Interview: Leah Flanagan

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: Scenestr, October 2020

With the release of her sophomore album, 'Colour By Number', Australian songwriter Leah Flanagan has delivered some of her most poignant and beautiful work yet. The record sees the NT artist present observations on her life's journey as a biracial Australian with artful finesse, capped off with gorgeous production by Sarah Belkner.

It is material that Flanagan is open in acknowledging has been harder to discuss in the past, yet in working with Belkner, she has found a new sense of pride and courage within the words she has written.

"A lot of these songs had been written five years ago," Flanagan explains.

"The songs that came together [on the album] were the songs Sarah picked, she's amazing. I hadn't developed them or anything; they were sitting in the backlog of songs I had half-written. It has been the most collaborative record I've ever made."
In creating 'Colour By Number', Flanagan and Belkner worked on the record out of Free Energy Device Studios in Sydney, examining and exploring each facet of the lyrics and arrangement.
The final result is a textured and nuanced album that covers wide-ranging experiences, both personal and creative.

For Flanagan, 'Colour By Number' is an album that paints the truest representation of herself as an artist, while also presenting an honest and candid narrative of the challenges and scrutinisation she has experienced when her cultural upbringing became a burden more than a proud part of her work.

"I remember talking about my identity early on," she says. "You don't think about it like it's a marketing tool; the music side of things and the industry turns into one. You find yourself exposed in ways that you don't want to be exposed."

The exploitative nature of the industry that Flanagan experienced in those crucial, formative stages of her career stopped her from wanting to use the art to tell her personal story in-depth. It became an element of her life that would simply remain something she would continue to write about, but not perform publicly.

"I was still writing the songs but I was like, 'I'm just going to write love songs. I don't want to talk about living in two worlds. I don't want to talk about Aboriginal issues, I just want to be a person who creates music.'

"I experienced early on, this horrible side of the music industry that was just so. . . they wanted to exploit it for their own gain, without actually knowing anything about me or the way I grew up, being biracial.

"The care wasn't there. It damaged me for a long time. I didn't want to talk about that stuff."

But as Flanagan explains, working with Belkner helped her overcome this personal hurdle; all it took was Sarah taking the time and consideration to actually her about her experiences, on a human level.

"I've known Sarah for years and I wanted to make something beautiful, and I knew how wonderful she was at arranging strings and melodies.

"There was a lot of support in the room. She actually asked me what the songs were about. She was like, 'How come you don't really sing these songs? I had no idea you felt that way about certain situations.'"

'Colour By Number', out now, is the sort of album that has been crafted for an immersive listen. To get the most from it, brew up some tea and allot the appropriate amount of time to listen, uninterrupted.

"I love the art form of the 'full album'," Flanagan says.

"All the kids who grew up with the world of streaming and digital music, I guess if they hadn't grown up listening to records from start to finish, it's a new way of listening for them.

"I went into this going, 'I know this is going to be the opening number. I know this is going to be the bookend.' I knew where the bookends were straight away; that's how we composed it."

Now the album is released for public consumption, how does Flanagan feel about having a record listeners can experience – one that exposes her story, but in the way that is honest and true?

"We didn't really think about the outside world," she says.
"The process was like, 'What's going to do the song and story of these songs justice?'.

"It was a really gentle, lovely process. I hope that's reflected in the music too. They're gentle songs, a lot of them are quite delicate; but I'd like to think that there's depth to them, musically and sonically."

Interview: Polaris

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: TONEDEAF, FEBRUARY 2020

Speaking with Polaris drummer Daniel Furnari, it’s evident that the band knows they’re on the precipice of something big. The lead up to the release of their sophomore record The Death Of Me this week has been marked by glowing advance reviews and an Australian tour that has seen multiple dates (including one at Sydney’s Enmore) sell out.

In the two years that have passed since the release of their ARIA-nominated debut, The Mortal Coil, Polaris have positioned themselves as one of Australia’s next metalcore giants, no longer waiting in the wings but now firmly on a global stage.

