Interview by Brooke Gibbs.

FMM: Thank you so much for joining me. How exciting that you have a new release coming out. How are you feeling?

Lizzie: I'm feeling so excited for it. It's been a long time coming, so I'm super keen to get it out in the world. Yeah, I'm super keen.

FMM: Do you have any big celebrations planned for the big day?

Lizzie: I'm actually at uni on that day, so I think I'm just trying to take my mind off it a little bit. But, yeah, nothing too crazy. Just letting it all happen on the day.

FMM: You'd feel like you're in a Hannah Montana moment going to uni, but then knowing that it's the day that your song has been released.

Lizzie: I'm just a regular girl, I'm just going to uni.

FMM: And I love this song because it's about reclaiming your voice after going through a long period of being silenced and feeling trapped. Tell me more about your experience and what you went through before this.

Lizzie: Yeah, it is about feeling like you've lost your voice in a way. I feel like the whole idea of the song is empowering you to speak up on it. I went through a tough situation that I think a lot of people have gone through when they went through something and then the person or whatever went and made you feel like you couldn't talk about it and that was hard to go through. Then, years later and dealing with it, just being able to take back your power in the moment and feeling like the weight’s off your shoulders and they haven't got any power over you anymore. It's just the best feeling.

I love that I've put that into this song and I hope that that can help people to also feel empowered to tell their stories and not feel so trapped in a situation where they might have lost their voice previously. I think the chorus of it being like, ‘does it stress you out? I could run my mouth, I could tell everybody. truth comes out’, sort of translates to, I hope this makes you feel, like, uncomfortable that you've lied about a situation and I actually have the truth that I could speak up on. It's kind of like theatrical and almost kind of threatening in a way, but not in that sort of way. Does that make sense?

FMM: Definitely makes sense, yeah. It's really inspiring because not everybody can, once they feel that they've lost their voice, it can be quite hard to gain that power and reclaim it. So, how did you come about and know that, you know what? I'm ready to just get my voice back and do what I need to do.

Lizzie: Well, a man made me feel that way and he actually made another woman feel that way a few years after he had put me through that situation. I think that made me feel some sort of guilt and it made me feel bad that I hadn't spoken up earlier about the situation because I could have helped her in that. It made me be, like, kicked me in the ass. I was like, this is enough. People need to know about the situation so it doesn't keep happening to people. Her and I got close from that.

FMM: There you go. It's good. It's bad that you went through that, but on the positive, you got a friend out of it that's also gone through what you've gone through and can relate.

Lizzie: Yeah, absolutely.

FMM: My favourite lyrics from the song is, I think, ‘I've told them things you've done to me and now you're sweating pretty hard.’ How do you feel knowing that he might listen to this song and say that, you know what? She's calling me out.

Lizzie: Hang on, let me think about this. Because I'm kind of nervous that he'll hear it, but there's always that underlying fear. But then I also want him to hear it and poop his pants, in a way. Do you know what I mean? I wish I could be a fly on the wall when he hears the song and he's like, oh, do you know what I mean? Because he's lied about it and then just telling my side of the story where he's gaslit the whole situation previously, I think is going to be a bit of an eye opener for the community that we're in because we share a bit of the same community here where we live. It'd be interesting.

FMM: It definitely would be. Yes, it would be good because you'll never get to see his reaction, but it would be good just to be a fly on the wall and just see the moment he realises what's happening.

And I'd love to hear more about your process when it comes to songwriting. So you've had this bad experience and now you've turned it into this amazing song. So how do you put your feelings into words?

Lizzie: I think a lot of the time I'm very transparent with my lyric writing. I think it's kind of therapeutic in that way. Like, I wrote a song about another harsh situation with a family member and I called it Lady Snake and just went into details of everything that my family member was doing to me. So, I've never really had issues with being, I guess, like, cryptic with my lyrics. I'm very much to the point, screw you this person. Without name dropping, obviously. I love doing that. It's so therapeutic.

This song came about because we were writing this song for an album that I had to do for Uni, well, I got to do for Uni, and we were in a time crunch, and it was super late at night. It was like 11:00 p.m., and I was racking my brain. The main riff, that bit was something I had written months and months and months ago, and I couldn't work out anything to add to it, like lyrics that would go with it. Then, I pulled it up and I was going through this situation at the time with the finding out that he had gone and done it to another woman and that made me want to speak about it and I was like, this is the perfect time to write a song about this situation.

It just fits so perfectly, the whole stress of our idea against the riff and I was like, it's just meant to be. And yeah, that's how it came about.

