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The Filipino-Australian emo/electronic artist’s debut album is also a reintroduction: “I’ve peeled back these performative layers. Now I’m just human, which is weird”
Words by Alex Rigotti
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catches up with a few days after they’ve undergone surgery. Yes, they were apparently advised to take two weeks off work. No, they didn’t stop. A few days before our interview, they filmed themselves dancing to their song ‘PQC’, still hooked up to an IV. Today, they’ve fired off 19 tweets to promote their new single, ‘I Used To Kill’. They profess: “Before my septum surgery, I was crying because I was like, ‘What if I die? I want to put out my album so bad…’”
NME
Their long-awaited debut album’s not out until November, and yet there’s already chatter about the Filipino-Australian musician’s sonic pivot. They made forward-facing trap-pop for years, and have banked huge collaborations with Bring Me The Horizon’s Oli Sykes and EDM artist Ninajirachi. Now, ‘In Endless Awe And Agony’ positions Daine as Australia’s next proper breakout star, thanks to its captivating fusion of stripped-back emo confessionals and life-affirming electro-pop.
Success will taste especially sweet for the Melburnian, who claims they were “flopping” from their career beginnings six years ago until now. “I’ve been in the mud,” they declare. “I think people could smell that I wasn’t fully actualised yet. Now, people who have never thrown me a bone in my entire career are in my DMs being like, ‘Great job’. I’m like… ‘What changed?’”
When NME first profiled Daine in 2021, they straddled the hardcore and hyperpop worlds in a way many musicians didn’t. Their fantastical, futuristic artistic direction separated them from a pack of budding popstars. With collaborations with Oli Sykes, mentoring from Charli XCX and a major label contract, everything seemed to be on the up. Yet Daine remembers this time as a period of creative indecision. “It was really difficult,” they reveal, “and I was being pulled in different directions, looking at what was happening around me and being like, ‘What do I do?’”
After a string of singles, EPs and mixtapes, Daine revealed in 2024 they had been dropped by their label. Left “thousands of dollars in debt”, their grandmother died, and their longest relationship ended in the same year. They attempted suicide and were hospitalised shortly after. When they reflect on the events of that year, Daine’s surprisingly irreverent. “2024 jumped me!” they laugh. “That was crazy… but it’s made me feel more whimsical and positive, because I don’t have that much to lose. Now I do, because through that detachment, I’ve become way more attached to life now. I’m really happy.”
During this time, Daine was living at home with their parents, which they credit with helping them write ‘In Endless Awe and Agony’. Compared to previous stints living in the frenzy of New York and label trips to hyper-competitive Los Angeles, the normalcy of Melbourne helped them block out the noise and “focus on my inner world”. “If you’re looking at what’s happening around you and making decisions off that, you’ve fucked it,” they say. “Because then it’s informed by other people. If you’re doing your own thing, I think you’ll find something more authentic.”
‘In Endless Awe And Agony’ draws on Daine’s emo heritage, but adds new flavours to the mix. ‘Wishing Well’ fuses jangle-pop riffs with lyrics inspired by the Bible (which they brought into the studio every day), while ‘Spider-man’ captures the acoustic intimacy of an Alex G song. Meanwhile, ‘White Collar’ explodes with the ragged synthwork of MGMT in their prime, and though Daine wasn’t even born when MGMT debuted, their collaborators were. “The album is historically accurate because the producers that worked on it were there for these childhood memories of mine,” they explain. “What feels like a faint childhood memory to my generation is the heyday of their early adulthood.”
Daine worked with an exciting roster of Melburnian songwriters and producers for ‘In Endless Awe…’, including Darcy Baylis, Lucianblomkamp and Simon Lam (Kllo, Armlock). Alongside Ninajirachi and 2charm’s recent international success, Daine is helping establish Australia as its own rightful hub of left-field electro-pop. “Me and Nina have talked about this – everyone is always asking us, ‘When are you moving to the States?’” they say. “There’s this expectation that you have to, but we’re fine here! This is proof that we don’t need to move.”
Daine wasn’t always so fond of the Australian musical landscape. In our 2021 interview, they told NME they had difficulty connecting with the surf-rock bands that mushroomed through the country. “I used to be pissed and think, ‘Damn, Australia doesn’t have cool shit’, but then I was like, ‘That’s an insult to me and my friends’,” they say now. “If me and my friends are making cool stuff, then the industry eventually has to tolerate us.”