“You’re always conscious of following up a previous release,” Furnari admits. “It’s almost impossible to push out of your mind.”

“The security we feel is that we know we wouldn’t put something out if it didn’t feel up to the standard that we wanted to create. We’re super critical of everything we do. There’s a lot of attention to detail as a band; it’s not just one person writing it. It’s very collaborative. Everyone gets to weigh in if they don’t think something’s up to standard. By the time it does get to that finished place, we’re pretty much of the mindset that we’ve done something good and something we can be proud of.”

The creation of The Death Of Me wasn’t a smooth process, by any means. Difficulties and creative blocks intruded on some songs’ completion, however as Furnari explains, it all played into the final result: a precise and uncompromising album of material that showcases the depth and development of the band.

Having become a favourite on the Australian touring circuit, and a formidable set of newcomers to the international market, Polaris have not had the luxury to rest on any laurels. Diving into their new album though, it’s clear that their hardworking ethic as performers and writers has delivered in spades.

“The song ‘Pray For Rain’, which is the first song on the album, is a song that was in the works for such a long time.” Furnari remembers.

“Versions of that song were being created but they just weren’t up to the standard that we wanted. The song went through so many iterations that we just weren’t happy with, but we had a couple of ideas there. The song was a quandary, to say the least.”

“Sometimes you get these records where have an intro track, but it doesn’t feel like a fully fledged song. That’s what we wanted to avoid, we wanted something fully realised and something that takes you somewhere. It just took us so long to achieve that. We had to put it [the album] aside and go to Europe and do a summer run, then come back and work out when and how we were going to finish it. somewhere during that break, that song got brought up on the tour. There was a moment there, when we got closer to a finished structure, there were a couple of lightbulb moments. More lyrics were coming together and we finally realised that not only was the song going to work, it was actually going to be released as an actual song we were proud of.”

Pushing creative pressures aside, Furnari speaks of the new Polaris album with excitement. The record is a new chapter for the band as with an Australian tour about to take them nationwide again, the opportunity for them to flex this new music in a live capacity has never been bigger.

“Lyrically, what we’re talking about on the record is very much a snapshot of where we’re at in our lives and where we’re at mentally. What we’ve gone through over the last couple of years to get to this point.” he says.

“We’re just trying to become a better version of our band with every record and learn from our songwriting in the past, to write better songs. Learn from what we play live and what we want to play live, how that will translate when we actually do go in for a show.”

In the eyes of many, Polaris are becoming that band. New flag-bearers for Australian metalcore, theirs is a sound rooted in dynamism and a fleshed out love for various sounds that have come before.

“Australian metalcore, in my opinion, is quite rich and varied when you get down to it.” Furnari says.

“Some people think there’s an Australian sound, which there may be. Maybe for some people, we encapsulate that. I don’t know if we do, because I think it’s such a broad and colourful thing that we have here, it’s hard to sum up.”

“We draw a lot from some of the more modern iterations of the genre and from bands from our own scene like Northlane, bands who have been impactful on Australian metalcore.” he expands.

“At the same time, there’s a big influence from bands like Architects and Parkway Drive, who have been a part of what we’ve loved about the genre since the very beginning.”

While bands like Architects, Parkway Drive, Northlane and Knocked Loose are names Furnari nods to favourably when it comes to the advancement of metalcore in general, his focus on expanding the sound of Polaris with his bandmates is looking broader.

“When you’re constantly surrounded by heavy music, it’s something you can’t always listen to all the time in your free time.” he says, thinking about what music inspires him.

“When you’re touring with metal bands and playing in a metal band, a lot of the time the stuff we go to in our own listening time, is stuff that is a little bit out of our range. Just to keep things interesting and to keep our brains a break.”

“More and more in the last couple of years I’ve been testing it out in writing and it’s made things more exciting. We’re just trying to incorporate everything we love into this band, so that we can be our own favourite band.”

