It might have seemed like Miss Blanks dropped off the face of the earth.
After releasing a string of bounding and successful singles, dropping an EP (2017’s Diary of a Thotaholic), notching up festival appearances around the country and sharing stages with the likes of Charli XCX, Channel Tres, Little Simz, the Brisbane rapper took a big step back.
At least, from the outside, it looked like she took a step back. She might have gone quiet on the music front, but Miss Blanks was busier than ever. She launched her creative agency Point Blank Group, which specialises in brand partnerships, events and advocacy. PBG has been repping acts like Mallrat, BENEE, DMA’s, and starting up parties like Day Ones and the annual fundraiser A Carry 4 Coins (which has raised tens of thousands of dollars for bushfire relief and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander LGBTQIA+ organisation Black Rainbow).
She’s also worked tirelessly over the last year lobbying the powers that be in the music industry to throw a lifeline to the independent music sector, which — more than any other part of the music industry — has taken an absolute battering during COVID-19. The day we sit down to chat, she’d spent the morning firing emails to the heads of ARIA, APRA, and QMusic.
And now, after two years backstage, Miss Blanks has returned — somewhat unexpectedly, and a lot earlier than she was anticipating. Spurred on by the offer by Beats By Dre to shoot a music vid, last month Miss Blanks came roaring back with ‘Fly High’, a delicious club banger.
She’s stepped back into a music scene in Australia which has changed markedly from when she last released music. At the same time, it also hasn’t shifted one iota. What’s changed is Miss Blanks herself — refreshed, re-energised, re-focused, an emerging powerhouse both offstage and onstage in the industry.
It’s been a little while between drinks for you and releasing music, how did the comeback happen?
February 4 we shot the music video, February 5th I had Carry 4 Coins in Brisbane, February 6 I shot the Beats By Dre campaign — so I’ve been sitting on this since February. You know how it is, the landscape was changing, timelines to meet certain targets and things changed…so anyway not it’s August [laughs].
To be honest, I had no intentions of getting back into music this soon, particularly during COVID. It’s not that I put Miss Blanks on hold or anything…but I came out of the gate really quickly with Miss Blanks — my early rise was really fast and there was a lot of momentum. I was a new artist and I only started making music back in 2017, so I got this feeling where I thought ‘Oh I have no time to learn, I just need to keep up with things’, and I didn’t have time to step into my own.
So when I stepped back to do Point Blank Group I had no intentions of releasing any more music for the time being — and then Beats By Dre, a client of Point Blank Group, approached us and said ‘We want to work with Miss Blanks’. And I said ‘Well that’s not gonna happen, cos Miss Blanks doesn’t have any new music, nothing’s happening’. They asked ‘Well how can we make that happen? What’s stopping Miss Blanks from releasing music right now?’.
It ended up getting to a point where I went ‘Okay, let’s do it, let’s bring Miss Blanks back.’ I sat down, and I had this beat from Oh Boy from mid-last year, and there were so many times where I’d written something and thought ‘Oh I’ll get to it, I’ll work on it’. Then Beats came through, I was going to be in their next campaign, they were going to fund the music video, and I was like ‘shit, they’re funding a music video I don’t even have a song for it, I’ve gotta get in the studio’.
I would say between November and January was crunch time — recording, planning, and having a big conversation around my artist development and how I wanted to step into this new chapter.
Through 2017 to 2019, I had that time to really jump in, make all the mistakes, learn all the lessons, do all of that. Now I’ve had time to go away and work in music in a different capacity. I’ve now learned all of these things, so it was time to reflect. I [wanted] to improve my practice to ensure that my output is something I’m happy with — that isn’t so focused on messaging and my identity as an artist, more just ‘This is a great song’.
I’m confident and happy now that there’s been a nice seamless rollout with the new track and the Beats piece, and there are a few other little gems that’ll be dropping over the next month or so. It’s a great track, and it’s a track that crosses genres — it’s nostalgic yet modern, and it’s encouraging people to get back in the spirit of fun and partying. I think when you listen to it it’s so inherently Miss Blanks, from the production to my tone to the delivery and the lyrical content, it weaves and integrates in a way that’s a really nice hybrid.
You mentioned that this is a big pivot for you, that’s it’s a significant step up — can you elaborate a bit on that?
I think before there was a lot of pressure in the past to be a beacon of morality and a beacon for….you know, ‘If it has Miss Blanks then we’re good, right?’.
