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Sienna Spiro is headstrong. That much is evident from the title of her breakthrough hit, “Die on This Hill,” a dramatic piano-and-string ballad that gave the British singer-songwriter her first Billboard Hot 100 entry in December. She stumbled upon its chords while attempting to learn Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody,” and lyrics about an unhappy, one-sided relationship soon followed. But, as she says over Zoom in her signature 1960s glam, her tenacity is what made the song such a standout.
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Spiro, 20, was eager to add an upbeat song to a catalog of slower tracks, she recalls with a raspy laugh, lounging on the bed in her family home in London. “It was [originally] in another key, and it was fast, it had trumpets. Then it was a stripped-back, Lauryn Hill kind of thing. Then it was a Silk Sonic kind of thing. It was a Teddy Pendergrass thing at one point.”
But her co-producers and co-writers, Omer Fedi (The Kid LAROI, SZA, Lil Nas X) and Michael Pollack (Justin Bieber, Miley Cyrus, Maroon 5), ultimately helped convince her not to push the tempo of “Die on This Hill” – and to make it a Sienna Spiro kind of thing. Despite thinking it “sounds sh-t” at first, her resistance shaped the song’s core. “I [had] so much resentment and anger, which honestly kind of helped the performance … And then I remember we just sat there, and we listened, and we all were quiet.”
“It’s a song about being stubborn and caring, which I don’t think is spoken about too much,” she continues. The track reached new highs of No. 20 and No. 11 on the Jan. 31-dated Hot 100 and Billboard Global 200, respectively. “There’s been this really big wave of nonchalance, of it being really cool to not care. I think a lot of people aren’t like that.” Her fans agree: The audio clip of the track’s most climactic part — a moment when Spiro’s voice cracks as she wails, “I wish something mattered to you” — has been used in over 1 million TikTok videos just a few months out from its release.
After that day in the studio, even Spiro had to admit that the end product was something special, regardless of how much it resembled the rest of her moody, cinematic catalogue (which includes 2024 debut single “Need Me” and 2025 EP Sink Now, Swim Later). She says she’s carried that lesson of abiding by what the music calls for into how she’s approached crafting her next project, whether that’s another EP or her debut album. “I don’t know what I’m working on yet,” she admits. “It’s a concept I’ve been thinking about for the past two years, but I’m very inspired right now and just putting the pieces together.”
For now, she and her team are focused on pushing “Die on This Hill” as far as it can go. In January, she released its black-and-white music video in which she slow-dances with a mannequin that represents the song’s emotionally unavailable subject. Two weeks prior, she had performed the hit on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon with a live orchestra that earned a standing ovation and left Fallon nearly speechless, which isn’t out of the ordinary when Spiro sings.
Even when her manager, Miriam Maslin, first met Spiro, she recalls being struck by three qualities in particular. “She was super driven, hardworking” — and of course — “pretty stubborn. I gravitate toward people that have an opinion on something. She’s one of the most passionate people I know … we share the same motivation of having long-term success as opposed to short-term hype.”
Maslin discovered Spiro four years ago on TikTok thanks to her cover of FINNEAS’ “Break My Heart Again.” At the time, Spiro had just transferred to East London Arts and Music after being bullied at her past school, in part she says, because of her fierce love of making music. And despite having no experience in the industry, Maslin – who’d previously founded modeling agency Revolt at 18 before being hired by Method Music as a creative consultant – knew she had to work with Spiro. Maslin says Spiro only had “like 1,000 followers, if that” on TikTok at the time but even then numerous managers were courting her.
In 2025, Spiro signed a label deal with Capitol Records and a publishing deal with Sony Music. Throughout the year, she and Maslin booked strategic performances to showcase her talent, including a guest appearance at Sam Smith’s New York concert in October to duet on “Lay Me Down” and a cover of Miley Cyrus’ “The Climb” for Gap’s 2025 holiday campaign.
And though Spiro admits that she was initially irritated at having to slow down “Die on This Hill” the day she recorded its final version, she loves how it feels to perform now. The hit is sure to be the centerpiece of her upcoming Visitor Tour, a sold-out 16-date trek through North America and Europe starting in March. “It’s really hard to sing [live]. But it feels great … like a rage room for the soul.”
A version of this article originally appeared in the Feb. 7, 2026 issue of Billboard.