Interview: RÜFÜS DU SOL

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: TONEDEAF, MARCH 2020

Joshua Tree, California. The famed desert is now also an important aspect of the RÜFÜS DU SOL story.

Bringing their atmospheric and immersive music to this space has made for a unique live experience – one which the band has cultivated into a live album and film for fans.

Pulling off an event like this may seem huge to some but for RÜFÜS DU SOL, their journey has always been leading them here. Since the release of their debut record Atlas in 2013, the Sydney trio have been building their body of work consistently and matching that energy live.

Their stage production has become more intricate and expansive, with the music itself being given the space to breathe and develop new elements further on from their original recorded form.

“It feels really exciting,” drummer James Hunt tells us.

“it felt like a really natural evolution for us considering most of our output has been via albums, via singles, but we’ve always had a respect for different mediums of content that other acts do try and make music.”

“One thing that has been the most connecting part of what we do, is our live shows. We realised that there wasn’t anything on the internet or out there in the world that really encapsulated what the experience was like. We’ve filmed a song here and there and put it on YouTube, but it definitely felt like the next step to try and showcase what that experience can be in a creative way as well.”

It has been a big year for the now twice Grammy-nominated group. With the release of their latest album Solace, RÜFÜS DU SOL have elevated themselves once again. Now mainstays on the international touring circuit, one would think that the rate at which the band has progressed and is progressing, has become part and parcel of the job.

For James, the significance of the last year and a half of releasing music and road life has definitely brought the band closer together. Together, they’re album to weather this crazy storm of album-cycle madness more defined than ever before.

“Over the last 10 years, we’ve gotten better at gelling together creatively, and as people.” he explains.

“Learning about people’s boundaries and sense of space. Not being too aggressive with each other when we know someone’s in a weird spot. Getting to know each other as people has inherently helped the writing process become more streamlined. It feels like this year feels like a new era for us, there’s a bunch of life experiences that we’ve all been having.”

“We’re all in a similar spot in embracing and re-emphasising mental health, physical health and self-care. There were times where that was definitely by the wayside but now we’re unified in attacking what we love to do in a healthy way and being on the top of our game. It’s a really exciting time for us, not just in terms of creating the music but as people and as friends.”

Delving into the how Solace has resonated with fans, James explains how this particular RÜFÜS DU SOL album has landed with him. As a creative, it can be hard to pull your head out of that creative bubble to appreciate the final product objectively, however he finds strong relevance in the music now more than at the time of writing.

“It’s almost begun to land more heavily with me, personally.” he says.

“Some of the things have become more apparent to me now, than when we were writing it. [We were] at the whim of this chaotic rollercoaster that we seem to be on, which is a really good rollercoaster, but it was chaotic – I think that was evident when were writing the record. It’s more relevant to me right now and so I’m connecting more to the record now in hindsight. It’s funny, connecting with your own music and different points in time. It’s very dynamic. It’s a strange perception of experience.”

RÜFÜS DU SOL: Live From Joshua Tree is out now (the full film is now on YouTube, too). Looking ahead to the rest of 2020, James is excited for the direction the band is headed in. Having grown into a major Australian success story in international markets that require a hard graft to break, RÜFÜS DU SOL have landed in the same lane as the Flume’s and the Tame Impala’s, in terms of respect and repute.

“We started touring internationally properly in 2014, so that’s six years ago now.” James says.

“Even at that point, there was this chatter about Flume, about Tame Impala. These international acts of this decade having a popularity and importance. Over that time, I feel like that interest in this weird thing bubbling in Australia, now I feel like it’s a really strong contender.”

“Just in dialogue I hear people talking to me about how many of their favourite acts are from Australia right now. I’m not sure why that is, I’m not sure if it’s a willingness to experiment or that Australia is a melting pot of a lot of different genres, or the fact that it’s own little cauldron bubbling in this isolated space. But it definitely feels that there’s a lot more respect and more intrigue towards whatever is happening in Australia. I feel really proud of that and stoked to be a part of that.”

