Natasha Vomit is a Melbourne-based sound artist, pop star and creative visionary with a colourful spectrum of musical collaborators, who’s spent the past five years performing in various electronically-inclined projects. In 2014 she went solo, emerging as EN.V, a mesmerisingly body-positive performer with a fierce aesthetic who could be found playing regular live shows around her home city of Melbourne. Last year EN.V released her debut EP Ur Future is Bright, a collection of sexy, paired back, nuanced techno tracks,winning over a new legion of fans in the process. As an artist, Natasha openly and genuinely explores her own experiences in terms of sexuality, mental health and vulnerability, using her music as a way of decoding and working through these issues, and hopefully helping her listeners do the same.
As we premiere the video for EN.V’s brand new single, Anxiety is the New LBD from her forthcoming EP Keep on Fighting, Jack Mannix sat down with Natasha to discuss her song-writing process, influences, feminism and doing things her way.
i-D: How would you explain EN.V to someone not familiar with your work?
Natasha: EN.V is my first solo project, or rather, a more self-directed approach to music-making that isn’t necessarily ‘solo’. It’s an outlet to release my frustrations by creating music that gives me physical and internal reactions, good and bad. I live for what exists beyond constant opposition and find that what is ‘in between’ can often be more confronting. I want to explore that in my music and in my words. I make the music with Luis CL, who also plays in Zanzibar Chanel, GlamouRatz, Cheap Present and various other groups, but the ideas we explore and indulge are mine. I just tell Luis what to do, or get him to do it when I can’t.
Where did the title Ur Future is Bright come from?
This title comes from a moment a few years ago while I was looking at my school report cards from beginning to end and reflecting. I was interested that my first report card said ‘Natasha’s future is bright, Natasha loves to share knowledge’, but then the following year my report card was so different! It said ‘Natasha gets upset when others do not share’ and as the years went on it just got worse. I questioned deeply when reading these reports, why no-one around me acknowledged the fundamental shift in my attitude towards the world. As Ur Future is Bright was my first ‘solo’ release, I wanted to acknowledge to myself that my future had always been bright, it was really the world around me that started to get nastier and harsher as adult life approached.
Your new video for Anxiety is the new LBD, made by yourself and GlamouRatz bandmate Adam Hammad, like your previous video for Computer Sprite, is quite abstract and conceptual. You don’t show your face in either video whereas your press shots are relatively intimate. Are these conscious decisions?
I decided I didn’t want to show my face in videos yet because I’m not actually making this music to be about my face or my appearance or access to fashion and resources. I don’t really have a production budget or much financial access and I really don’t want to lie about it before I can actually create the wild visual concepts and ideas I have. I want to do the ideas and the people I work with justice. I love working with Adam for so many reasons. He’s a genius and my friend, but we also have a visual connection without the need for a ‘mood-board’. Like, we sit down and talk about things, we show a few pictures and then have a glass of champagne! And then when we make things together it always turns out so much more extra than we both expected, so I don’t really wanna let go of that magic. Adam really inspires me because we are both our own muses and that demands respect. For this video I told him I had a vision of “a striptease styled by A Current Affair” and he just said, “OMG yes!” and this is what came out of it.
EN.V, Anxiety is the New LBD
Speaking of your aesthetic and imagery, I’ve noticed a consistent message of sex/body positivity and femme empowerment. Is this something that comes naturally to you and have you always had a healthy relationship with your body and sexuality, if you’re comfortable discussing this.
My relationship with my body coincides with my relationship to music. I was in constant denial of how much I enjoyed creating music, as much as I was in constant denial about the health of my body and my own perception of my body. I was bullied in high school for reasons which are thankfully now, in some ways, actually celebrated in youth culture. For example I’ve always actually dressed however I want, regardless of what other people thought, which some people read as confidence, but that doesn’t mean I was actually confident. Now I finally do feel a confidence in my body, after experiencing so much illness and trauma, I realise that this is my one ‘meat sack’ and I’d better start to enjoy being in it and try to look after it, because it will always be mine. I also use imagery like this because I think it’s important for people to understand that displays of sensuality and sexuality does not equal consent. To look ‘horny’ does not mean that you deserve a horny stranger’s paws on you – we need to respect each others’ bodies. Also I just want to say: slut-shaming doesn’t work if you aren’t ashamed of being a slut!
That’s great advice. Another common theme throughout your work is strength-through-vulnerability and hope-despite-struggle. How do you feel about the idea that artists have a responsibility in terms of the messages they promote?
Because I’ve always felt like I’ve been struggling: whether financially, mentally or physically, I find it very hard to not share those feelings post-struggle. For example, when I come out the other end, I want to tell everyone how to get across, I want to make sure it never happens again. I want to find power for myself and others in the negativity that we experience. I wear my hurt with pride because it makes me resilient and prevents me from becoming a creature of habit. I think as well, because I am disconnected in many ways from family, culture and identity, and that because of my poor economic standing, I become disconnected from society. I find that hope is sometimes the only thing that gets me through, and when you hear someone else talk about it, it validates you in a way that the world doesn’t. I also think if you are being indulgent and selfish by creating music it is also your responsibility to offset that in some way by being involved with communities and structures outside of your own personal ‘gain’.
EN.V, Computer Sprite, made by Alden Epp.
Who are some other current local artists who you admire?
I really admire Callan and am so proud of what she has achieved. I also adore Claudette from GlamouRatz, she is just so talented! She blows me away – such beauty, such grace, I am so glad and lucky to play music with her.
What does the future hold for EN.V?
Callan and I are planning a split record which is conceptually about sisterhood and I’m releasing a new EP, Keep on Fighting soon. There’s a tour near the end of the year and I’ll continue to do what I always do, trying and crying, cos I got to keep on fighting.
EN.V’s new 12″ EP Keep on Fighting is out soon through DERO Arcade. Split 12″ with Callan due later this year.
You can catch EN.V live as shelaunches Anxiety Is The New LBD alongside Ah Mer Ah Su (NYC) & DJ Sezzo Snot at Hugs&Kisses Friday April 14th 11pm.
Credits
Text and photography Jack Mannix