With this track and with this comeback it was really important for me to present myself in a way that is still me, that’s always been me, but in a more…there’s no smoke and mirrors anymore, and there’s nothing pretentious there. This is the track. This is the music. All it is is a fire track, a fire music video, some bitches dancing in lingerie and bikinis in a rich house in the rainforest in New South Wales. This isn’t a conversation on gender, it’s not a conversation of my brownness or my queerness. It’s something that I refuse to allow to be commodified based on my intersectionality.
It’s something that I refuse to allow to be commodified based on my intersectionality.
And I think that’s the pivot — before with the music that I was releasing, even though it was fun, dope club tracks, it was always prefaced with, you know, ‘Skinny Bitches’ is about…dah dah dah dah dah, beauty standards or whatever. There was always this performative messaging linked to the music. And because I was so vocal outside of music, that pressure was applied to me by others — by how they’d paint me as this fierce slay click artist.
And it was like ‘Oh this is what they want’ — this is just entertainment because it’s extractive and it’s also the archetype of the sassy, fierce, brown trans woman. I’m all of those things, but there’s so much more to me. I can be fun and informative and sexy and political — you know what I mean? We’re all capable of being all these things at once. But because I was a first for the Australian music scene, it was polarising, and that became the focus and the messaging [around my music].
Now, we’ve gone through a cycle of conversations around Black Lives Matter and conversations about equality in the LGBTIQ community, and #MeToo and women’s rights — so now that I’m back, we don’t need to make my music about this stuff because we’ve all had time to sit with it.
Do you feel like you do feel like you’ve stepped back into a very different world in terms of the media coverage of your music? Can you feel that shift?
Yeah 100 percent, I’ll be honest with you I feel like it’s shifted so much so that there hasn’t been as much press coverage — because they can’t focus on that stuff anymore.
I mean no disrespect to any of the titles, I’m okay with it — I would rather you not cover the release than to cover it based on Miss Blanks Called Out This Artist and oh, and she’s got a new song [laughs]. I’ve definitely noticed there hasn’t been as much coverage and support in comparison to every other track I’ve released, which is fine, it just means now the focus really is on Miss Blanks…musician…rapper…new song…that’s it.
Does that feel freeing?
One hundred percent it feels more freeing, because now I can build a genuine story around my music. If we were to get deep about it, I would argue that it would have been nice to have the support, not in light of the things that I represent — but because the landscape has extracted and capitalised on me in the past in those ways, and still does in other ways. But I’m happier now knowing that whenever a conversation about Miss Blanks comes up, it will be about the music.
I also have a level of privilege that never goes unchecked by me — I’m really mindful that I have the experience and the language to go into conversations like these and have an expectation from the press and from the media. And at least there’s enough respect for us to have an open exchange and dialogue on what that looks like, and what that support looks like, where traditionally for introductory artists there’s a lot of ‘I’m just happy to be covered’, there’s a lot of that. But sometimes that relationship and exchange between artist and publication becomes conflated with a false sense of collaboration.
But, it’s all a journey [laughs].
So is there more music in the pipeline to come?
I have another track coming out, which I’m so excited for — it should be dropping soon. New music is coming this year, I’m working on an EP, and I’m just looking at doing what I’ve always done with Miss Blanks, whatever comes naturally, with touring, music, merch, all the things. This time around, what’s different is that everything has been fine-tuned. From the music to the approach of creating it, the live show, the visuals.
The landscape has extracted and capitalised on me in the past in those ways, and still does in other ways.
With all due respect to many of my peers in this market…the standard is here [gestures to a high point], and the expectation to build on that standard over time as an artist progresses over their career…there’s not much development or brand development [here in Australia]. Even at Point Blank, you see there’s not a strong push for ‘As a rapper how am I pushing my pen?’, ‘How am I pushing my look’?
I did the thing in the past, that’s great — but now what’s different? What’s better? I always want to be pushing myself to keep levelling up, because that’s the focus with this new music.
Photo Credit: Georgia Wallace
In the last couple of years, you kicked off Point Blank Group, the management/promotion/events company. Why did you decide to get into that part of the business?
My background is in brand management communications, but with a special focus on events and project management. And I had been doing that for close to 10 years.
I quickly realised that, with all due respect to my peers, there’s a lot of trash people out there. [There were] a lot of mediocre people that I saw doing all these things — events, projects, activations, and partnerships — and doing them really poorly and making a lot of money. Not only that, but I also realised that there were a lot of people that didn’t get invited into those spaces — I remember there was a huge brand party for Mardi Gras, I’ll never forget it, and there was not one single person of colour that was invited. Not one woman. It was just all these white gay men. I remember seeing that and I was like, how and in what world is this happening?
