BEL! is a pop artist with a love for big feelings, bigger laughs, and even bigger performances.
Raised in Sydney and now based in Melbourne, BEL!’ has spent years shaping her sound through acting, cabaret, and TV production, skills that make her music videos cinematic and her live shows unforgettable.
Her new single ‘Who are You’, is just the start. Whether she’s riding a mechanical bull in a karaoke bar or lighting up queer clubs, BEL! brings heart, humour, and unapologetic energy to everything she does.
HAPPY: What’d you get up to today?
BEL!: I started today how I do everyday, with a swim at the local pool and a big stretch in the steam room.
Then I was in the studio mixing my next track! Yes the rumours are true! Stop Bothering Me out on Jan 6th! Leaked Exclusive lol.
(Yolo… I’ll leak it here ;) ‘Stop Bothering Me’ Out Jan 6th)
HAPPY: Tell us a little about where you’re from, and what you love about it!
BEL!: I grew up on Gadigal Land (Sydney) and moved to Naarm (Melbourne) when I was 18.
I loved being a young adult with lives across two cities. I get the beachy sunny aspects of Sydney and then get to sass it up with the wine and jazz bar culture of Melbourne.
Both Sydney and Melbourne and my people in each city have given me such a good launching pad for my career and for me to be me!
HAPPY: You’ve described your whole life as “steadily walking towards pop music.” How did your experiences in acting, cabaret, and TV production ultimately fuel the artist you are now as BEL!?
BEL!: The music video is an art form I am very much DEDICATED to. Ive always loved nights with my friends watching various video clips until 3 in the morning and I want to contribute to that vast library of works.
I began my TV career as a runner, emptying bins and getting people coffee and slowly I got my hands on more of the projects, finally working as a creative producer!
It’s this experience that has allowed me to make music videos exactly how I imagined them in my head… mechanical bull and all!
Now the acting experience – that is so I can give you a SHOW!
I love performing. I did my first musical at 6 years old where I played a witch (topical) and I fell in love.
I’ve been lucky enough to spend a lot of my adult life performing music, dance and theatre and so the stage feels like my second home.
With this project I have the opportunity to bring this all together and hopefully deliver something unique.
That’s my promise to people who come to a BEL! show.
You are going to get a singular show, I’m going to be speaking to you, present and with you through it all, inviting you in to my world one tune at a time.
Not reciting stuff I’ve said the night before… and ensuring we will all be dancing!
HAPPY: You co-produce your music with Daniel McKenzie and Brad Jackson. What does that collaborative dynamic bring to your sound?
BEL!: Polish, polish, polish!!!!
If you guys heard the demos I made by myself you’d be in hysterics.
We’ve got a good little thing going with the three of us.
I write the song, and then produce a really early demo.
Daniel takes it and does what I call the salt and pepper; He records real instruments over the top and adds to the arrangements, then finally Brad helps me give it the ‘masterful’ tidy of a lifetime. (Pun Intended!)
Genuinely couldn’t do it without them.
HAPPY: With a background in comedy and musical theatre, how do you balance the “comedy edge” in your songs with the goal of making people genuinely feel and dance?
BEL!: It’s always focusing on truth. Life can be funny, it can also be heartbreaking and joyous and scary.
In my music I try to allow all of those feelings to come through.
I’ve always been someone who feels things in a big way and I hope when people listen to my music they feel free to feel too.
Whether that be the fun, silly moments in their day or the vulnerable ones.
HAPPY: As the second track in your ‘anxious-in-love’ trilogy, how does ‘Who are you?’ advance the storyline from the office-daydream phase of ‘Obsessed W U’?
BEL!: Obsessed W U and Who are you? Were both written in the same month, I had a crush and I was being crushed by it.
Each of these songs examines budding love from a different angle.
Obsessed W U is all about that initial spark and the excitement. Then comes Who are you? The other side of that feeling. Where curiosity brings doubt and mystery, it’s when the cynicism starts to creep in, where you become tactful and maybe play hard to get.
The battle between that feeling and fear as you try to wrap your head around it all.
HAPPY: The music video for ‘Who are you?’ has just come out. How does the video bring this karaoke bar fantasy to life?
BEL!: The day I met my partner, they walked into the bar and I felt transported, not like I was in some dingy karaoke bar in inner city Melbourne, but like I was seeing a cowboy walk through saloon doors.
This was the concept that sparked how the video came to life!
I hunted down a bar that had a mechanical bull, Shout Outs to Moondog in Footscray, and my dear friend and DirecorCielo (who directs all my videos) and I got to work creating the story.
He even used the same lens used in the Good, the Bad and the Ugly.
We came up with the idea for me to play both characters so I could ride the bull maximum times in the video.
View this post on Instagram
HAPPY: Having debuted at Gaytimes Festival, what does performing for and being embraced by the LGBTQIA+ community mean for you and your music’s message?
BEL!: It means everything. To be embraced by the community. I’m pansexual and I grew up as the only Queer person in my group at school.
My childhood was great, however it wasn’t until I moved to Melbourne and met other members of the LGBTQIA+ community that the final pieces of the puzzle clicked for me.
Queer clubs and parties have given me community, made me feel joy and safety, and I want my music and concerts to be that for younger LGBTQIA+ people.
My music is all about self acceptance, and I want Queer people to hear my stories and know that it’s a great thing to be Queer and they should be proud and excited for what the future will hold.
HAPPY: Your gig at Brunswick Artist Bar is billed as a “chiller vibe.” How will that intimate show differ from your planned album launch parties at The Quadraphonic Club and Oxford Arts Factory?
BEL!: I’m a party girl at heart, in the words of Charlie XCX “365.” So for my album launch parties next year I want to emulate the clubs I like to go to.
I’m going to have a Drag Queen as my opener, followed by an Iconic Aussie Pop Girly (who will be announced early next year) then followed by some of my favourite DJ’s.
So expect to shake ass and make some new friends in the bathroom queue!!!
My gig at Brunswick Artist Bar will be chiller, but still the BEL! version of chill (the energizer bunny was my nickname in school.)
So it’ll be an acoustic guitar, but still expect a hearty giggle as you hear the behind the scenes stories of each of my songs!
HAPPY: Lastly, what makes you happy?
BEL!: Connecting with people.
I really love performing. It is such a big reason why I do this.
Yes, the writing and the producing are fabulous but I really love to perform and part of what I like about it is my ability to reach people.
Connecting with people makes me happy as an artist however it is also something that brings me great joy in my personal life.
I am definitely what you see is what you get, I am loud and rambunctious and unapologetically those things, but I do like and enjoy seeking out people who appear a bit more shy.
People who maybe feel that they don’t have that place.
I get immense satisfaction from bringing that same rambunctiousness and loudness out in others.
Shy people always have the funniest asides you just have to be listening!