It’s a refreshing perspective, especially given Australia’s much-discussed ‘cultural cringe’, or perceived inferiority compared to bigger players like England or America. But Daine gently pushes back against this. “Cultural cringe is dying,” they tell us. “There is a real hunger from young Australian people for earnest, vulnerable art.”
“To yearn, to suffer, be a freak, lose your mind and do it publicly… what a thrill”
What does it mean to be “vulnerable”? The recent waves of what some journalists have called “indie sleaze” and “trash pop” has made it fashionable to spill your guts both in and out of song. By singing about ugly emotions and topics like jealousy, self-destruction and instability, popstars like Charli XCX, Slayyyter and Kim Petras embrace a degree of personal exposure, setting a new bar for how authenticity might sound in pop music – and, at a time when swarms of stans await a star’s downfall, raising the stakes.
Daine characterises their art as “this weapon I’m casting” on ‘PQC’. Perhaps what they’re forging is a double-edged sword; what do they gain by being so painfully open about their flaws? “To be a popstar is kind of to be a loser,” Daine tweeted recently; NME asks them to elaborate. “You’re showing parts of yourself that are embarrassing,” they explain. “It’s embarrassing in a delicious way; you get a little kick out of it.
“To yearn, to suffer, be a freak, lose your mind and do it publicly… what a thrill,” they add with genuine joy.
On album opener ‘Silly Little Animal / Go!’, Daine advises that failure is inevitable, and suggests the listener “touch your pain and let it in”. What motivates them to connect with even their most uncomfortable emotions? “You can’t avoid it, no matter what you do,” they counsel. “The only way to get through it is to get intimate with it, even though it goes against instinct. But, you know, that’s alchemy.”
To prove their point, Daine does away with Auto-Tune on ‘In Endless Awe…’, having spent their entire career to date using it in abundance. This evolution parallels that of their personal style, which has also drifted away from their previous high-fantasy, club-ready aesthetic into a look that’s more grounded and colourful. “On a day-to-day basis, I’m so normal, and now I feel I’m too cartoony when I dress up too much, so I wanted to be more human,” they say. “The sound also got more human; there’s less vocal distortion, no Auto-Tune. I’ve peeled back these performative layers. Now I’m just human, which is weird.”
Daine is open about their struggles with the social engineering required to be an artist on the album. They take aim at “ridiculous, privileged, underperforming” musicians on ‘White Collar’, calling them “culture’s cloaked assassin”. By the end of the song, the pronouns switch to first person; it turns out Daine is playing the same game.
“I was trying to criticise that voice while acknowledging that I’ve probably been complicit, because I’m in a unique position where I’m able to see these dynamics very intimately,” they say. “I get to hear some of the inner neuroses of these people that are blowing up. These people are sometimes very entitled, rich white kids that have too much free time, and they’re totally neurotic about their creative identities and their personas. It’s a sport to them.”
“Cultural cringe is dying – there is a real hunger from young Australian people for earnest, vulnerable art”
Daine admits they do enjoy aspects of the clout-chasing LA environment – “It’s made me a well-rounded person,” they say – though they claim that such privileged artists are missing “humanity and humour” from their music. “Their shit’s just not funny… if you’re too far removed from real life, there’s no humour. Being authentic? You can’t buy that.”
Daine’s struggles were so essential to making the record that it inspired the album’s oppositional title; today, they say they’re “grateful” for how their career’s gone. “Because it’s been so fucking bad, now it’s Christmas for everybody!” they joke. “It’s like my whole team is on drugs – everyone’s getting high off the hype. I’m grateful that it was shit, because if this happened to me three years ago, I would have expected it, and I would be like those other nepo brats.”
All it took, oddly enough, was to give up control, even in the moments where they felt they had to seize it. Daine acknowledges that it’s paradoxical, but to “give up fully” is to become “more empowered in your own life” and “approach everything with curiosity”.
They recall a recent conversation with friends, where everyone discussed their individual control issues – all except for Daine. “Since being softened by the throes of life, I think I’m pretty good at giving up control, and that’s been great because I went with the flow, and that got me a really good record,” they say. “So… yay!”
Daine’s debut album ‘In Endless Awe and Agony’ is out November 6 via Pack. Records.
Listen to Daine’s exclusive playlist to accompany The Cover below on Spotify or on Apple Music here.
Words: Alex Rigotti
Photography: Dean Podmore
Styling: Cecile Hyunh
Styling Assistance: Maggie Luu
Hair: Xeneb Allen using Kevin Murphy
Makeup: Sarah Fritz
Label: Pack. Records