Not one single person of colour that was invited. Not one woman. It was just all these white gay men.
I was like talking to my business partner at the time and I was like, ‘This is really disappointing’. Like we put on great events and great parties, but we don’t have the same access. We don’t have a line of credit. We were not eligible for a lot of these grants. All this public funding is really unfair. And then at the same time, we were also seeing how extractive the same brands and promoters were being from the local community — putting them on and maybe paying them like 70 percent less, or the terms of the deal were really biased.
So how it actually started was my business partner at the time, David, and I stepped in and started representing these kids that were appearing at these events. And we were like, ‘Hey Converse, if you want to work with this person, you need to pay double’. And weirdly enough, they were listening to us. So we started doing events and touring.
We had our launch. We did Day Ones in Melbourne, we’ve done Carry 4 Coins for two years now, hopefully with a third in February. And we’ve invested a lot of money into the independent sector, especially during COVID. And that’s kind of how it started.
During COVID we’ve had to pivot like everyone else and we restructured, I moved back to Brisbane, which has been great. And as much as events and touring is front of mind, I just know that in this current climate it’s not viable. Customer confidence is down — no one wants to buy a ticket to a show, especially right now. And a lot of the independent contractors we work with and the talent we work with can’t go through the excitement of getting booked and then getting cancelled. They’ve already made preparations with the understanding that they’re getting this money and then yet again, hey, it’s cancelled.
How has it been steering a company, and an independent company, through the last 18 months?
It’s been horrendous. I don’t recommend it [laughs]. It’s been really crazy.
No one could have anticipated this happening, and all of the positive signs that we were going to be supported as a small business, all of the signs that said that we would be moving towards a COVID normal, all the signs and messaging handed down by the government and our industry captains — all of it went out the window.
Especially in the past few months, but certainly with the lockdown in Melbourne and the lockdown in Brisbane, it’s reaffirmed for me that there’s no light at the end of the tunnel at this point, and that’s a harsh reality that we have to face. Any business right now needs to be really mindful of the reality — that an undetected singular case could impact a whole state.
There’s no light at the end of the tunnel at this point, and that’s a harsh reality that we have to face.
In terms of running a business over the past 18 months, it’s been tough, but it’s been more tough seeing my team go through it. I’m a pretty tough bitch and obviously, I can handle myself, I think that’s pretty evident to most people by now. But I think the hardest part has definitely been seeing my clients and suppliers and vendors and everyone go through it.
It’s been real. I think the hardest part has been seeing my entire industry and community impacted. Having absolutely no support from government throughout the entirety of COVID — Point Blank Group hasn’t received a cent from the government because we haven’t been eligible for various reasons.
Some funding criteria say that you need to be employing staff — well, most independent operators don’t employ staff. The reason why we don’t employ staff, and use independent contractors, is so there’s rotation of opportunity, a rotation of wealth, a rotation of experience. Even the teams around artists, managers and the like, they’re not employed staff. So we haven’t received a single dime.
Looking at the figures just the last seven months alone, Point Blank has invested over one hundred and fifty thousand dollars into the independent sector from our successful projects and events that have been able to go forward, which I’m really proud of — I’m proud to be able to contribute in such a way to the local economy and the ecosystem that has been impacted. To find out that, you know, our cultural institutions and venues and festival operators are getting in the millions in crisis relief and funding and support — and I do think that support is necessary — can they find a spare million to spread out to the rest of us?
What have you made of the support from the government, broadly?
Let me be very vocal about this. Recently I wrote to APRA and ARIA CEOs as well as the CEO of QMusic, which is our state body for contemporary music, and I asked ‘What are you doing to lobby the government, all tiers of government?’
I don’t have that access to the ministers and the premiers and the politicians that essentially get to make the decisions on who’s getting this money and who’s making it easy for others to access that money. That’s a conversation that’s going to have to continue for a little bit longer.
I think right now…what I think that needs to happen immediately is not so much a crisis funding for right now, but the independent sector and the live music sector needs access to funding and resources to help sustain it, to build futures and build future pathways.
Because there’s a lot of people now that are questioning whether this is an industry that they can continue in. There’s absolutely no confidence with customers and with the very people that are fostering culture at the grassroots level. And those that are fostering that culture at a grassroots level are in the independent sector — our sound engineers, lighting technicians, stage managers.
There’s a lot of people that have fallen through the gaps that don’t have access to the support. Right now my mission, which is the same as many others’, is to get that support, not just for the one percent.
Photo Credit: Mitch Noakes
Even aside from COVID, the last few months have seen some incredible upheaval in the music industry. What have you made of it all?
