Interview: Stepping into the BIGSOUND spotlight Brisbane’s Visionary Koady remains DIY all the way.
- Tessa Fleur
- 11 minutes ago
- 8 min read
The Magandjin/Brisbane-based producer, songwriter and filmmaker originally hailing from North Queensland, stepped into the Australian music scene in 2024 with his debut single “Prozac”. He has since continued developing his unique aesthetic world, intuitively twining music with captivating visuals over the last three years. "Do it yourself " as he puts it, not a slogan but an ethos he's carried since his childhood, building a world from the ground up on his own terms.
I caught up with Koady two weeks out from BIGSOUND. Freshly arrived back home from his 9 to 5 appearing grounded despite the chaotic array of tasks closing in around him. He describes the month leading up to the showcase week as a blur of life admin, EP video edits and prepping his next single, all squeezed around a full-time job as a graphic design coordinator.
"Honestly, not that much music-related stuff," he laughs, before mentioning that the actual music has felt like the smallest part of it. He mentions that ‘relief’ is still weeks away, not until BIGSOUND itself is done and dusted.
Koady spent his childhood growing up in Mackay, North Queensland. Raised by a practical, hardworking family, Koady was the outlier who was drawn to creativity, with few places to go and an abundance of time to fill.
“I grew up in Mackay in Northern Queensland, I had a lot of time to myself. I grew up in a cane farm area with pretty much just family around which was super nice. I don't regret it at all. It really fostered an environment for doing DIY type stuff. I got really into making videos, making art and drawing, ever since I can remember. That was probably the most pure form of creation I've ever done because it was really only for myself. My childhood definitely played a massive role in why I still make stuff now and the enjoyment I get out of it.”
I was curious what kind of videos he made as a kid and what he made them on.
"Literally the dumbest shit possible. I definitely had a little era in high school where you'd make YouTube videos. I've got a couple of old things on my old iPods and stuff. I honestly don't even know what to call them. You'd call them short films, but they were just random stuff. And I would play all the actors and stuff."
After finishing high school, Koady knew he wanted to keep making things. This meant leaving Mackay behind and moving to Brisbane where he enrolled at The Queensland University of Technology, initially studying Design. I asked him when music came into the picture and unsurprisingly, it was his love of film that guided him towards it.
"It was still definitely that whole film side of things. My favourite and most inspiring thing art-wise, was probably music in cinema. That crossover of soundtracks and stuff like that. So that was sort of what got me into music in the first place. Trying to make music for my own videos that I was making… meeting people at uni who were doing music and talking to them and realising this is something you can do without knowing everything”.
Partway through his course Koady swapped majors and landed into a music degree, guided by his own curiosity with no formal background in it whatsoever.
"My parents would have been like 'What the fuck?'...I didn't do any music in high school or ever before then. All of a sudden I just got into making music, honestly the first year I moved to Brisbane."
This year Koady has released two singles “Landscaper” and “Hello”. Three years and three singles in, Koady's growth in writing and producing his own music is noticeable. Where his debut single released in 2024 “Prozac” felt raw and self-contained and his two latest singles reach for something bigger with layered guitars, stacked vocal harmonies, a real wall of sound built with more emphasis in dynamics and percussive textures that give the production a more dreamier feel. I asked Koady what changed between then and now.
"They were made over a pretty long period of time and I think the growth if anything sonically, really just comes from the time of growing and learning more about production and being able to maybe achieve the different things I want to achieve more than I used to. They've all pretty much just been made in my bedroom alone."
With two new singles out and one more on the way in early September, I asked Koady if these releases culminate into something bigger.
"They are part of my first EP which will come out later this year, at a date that'll be announced soon I assume, once I figure it out. But yeah, I'm super proud of it. It's pretty much the first thing that I've actually finished and followed through with. A good stepping stone to more things hopefully."
Koady made a conscious choice to give some of his solitude away, at least a little. Once it came time to finish the songs of his EP he got Hamish Mitchell (Armlock) to mix the tracks. It was the first time Koady had let someone else touch the faders.
"I mixed my first single by myself but with this stuff I sort of just wanted to get someone else's ear on it. Hamish mixed the tracks and then put some additional production in. There were times I pretty much gave him creative control because I just love his project. They've had my favourite records for the past two years."
