Interview: Vocal surgery hasn’t stopped Melbourne’s NUSSY from charging ahead with ambition

As we sit perched atop beanbags inside Singapore’s CHIJMES venue, Melbourne electro-pop artist NUSSY is basking in the sunshine. While her presence in Singapore largely revolved around appearances at Music Matters Live – performing both solo and as part of Swim Season – Nussy was also part of a contingent of Australian songwriters taking part in APRA’s SongHubs sessions in the Asian city just prior to the festival.

Marking her return to live performance and the immersive world of making music after recovering from vocal surgery, the songwriter opens up on SongHubs and the lessons it brought with.

“I cannot rate SongHubs highly enough.” she enthuses. “It is one of the best experiences that I’ve ever, ever had. Just being able to work with different producers every day and being thrown in the deep end with people I’ve literally just met going, ‘Okay we’re going to go in a room and write and produce an entire song today’. It was not anything that I’d ever done before but it stretches you to do things that you wouldn’t normally do.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/BYx4jhsjYkd/?hl=en&taken-by=willrap4tuka

“The track I did with Tuka was, again, not like anything I’d have ever done if I approached it like a normal NUSSY session.” she says of working with the Thundamentals rapper. “It’s cool to be able to work with different people who play completely different genres of music to you, that you normally wouldn’t think to collaborate on. In their own right, they do completely different music to what you do. I got to write music that I wouldn’t normally have gotten to write.”

Turning attention to her live performances in Singapore, Nussy admits to some nerves preceding the gigs. Not having performed at all in months due to her vocal recovery, her approach to these shows and further shows at home in the New Year, is driven by a re-energised confidence.

“I’m actually just so keen to play.” she laughs. “The last live show I played was back in March so I’m itching to get back on stage. It’s cool that I’ve been able to work with all these other artists over three days, being able to see them do what they do in their own right as well.”

Upon her return to Melbourne, Nussy is keen to keep the momentum spurred on by her SongHubs and Music Matters experience rolling. A new year means new opportunities and with so many new connections made and avenues opened for Nussy in September alone, she’s excited about moving ahead.

“I wasn’t able to record anything over the last four months, which has put a little bit of a spanner into the works,” she admits. “It sounds really lame to say, ‘You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone,’ but I’ve never missed doing music so much. I got into this rhythm of write and recording singles, just putting them out one after the other. You get stuck in that rhythm. Not being able to do that for a little while puts things into perspective. It’s made me excited to make new music and put new music out.”

“Honestly, the way that I feel right now? I’ve never, ever been so excited about doing music. It’s just been the best experience.”

Photo Credit: Music Matters Live, by Dawn Chua.

Follow Nussy on Facebook here and check out her music here!

Revisit all the artists’ music via the Music Matters official playlists at www.AppleMusic.com/MusicMatters.

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