Interview: The 1975

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: BEAT MAGAZINE, JANUARY 2020

The 1975 aren’t in the business of making records to be digested and thrown away with ease. 

Come April 2020, their new album - Notes On A Conditional Form - will be released. An album that has already spawned three distinctive tracks (‘People’, ‘Frail State of Mind’ and the Greta Thunberg-featuring ‘The 1975’), Notes is not simply Album Number Four for the British group. It’s a sign of the band’s continuous strive for completing a chapter of their career that is more flourished and intriguing than what came before.

“It’s not an environmental record,” Matty Healy is quick to assert of The 1975’s next venture.

“I’ve led with the Greta song into ‘People’, so now a lot of people are like, “Oh, it’s the environmental record”, but it’s not. A Brief Enquiry… had the title of Into Online Relationships [and] that set the tone. It’s a record about being a person: fear, love, the human experience. There’s a cloak of that idea and this [album] has the same thing. The main thing I’m scared of on this record is bigger environmental concerns, but it’s not an environmental record.”

When it comes to The 1975’s presence in a music culture far different from the one they entered in 2002, Healy is open about how they’ve weathered a cultural storm of streaming and chart-data led success.

“The artists whose single streams are in the billions, people don’t buy their albums, necessarily.” he says. Using pop music as an example, Healy describes his perception of the singles vs albums debate. 

“Ellie Goulding [for example],” he says. “Not slagging her off, just using her pop style; people will listen to her music at the gym and they will listen to it on playlists. They’ll put the ‘Pop’ playlist on and it will get out there. When it comes to her putting out a record, which is someone saying, “Will you invest in my lifestyle?” or, “Do you want to invest in me, as an idea?”...I have a lot of “Yes, I want to invest in you as an idea,” and less, “I’ll pop this on when I’m doing whatever. We don’t have a [really] transient audience like that.”

“I’ve said this before, but the Drakes of the world, they’re professionals at keeping people’s attention for three minutes.” Healy adds. 

“They can do that again and again. I’m not that good at that. A single will happen accidentally throughout the myriad of writing songs. The way that we express ourselves is like longform. I can do it and I do it occasionally, I’d love it if we can make it work where I get a big idea down in three minutes. We’ve always been an albums band.”

Reflecting on almost two decades of The 1975, Healy is frank about how he has matured as a musician and what looking down the barrel of a new decade is like for him. In short: it’s exciting.

“When I was a teenager, culture and everything said, “To be an alternative artist, you get a deal with a small indie and that’s how you do it.”” he explains. 

“By the time I’d put out my first record, I was already...I didn’t have people from record labels [calling], I didn’t have any of that, there was already a freedom to it. I suppose I am in a privileged position, but the most privileged thing is that I created that privileged position. I can kind of be proud of it.” 

“We’ve proven that, with luck and with the zeitgeist, and with it being the right time, you can do what you want. The coolest thing about The 1975 is that this past 10 years has been the dissolvement of genre, especially with us. I see artists like Billie Eilish, these artists who are fearless now. I love that. We’ve definitely been part of that new sense of freedom with young kids.”

The first time I interviewed Healy, we were both in our early 20’s. The band’s profile was growing rapidly off the back of their debut EP. The second time we crossed paths, The 1975 was well and truly settled into their role as a breath of fresh air coming out of the UK indie scene, transitioning with ease into mainstream pop success. 

“The culture has changed quite a lot.” he says.

“A lot of people who come from indie or punk grow in their sense of wanting to do something, but they don’t actually have the ability to do it. I think because of our ability as producers and musicians, we can actually challenge ourselves and do things that are a bit more viscerally powerful.” 

Now both eyeing up our next decade in an industry that has changed so significantly for each of us, on stage and behind the scenes, Healy is reflective on his personal approach to the craft and consuming of music as a fan. 

