INTERVIEW: New talent Monnie releases new single 'Bored': "I just want to do more, I want to try it all. How do you know what you like until you try?"
Interview: Jett Tattersall
Image: Brianna Da Silva
Monnie is a powerhouse performer who launched her solo career with a bang in March with debut single ‘Tell Me Something’ and today she releases her second single ‘Bored’.
Written with and produced by Dave Hammer, ‘Bored’ is a shimmering, eclectic pop track that moves between gentle electro-synth to addictive chant-rap. Lyrically it is a playful exploration of needing constant stimulation to avoid boredom. “I’m doing it both ways so I’m not bored'“ she sings.
Monnie’s first two single releases have heralded the arrival of a major new talent. Starting out in classical music in Brisbane/Meeanjin, Monnie later moved into the indie rock music scenes, performing in bands, before moving to Melbourne/Naarm. Recently, she has toured with Thelma Plum as her bass player, and last year debuted her solo career with performances at the BIGSOUND festival. She creates music to help her process the world, but also to help others process their world and find their community.
“Through COVID, I saw how different music brought people together in different ways,” she says. “There should be space for other people, who we do need to hear from about their experiences. So I wrote pop music for people to have fun, to evoke a certain type of feeling. I just wanted everyone to be okay and to have a community. Have people to talk to. In a way, that’s my thinking underneath it all.”
With more music coming up from Monnie throughout 2023, she is an artist that has all the ingredients to be a major star and you are going to fall in love with her - put her on your playlist right now. We recently sat down with her to find out more about her music and career.
Hi Monnie, it is so lovely chatting with you today. Firstly I have to talk to you about the recorder - you became obsessed with it at school and took it all the way didn’t you?
Mum got me like resin recorders for my primary school graduation because I was that into it. I had a little one, the Irish jig, the tin whistle there's lots of different recorders. There's five different sizes of recorders and I'm into it! I'm a music fan!
What was it about that sound that you had going ‘this is my instrument’?
It wasn’t about the sound, it was just about playing it. I've always loved playing instruments, and I went from recorder to clarinet, so I was a classical clarinet player for 14 years. I much prefer the tone and the sound of a clarinet to a recorder, but at the time the recorder was what I had, so I went with it.
What was it that got you out of the the orchestra pit and into the very experimental playful pop that you do now?
Well I’ve always loved singing, I've always sung. When I was a kid, I would sing about what I was doing, and mum and my Nan would sing us to sleep as well when we were kids so it was always a part of my life, singing and making music. I also played a bit piano, I was really interested in doing everything. I wanted to learn as many things as I could. I thought percussion was so cool, and I loved playing clarinet, and I still love playing clarinet. The intonation between playing an instrument in a big group of people like an ensemble or orchestra is an invaluable experience that I'm so glad that I have. But the biggest thing for me is that it's so competitive - not that this side of the industry isn't - but working in classical music as a clarinet player, there's like five jobs you can get in the whole country. Half the time, you've got to wait for someone to retire or die before those things jobs come up. I know that sounds extreme, but it's true like before, because it's only one or two clarinet players in any symphony orchestra.
No, they have to go into synthwave bands now!
Which is cool as well. I love that! But I was in that world, and I was like, ‘What am I going to do with this?’ It wasn't that I didn't want to keep playing music. I was just do I really want to be in this world? I worked with a lot of wonderful people, but I also felt a little bit out of place in the classical music world. I felt like I was a different kind of person to the people that I was working with, which is neither a good nor bad thing, it's just what I felt. So I went into contemporary stuff. I was really interested in learning how to produce, I loved electronic music, and really experimented electronic music, I listened to a lot of that, I still do. I was listening to a lot of experimental music, really instrumental and glitchy stuff, and I really wanted to learn how to do that. My experience of classical music at the time was all about the composition and the arrangement of a piece, inclusive of all the different sections that you find in an ensemble. There's such a variety of sounds that you can make, and I loved that about it. I feel like in my brain, there's a parallel with electronic music, especially minimal, experimental electronic music, or that thing where it's about a motif that that gets passed around the different parts of the instrumentation and comes back to a main theme. So I got really into listening to that, I really wanted to know how to do it. I thought it was so cool. I love synth and the sounds you could get with synth and electronic music was really interesting and I was really excited by it.
I want to talk to you about your new single ‘Bored’ which of course is out today. It opens with…the only way I can describe it is like an arcade killshot, and even when the melody kicks in, it’s like you're in Tron.
Yeah! That is so fun. It’s about me being bored of the indie rock scene here. I don't want to upset anyone by saying that, because I've got nothing but love and respect for it. But personally, I was just sick of having to be serious all the time. And I wanted people to respect me. In the male dominated industry playing bass guitar, the amount of times I have to justify myself to sound people or other men who don't think that women play music. I just got really sick of it, and I was like, I just have to be serious because no one believes that I do this, even though I'm here to play on this stage, to do this with the men in my band. I've seen a other women talk about this a lot, it's clearly not an exclusive experience to me and I'm very lucky that I could make the change over to do something like ‘Bored’. I'm very lucky and grateful for the opportunities that I was given, and that's kind of what that song is about. I just want to do more, I want to try it all. How do you know what you like until you try?