I think I’ve been pretty vocal online. I think I’m maybe a bit too radical for some people [laughs]. That’s my quick observation.
I’m really mindful that the music industry can’t help the music industry get out of this situation when it comes to cultural change. I think it’s also important for people to know that you can’t import identity politics, you can’t import race politics, and you can’t import the #MeToo movement and momentum from the United States, and think it will apply in the same way in Australia.
There are a few Australian versions of Alyssa Milano, I must point out. I think there are a lot of people that are not only importing the same ideologies and approaches and politics from the states, but there are also a lot of people that are upholding the very oppressive structures and toxic structures that they’re supposedly trying to undo. A lot of the approach to the conversation has been with a punitive justice mentality — I think we need to have a conversation about restorative justice and how we rebuild and how we not just dismantle the framework, but completely redesign our approach to harm and gendered violence.
The music industry cannot help the music industry. I also think you can’t have a top-down approach without a grassroots approach as well. I also think that we need abolitionists to be leading this conversation. And I think you need people that not only have lived experience — but have lived experience in terms of experiencing the harm, and lived experience that is representative of the entire community.
The music industry cannot help the music industry…you can’t have a top-down approach without a grassroots approach as well.
And when we talk about harm, let’s be very specific, because I think that if we’re talking about sexual violence and assaults, I think that we need to talk about the behaviours that led to that point and how we shift that culture — how do we address the root of the harm?
Because when we talk about harm and violence and also punitive action, we age it as we grow up. We go from spanking little kids or putting them in time out — removing them from the community and punishing them. And there’s no learning or unlearning in that process because they know there’s a space to do it again. And then as we grow up, in high school, you get put into detention or you’re given extra homework or whatever. But essentially, again, you’re removed from community. And then as adults — the prison industrial complex has really taught us that punitive action and violence and harm — especially like colonial gendered violence and harm from birth, ages right from childhood through to adulthood.
So when we have a conversation around how do we change things in the music industry, we need to be having a much broader conversation — because you can’t have this very specific conversation on sexual assault without addressing those other things that played into the behaviours to get to that point, whether it be a class, race, gender, or anything else.
I think the people leading the conversation at the moment… a lot of these people are fully employed by the very institutions that create the harm. Or these are other women that are agents of patriarchy, that are agents of white supremacy and who uphold those very structures.
I think the people leading the conversation at the moment… a lot of these people are fully employed by the very institutions that create the harm.
So I mean, anyone can have a crack at it — and if you can change something, if you can do something, great! But I think because there are so many voices that don’t understand the nuance and don’t understand that we need to have this broader approach…it’s kinda going nowhere.
We’ve already seen it through so many different campaigns and movements in our industry. Me no more. Don’t be that guy. Now, Australia. The industry calls for cultural change blah blah blah blah group. And that’s all in the space of a couple of years, and I’ve just counted four or five different campaigns, and yet there’s been nothing.
I definitely have some pretty amazing ideas and solutions that I think could be implemented into the framework on how to approach this and dismantle and shift things — but, you know, until they feel they’re ready for that challenge, I’ll just keep them in my head.
Looking at the music industry in isolation from the rest of society is a very strange way to go about it, isn’t it? We are living in a colonial world on stolen land with a binary view of the world, how can we ever expect the music industry is going to crack out of that as well until all those other things are addressed?
Well, that’s the thing. I’m also a believer that true justice can’t happen while we’re living in a colonial state on stolen land. True justice can’t come when the very land on which we stand is violence and harm.
I feel like we’ve talked about the world all over the last hour. I just have like a final quick question, which sounds big…if you could if you could change three things in the industry tomorrow, what would you change? Instantly.
Do I want to be smart about it or do I want to be petty about it? [Laughs].
If I had complete control to do that….oooh spicy. I would most probably set up an independent taskforce that’s completely autonomous from major labels, from our governing bodies, that is publicly voted on. Everyone has access to vote, regardless if you’re a musician or not. And that basically governs how the music industry operates. I see it as a regulatory board and it basically has the power to basically say whether you get funding or not based on how ethical you’re being or how inclusive you’re being or whatever.
So my first call to action is an independent regulatory board that would be set up. I would expand funding to the independent sector…A lot of funding [laughs]. And the third thing I would change in the music industry tomorrow would be to implement a 50 percent quota on women, black, Indigenous, people of colour. The road to Miss Blanks 2030 prime minister campaign begins now.
Miss Blanks’ ‘Fly High’ is out now.
Photo Credit: Georgia Wallace
Editor’s Note: Some details in this story have been changed post-publication.