FMM: Yeah, I think that's great and I found it empowering because not everybody can find the words to put their experience into music. So the fact that they can listen to this and can relate.. I guess that what makes you connect to other people

Lizzie: Yeah, definitely. I really hope that someone can listen to people can scream it out and be like, this is a similar situation to what I've had to go through and then just be able to sing it and relate to it, I think that's just the most amazing thing. And if one person can feel empowered to speak up about the situation, it's just the coolest idea and I think that would be so amazing.

FMM: Of course, and speaking about screaming it out, I love how it's full of energy. The sound’s very different and unique to your previous releases. So, tell me more about like this particular sound and how it feels to be changing that sound up a bit.

Lizzie: I've always wanted to sort of take my music in the more like disco upbeat, sort of poppy style of music because that's what I listen to and I love writing songs that are more upbeat. Sky, which was my previous release, the slow ballad and I really wanted to give that song a big push.

I worked with a producer for the first time because I didn't think I'd be able to capture that song perfectly without a producer. And then he was so amazing, so I was like, okay, I want to keep working with a producer. He just captured Stress You Out exactly how I wanted it to be and I think it's just definitely moving towards the sort of music that I like listening to and I think that's the sort of music that I want to keep writing.

Most of my songs that I've written for my EP that I'm going to be doing later in the year are pretty upbeat and similar to Stress You Out.

FMM: Yeah, I love that new direction. I feel like it's a good direction to go into and hopefully people vibe with it as well and come out and support that.

Lizzie: Thank you.

FMM: Speaking of that, how's the music scene in Adelaide? How can people come out and support you if they are vibing with what you're putting out? I sometimes do gigs most of the time it's mainly just releases and things like that. Just because the music scene is amazing in Adelaide, but it is the pop… The pop scene is less big in Adelaide, but I'd love it to grow a little bit more. So when I do gigs, I'd love to have people come out and I should be doing a gig later in the year, but we'll see how that goes and yeah, definitely, if they can come out and support that and things stress you out, that'd be so cool and a bit of a fun one.

FMM: So, the songs called Stress You Out, and we talked a bit about what's inspired it, but what are some other things that stress you out?

Lizzie: Uni. Last year of uni this year, so it's a big one. And him. That man stresses me out. And what else? I think that's the main thing. Uni and ex boyfriends, probably.

FMM: Yeah, they definitely are stressful elements, so I can resonate with that and relate, definitely. And I'd love to hear more about you as well, say someone's coming across this song and they haven't heard your music before and they don't know who you are, like, who are you and how did you get into how you're releasing music today?

Lizzie: I started releasing music back in 2020 and my style has definitely changed, so I have a range of different genres and whatnot in my music journey, starting from like, acoustic key songs to more the disco-y, poppy stuff that I'm doing now. I really got into music a bit. I've always been like, a little fun performer in its own right. Like, I've always been a little entertainer ever since I was like two or three. But, I've really gotten into writing and recording music in my late teens and early 20s, so it's pretty new to me, but it's also such a passion.

I've always wanted to write music and I love writing music and writing music with my friends and performing with my friends is just like, the best experience. That's my main story with writing music.

FMM: Well, congratulations on getting to that point where you actually release the music you're passionate about and getting to perform it live to people you talked about. Like, I think you mentioned you're going to do an EP or something or you're working towards an EP?

Lizzie: Yes, I'm working towards an EP right now. I've written most of the songs that I'm happy to go on it, so we should be having an EP later in the year and then I'm also going to be probably doing a Christmas song EP as well, even later in the year, so it's a big year for me, but I'm really excited for it.

FMM: I'm excited for the Christmas one. I just love Christmas music and I love that people are out there doing their own versions of it as well. What's your favourite Christmas song?

Lizzie: [Laughs] Under pressure now. Probably White Christmas. A little classic but I love the Christmas Song as well.

FMM: That's a good one. Mine would have to be very basic, but All I Want for Christmas Is you, the thought of it and you're like, yeah, I'm into this.

Lizzie: Absolutely love it.

FMM: Hopefully that makes an appearance on the Christmas EP as well.

Lizzie: I'll keep it in mind.

FMM: And was there anything else you wanted people to know about this particular release or about you as an artist that you like to share with people?

Lizzie: Yeah, I really just want people to know with this song that you can speak up if you ever feel silenced, like you have just rely on your support network, like people are going to listen to you and stress you out. I hope it resonates with people and I hope that people that have gone through similar situations can find their voice and I hope this inspires someone to speak up about their situation because you never know who else might have to deal with it and you might be helping someone.

FMM: Exactly, and it creates that safe place as well, where they can listen to it. They know that somebody else has gone through it if they can come to a show and scream the lyrics out along with you.