One of pop’s most sought-after artists, de Casier has written for K-pop stars and remixed Dua Lipa, but hid behind her bolshie alter ego Bianka for her own music. Now she’s finally found the confidence to drop the act
Erika de Casier is uncomfortable. She is sitting cross-legged on the floor of what looks like a building site, cables hanging above her head, an unopened box to her right, and what appears to be an upturned sofa to her left. “Excuse the mess,” she says, adjusting her laptop on the bare wooden floorboards of her newish home in Copenhagen as we video call at the end of 2023. “I moved in a year ago but I haven’t really been home, so now I’m renovating it all. I’ve been living in a suitcase,” she sighs.
De Casier spent most of last year either touring her Dua Lipa-approved suite of 1990s and 00s-inspired R&B opuses, writing songs for others, or working on her forthcoming third album, Still, which features input from Blood Orange and Shygirl. It’s the completion of the album that means she is not just physically in limbo, but mentally, too. “I’ve been a mess lately, actually,” she says. “Before I release anything I get cold feet about releasing it. When you start making music you have this feeling of: ‘Oh, this is great, and it’s fresh,’ and then after a while you get critical about everything. So I’m in that stage.”