“The whole thing is about not being bored.” he laughs. “It’s not about striving to be bold, it’s about avoiding being bored. If you’ve been in a band with your best friends for 17 years, doing anything for too long is boring. Making one type of music is boring. That’s been really reflective of the way the culture has been. I think that we’ve been constantly balancing back and forward between people just getting that every time we make a record.”

“I’ve had to learn that that sense of freedom I get when something excites me, just chase that. Chase it, that’s the only thing I can really do.”

Interview: Sampa The Great

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: THE BIG ISSUE, SEPTEMBER 2019

Sampa The Great. A name that already indicates confidence and flair. 

For the Zambia-born, Botswana-raised emcee, poet and songwriter, her journey towards fulfilment and greatness has been an ongoing one. Calling Australia home since 2014, Sampa’s presence on the Australian music scene began with the release of The Great Mixtape in 2015; an introduction of a fresh and exciting voice out of Sydney that would change the hip-hop landscape in Australia indomitably.

Since relocating to Melbourne, Sampa has become a significant voice to be reckoned with in the thriving musical community that fuses hip-hop, funk, jazz and soul with ease. Her acclaimed mixtape, Birds and The Bee9, experimented sonically, while thematically, Sampa Tembo’s exploration of what, creatively, formed her own identity was laid bare on record.

As a live performer, Sampa The Great has become a favourite on the Australian scene while international love has also come her way. Supporting the likes of Lauryn Hill and Kendrick Lamar, while also growing her own headline presence impressively, Sampa’s talent has long been seen as a powder-keg ready to detonate. 

She definitely feels the love, too. “I can’t wait for the touring that’s about to come because we’re playing all the songs, most of the songs on the album are going to be played live. Everyone can feel it, they can feel the difference. They can feel the growth. It’s something else. The whole band can feel it as well.”

With a massive run of Australian touring on the near horizon, including a stop at this year’s Lost Lands Festival, Sampa The Great is currently preparing to introduce fans and newcomers alike to the sounds of her new album, The Return. If the Australian Music Prize-winning Birds and The Bee9 was an introduction, The Return is a powerful, confident statement of intent.  

“We were breaking down in the sessions,” Sampa remembers. “On that level, already I was like, ‘This is way different’. Not hella different to the other sessions, especially BB9, where you’re super vulnerable, you’re talking about issues that affect us, but this one was really the naked truth. It is what it was. Now we’re not scared to say anything; this is where we are.”

Dropping the first hints of the return in singles ‘Final Form’ and ‘OMG’, Sampa The Great unleashed a beast of musicality that proved to be an exciting smack to wake listeners up. A rallying sense of strength permeated both singles as well as the music videos, filmed on Sampa’s latest trip back to Africa. Re-engaging with her homeland in Zambia, bringing her music home for the first time, was a daunting experience.

“We were all excited, obviously.” she remembers. “We were preparing the venue and I meet one of Zambia’s finest rappers - Chef 187 - and we’re just talking about how he used to spend the first half of his career wishing he was doing what I’m doing and I spent the first half of my career wishing I was doing what he’s doing. There was that realisation. I could with all my mind, wish that my career started somewhere else, but there are many people wishing the opposite.”

Imposter syndrome, an emotional and mental struggle many can encounter, is something Sampa is open about experiencing. Even now, as her star is rising in Australia and international attention is turning her way, that desire for that connection and platform back home is something that has remained, even in a small way.”

“It’s still a thing.” she says. “There’s always going to be a sense of imposter syndrome. I experienced a small, minor sense of displacement whereas you know, some of my friends can’t go home to South Sudan. That made me explore what is ‘home’ to me and all these different answers came out in this album, with the conclusion that home is also yourself. The body. Your soul has made a place in this body which is your home. How do we live with that, how do we deal with that without the culture that we’re from? How do we deal with this one, first of all?”

“As much as I still feel imposter syndrome, I am learning things and Australia has provided a lot of opportunities and avenues that I can bring home and help people back home with.”