100%. You’ve obviously been in the pit with a clarinet, you toured with the goddess Thelma Plum, you've had this amazing window into other people's music for so long. How has that strengthened your solo work?
I don't think I'll ever stop being inspired by my friends and especially Thelma, she's amazing. Getting to work with her is a real honour and a privilege and it makes me very happy. I also am really heavily influenced by punk music, because I grew up listening to my mum playing the Ramones, The Clash, The Saints were a big one. The Go-Betweens, also Jonathan Richman from the Modern Lovers, which is not really the same era, but worth mentioning. I'm always inspired by the people that I'm around.
I never feel more confident than when I'm with my friends on stage. As a solo artist, I'm pretty nervous, I'm doing okay so far, but honestly, I thrive in a group. I have three siblings, I grew up in a house of six people and my mum's family is massive - my mum's mum was one of 16 children. I've got a lot of family and I grew up with a lot of people around me, and I'm very grateful that that was my upbringing. So for things to just be about me feels very strange, but it's a good challenge. I love entertaining people, I love to make people happy, and make them smile and make them feel welcome and accepted. I think about that when I'm on stage, and I think about this is me, but it's also just one part of me that I want to share with everybody. Then when I'm off stage, I can be all those different parts of me that are nervous and self conscious!
Your songs, they're fun. They're welcoming and they're playful and you really go hard it with your story, you don’t pull any punches, but at the same time, you’re not being an asshole about it!
Yes! Who wants to listen to that? There's no point. It's got to be fun. And being in the indie rock world, it's very male dominated, and I didn't feel like I was allowed to be frivolous or fun or whimsical or silly, or any of those things that I love to be. I'm also a serious person, an intellectual person, there's lots of facets to everybody, right? But in the rock music scene in this country, there's not a lot of space for women in that scene, and you have to be masculine, you have to present yourself in different ways. I would talk differently, otherwise, these men don't really listen to you, and they don't really give you the time of day. I was really fucking sick of that, because I shouldn't have to, people shouldn't have to do that. I'm already privileged, I’m a white woman, I’m tall and thin, I've got a lot of things that I benefit from. So I'm like, if it’s like this for me, it must be fucking shit for a lot of other people as well. I just got so sick of it, there's no point in being an elitist in music, like, are you trying to make people not listen to your music? What are you getting out of that? I can be a serious musician, and I can have fun with it, at the same time. Both of those things can be true.
Some of my lyrics might come across a little bit bratty, and I think that's funny because I would not consider myself a brat but I do say what I think and I'm pretty blunt as an individual, I always have been. But why can't we say what we feel? Can't we be silly and meaningful at the same time? Can't we accept and celebrate those things? There's so contrast and conflict being a human being and living in the world, why not be honest about it, and be positive. Everything's fun, weird, hard, and stressful, but hey, we can dance!
You're not gonna convince anyone by shouting at them. Genres are mixing and blurring more and more, which is great, but I feel in Australia particularly, pop was kind of like a dirty word and it still is. There was only a couple of people that were allowed to do it, and so that's why a lot of young pop artists, such as yourself, were forced to go overseas because that was the only way that could have a career. How have you found the transition into pop yourself, apart from liberating?
I think people are ready for it here. People still have a lot to say about TikTok, but one thing that I think is undeniable, is that it is breaking down some of those expectations or judgments that younger people have. The people who are on those apps aren't viewing things in that kind of geopolitical way that maybe things were viewed previously. Making music at home is a lot easier than it used to be, making music on your own is a lot easier than it used to be, putting it online, sharing it with people is quite easy now. And because of that people's judgments or expectations of what something should be is changing, especially in regards to genre, in regards to pop in this country. You'd have to fight hard to hold on to that elitist idea of pop is boring, and you should get out of here if you're doing pop.
Absolutely. Before I leave you, ‘Bored’ is out now, what else is coming up for you?
Well, I'm currently doing a little DIY studio in the garage at my new house, so I’m going to be trying to write lots of music and have. I’m really excited for the film clip to come out for ‘Bored’, because it was a lot of fun working on it and I'm really happy with it. I'm excited about a lot of things!
‘Bored’ is out now via Sony Music Australia. You can buy and stream here.
To keep up with all things Monnie, you can follow her on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
Monnie will be performing as support act for Northeast Party House throughout May and June. Tickets available here.
20 May - Northcote Theatre, Melbourne
27 May - Princess Theatre, Brisbane
3 June - The Gov, Adelaide
4 June - Freo Social, Fremantle
23 June - Metro Theatre, Sydney