Mastering went to Greg Obis, best known for his work with MJ Lenderman, Slow Pulp, Wishy and Twine. I asked Koady how he went about reaching out to him and of course, it was in the most DIY possible way.
"I just reached out to him. I sort of thought, who's the coolest guy I could probably get to do this? And I'll just reach out and it worked."
Koady’s eye for detail and visual aesthetic is unmistakably unique and not limited to his single releases. Vlogs, photography, everything he puts out carries the same visual identity. Braille and coded overlays on juxtaposing visuals between the natural world and the sterile, synthetic-industrial spaces and not to mention his bold and moody colourgrading style. I asked Koady why high quality visuals are integral in expressing the music.
"I think when I got really inspired, like really getting into different artists in the later years of high school, all those artists I liked were people who had really strong visual identities. Around 2018 and 2019 I was listening to a lot of Jean Dawson. Underscores were a bit later but I've always loved their world building. The whole Brockhampton era too, Kevin Abstract and all that. I loved that. But these people were always from other countries and it almost felt like Australia was always catching up when it came to really visual-driven projects. It's pretty much just what I, as a teenager, was really inspired by. What I thought was cool back then is basically the ethos for what I want to make now."
Video-making for Koady remains a one-man operation and a choice with its own real trade-offs. With no crew around to assist and no DOP (Director of Photography) for a second opinion on creative shots and angles, the process is slow and long. But that's exactly what makes Koady's work so unique and instinct-driven.
"I've got to pray that when I put it into DaVinci it's in focus or I can bring it back. But shooting by yourself does help you make decisions you might not have made with a big crew around."
"Honestly, it's a pretty holistic approach which makes the process way more manic and almost impossible not to do DIY. I never start out with a full vision for what's gonna be in the music video. It just builds and builds, sometimes while I'm still making the song. I'll go shoot some stuff, bring it in, see how it looks and think, what would be the coolest thing to happen right here and then go find a place to film it and add it in."
For some artists the DIY path is a financial necessity. For others, it's about enjoyment and creative control, or both. I asked Koady why he stayed DIY and what it actually costs and what it gives back.
"Growing up without those collaborative environments, coming from a place where expressing yourself that way wasn't as open as it is in Brisbane both opportunity-wise and people to share that with. But it's also just having full creative control. I get to immerse people into the exact thing I want them to be immersed into. It's almost an unhealthy pact I've made with myself. I want to do everything myself. I'm trying to get past that a bit with the next project, and collaborate more in studio sessions. But I also just love watching stuff people do all by themselves. You can have the coolest music video ever with a massive record label and a big budget, way more grandiose. But when you know something's made all by yourself there's a feeling behind it you can't really get any other way."
Brisbane’s very own BIGSOUND is approaching its 25th year as the largest music industry event in the southern hemisphere, showcasing 100 emerging artists from Australia and New Zealand. As for what a slot like this means for Koady, this early in his career, he doesn't reach for anything grand.
"A lot of the time when you're making stuff, you don't really know if people are actually liking it. It sort of confirms that you're doing something right, that it's connecting with people in some way."
It's also, he admits, a rare chance to sit in a room with people who understand the business side he'd rather not think about at all.
"It's good to be able to meet people at this conference who know more about the business side than I do because I don't really enjoy that part that much."
Koady’s priority within his four-piece band is still working out how to fold his visual world into a stage set, something that's proven trickier than filming alone ever was.
"We're pretty much a four-piece band, and that's what we're trying to figure out at the moment how to incorporate some visual elements into the live show. I've still never done a headline gig of any kind, I've only ever opened for people over the past couple of years. The main thing that'll let me do a proper one is finding a venue that can accommodate heavily incorporating that visual element."
It was wonderful getting to know more about Koady during this Interview. Pior to chatting we did a photoshoot together and it was a joy watching him fearlessly jump into dense bushes, getting up and close to spiders and doing what ever felt right in the moment. It's those instincts that drives everything he creates.
I Finally asked Koady where he'd play if he could choose anywhere in the world, and of course, there's no place quite like home.
"Honestly, probably Mackay, I just being able to go back there and play, maybe some sort of festival. It would just be funny, and it would sort of feel like... I did it."
You can catch Koady at BIGSOUND across the week performing two unoffical showcases on Tuesday and performing two official showcases between Wedneday and Thursday. Details are displayed on the show poster below.
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