders intended; to create social change.
In 2015, the tale of BRIGGS took a turn onto the big screen. His razor sharp wit and magnetic charm has generated a regular seat at the writer’s table of hit ABC show’s ‘Black Comedy’. Not only writing for the screen, BRIGGS has also been in front of the camera as a major supporting role in upcoming series ‘Cleverman’, due to screen in 2016.
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