Navigating themes of self-satisfaction, fully embracing one’s identity and exploring a connection to a culture one finds themself not living in day in, day out, The Return is equal parts love letter to Sampa’s heritage as it is a touchstone of the artist she is today - an artist stood at the doorstep of global influences, being welcomed in with open arms.

“With The Return, it’s no longer a question of finding myself and who I was,” she says. “It was like, ‘This is me. I’ll show you where me came from and I’ll show you where me is going. This is solid. This is who I am, guys. Anything after this is just growth.’ It’s more assured. It’s more assured of who I am. It’s the journey as a whole.”

Interview: Two Door Cinema Club

PHOTO CREDIT: Katy Cummings
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED BY BEAT MAGAZINE, JUNE 2019

Two Door Cinema Club formed an integral part of many indie playlists at the beginning of the 2010s.

Almost ten years on from the release of their debut Tourist History, the band has made an exciting return with their fourth studio record, False Alarm. The result is a vibrant and confident new snapshot of a band operating at their creative best.

“I think it’s an awesome time to get new music out,” says bass player Kevin Baird. “I think it was a necessity for us to do something that’s exciting and different.”

Well aware of the popularity of Tourist History and the place the album still holds in the hearts of many, Baird is quick to reassure that the importance of their debut hasn’t been lost on the band. However, we’re almost a decade on from ‘I Can Talk’ and ‘Undercover Martyn’.

“Making music and putting out albums, it is a journey,” Baird says. “We’re very different people to who we were when we were writing the first couple of albums. We’re nine or ten years older. The way we write music and what we get excited about has changed.”

“It’s really nice that people have grown up with us. I guess we’ve managed to stay a little bit relevant to those people with that first album, hopefully. It’s a really nice thing. I think we came around at the perfect time when streaming was in its infancy; it started to really kick off around 2013 and 2014, when we started to take some time off. It’s allowed people to go back so much easier to our earlier music and it’s given us the platform to do whatever the fuck we want.”

With False Alarm, the band collaborated once more with Jacknife Lee (The Killers, Bloc Party), a figure who has had a large part in the development of Two Door Cinema Club’s sound since their sophomore effort, Beacon.

“He’s a very inspiring person,” Baird says. “It feels like he’s never negative about anything, especially to do with music. It’s so fun. We don’t just spend time working at the computer on little bits of the song, it’s all about the journey and discovery as well. We’ll be discovering new music and records, constantly listening to new things and being inspired that way as well.”

“Initially it was hard for us,” he remembers. “We were worried about working with a big producer in 2011 and we were reassured by the fact he’s also from Ireland and he wasn’t a big time Hollywood producer who was going to change us. I think we’ve always really enjoyed his honesty and his humility, and his extremely amazing talent.”

Upon first listen of the record, False Alarm puts you at ease. A fun album jam-packed with melody and, if you’ve seen Two Door Cinema Club live, the energy matches that of what you see on stage. The album’s release is timely too, as it comes just after the news of the band’s Australian return for Grapevine Gathering.

The concept of touring this album is one that Baird is particularly excited about. Bringing False Alarm to life alongside their other three albums offers the band a chance to get stuck into four different phases of their creative journey.

“With this album, we’ve almost created a world that this album lives in,” he says. “We’ve put ourselves into that world and that’s become the basis of the music videos and the live shows. It’s so much fun for us to go two feet in with it.”

“We’ve felt like it’s been important to have some level of escapism,” he adds. “It’s always been about pure hedonistic enjoyment. I think sometimes, obviously when the room gets bigger and more people are there, you lose the sweaty, walls are dripping experience, but I think we’re continually trying to replicate that just on a bigger stage with more slick production.”

Interview: Briggs

PHOTO CREDIT: Michelle Grace Hunder
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED BY https://www.thebigissue.org.au #588, JUNE 2019

With creative powerhouse Briggs at its helm, record label Bad Apples is set to push Indigenous musicians squarely into the spotlight. 

