Interview: Getting to Know Ani Lou
Tasmanian born artist Ani Lou is about to release her first single of 2019. We asked her to tell us about herself:
I am… currently absorbing vitamin D while my senior and highly sassy foster dog Tash gives me the eye because I haven’t taken her for a stroll yet.
Bad Body’ is… a song that explores the loss of control we experience as humans. Our lack of dominion, even at times over our own selves and bodies. It also reflects more personally my experience with chronic illness and the loss of security and innate trust I’ve observed in relation to this. Ultimately, I think many people can relate to the things I’m expressing, from a myriad of perspectives. The world itself feels pretty out of control right now.
Home is… by the sea. Most of my life I have lived in smaller coastal towns, so I have a sense of nostalgia when it comes to the big blue. I remember feeling so free exploring the cliffs below the bluff I lived on, grinding down iridescent shells for fairy dust and shattering rocks into tiny pieces to place them back together like a puzzle. I used to keep a huge box of the rocks I’d scavenged under my bed, like treasures. There was a sheep skull in the mix, too. I thought it was fascinating, looking up at me from under the water. I remember a friend found it during a sleepover and freaked out.
I’ve never… learnt much about how individualized our culture can be. A book I’m reading at the moment – ‘Lost Connections’ is really blowing my mind. It talks about the effect of Western Cultures focusing such an unhealthy amount on the individual. Many of us don’t feel a sense of community and belonging, something I know realize I fundamentally need to feel strong. Especially in this internet age, it’s often about the individual hustling against the world. It’s lonely.
I spend too much time… paying attention to catastrophic thoughts, stuck in my own consciousness bubble. Distract me from myself?
It might surprise people to learn that… I can, rather oddly, retain water in my cheeks and speak in an involuntarily high-pitched voice at the same time. Occasionally the poorly stored water source will burst out onto people I am showing, but it is regardless impressive. Right?
In the future… I hope we can work together and be a whole lot kinder to mother nature. She’s deserves it.
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Follow Ani Lou on Instagram at @_anilou
Interview by Bobby Townsend.