BRIGGS. One name for one man with many guises. A rapper with a unique sense of humour that’s made him a regular on the ABC’s The Weekly. A Simpsons fan invited to write for creator Matt Groening on his new Netflix series, Disenchantment. The man who made music for Indigenous sci-fi series Cleverman while playing the character Maliyan. The solo artist who teamed with producer Trials to create the earth-shaking duo A.B. Original. The Yorta Yorta man from Shepparton emblazoned with tattoos honouring his people. And, in what may turn out to be his most significant role yet, record label boss at Bad Apples.

“[I’m] trying to change the way that Australians perceive what Indigenous artists can be and who they are,” Adam Briggs says ahead of the Bad Apples showcase, taking place at the Sydney Opera House as part of Vivid Live.

Bad Apples is helmed by Briggs and label manager Coco Eke, who together nurture the careers of hip-hop artists BIRDZ, Nooky and Philly. The label is also home to A.B. Original.

“I don’t think it was as reactionary as people might think,” he muses of the label’s creation. “We often spoke, for the last few years, of how there was a lack of representation and there always has been, you know? The label doesn’t feel like a reaction to that; it feels like it’s actively trying to change the space and what the scene looked like. We were just trying to create a new lane, a new pathway.”

As one of the artists who has forged a career on this new pathway, emcee BIRDZ details the significance of Bad Apples Music when it’s come to his own creative direction: “When I first joined [the label], it was exciting to have a home and a support network,” he says. “It’s a label, but it’s a family and a home. There’s really no other way to describe it. I was excited about joining a movement that was led by someone that understood who I was and where I came from.” 

Releasing his debut album Train of Thought to industry acclaim in 2017, the Melbourne-based rapper has become a fixture on stages around the country, and is acknowledged as an important new voice of Australian hip-hop. The confidence to opine as strongly and freely as he has stems from the support of Briggs and Bad Apples.

“I have a vision and they’re like, ‘This is how you make it great’,” he says. “Just having that support and having them reaffirming and instilling that confidence in me, that’s really been significant. Those kinds of things led to me making an album I wanted to make and to be recognised the way it was recognised.”

Similarly, fellow Bad Apples artists Nooky and Philly have undergone immense levels of creative change in the years since their signing. Young artists cutting their teeth on stages and behind the production desk, they are prime examples of Australian excellence born out of determination and hunger for success.

Briggs is full of praise. “The growth of dudes like Nooky — being such a fantastic producer as well — watching that part of his career grow over the last couple of years [has been great]. Being able to be there for Phil, and helping guide him through his album and video; just being able to be there for these dudes at this point and also having the scope to grow it.” 

The ambition and broadened scope have culminated in a handful of successfully curated events, where Bad Apples have been able to give more emerging artists a platform – an exciting indicator of the kind of Indigenous talent approaching the precipice of wider acclaim. 

“Bad Apples did two all female line-ups for the Brunswick Music Festival and the Parramasala one in Parramatta.” Briggs says. “That was a conscious effort on our behalf over the last 18 months. I was like, ‘Look, it’s really easy for us to sign black men rappers, they’re everywhere! If we want to make the impact we want to make across the community, we need to be representative of the community’.

“It’s the exact same execution and method that we had when we started the label,” he continues. “It’s like, ‘There’s not enough blackfella rappers who have pathways, let’s make one.’ Alright, now we’ve done that, how do we bring in women and how do we make them feel safe and comfortable as well? Let’s work at that. I understand that I’m a dude in that world too, so I’m trying to navigate that and be as helpful as possible.”

For BIRDZ, this Sydney Opera House event in particular is exciting to be a part of. “It’s a real example of where Bad Apples is heading and it feels like there’s no real limit. I think that’s a big thing. For so long, a lot of us had felt there was a limit on us, but Bad Apples has really shown that there isn’t.”