Inspired #280 - SANNIA
Emerging Melbourne artist SANNIA has released her first music since 2019 with new single ‘Love You Like’ - a dreamy hook filled heartbreak anthem that was born in lockdown, and inspired by Netflix. She took a moment to talk to us about the inspirations behind her music.
Who are your top three musical inspirations and why?
Lady Gaga – as a brunette, 5’2, piano playing, Italian-Australian singer with a regretfully prominent nose, I’ve always identified in more ways than one with Lady Gaga. I found comfort and drew similarities between her dragging her keyboard around bars in New York, and me wheeling my keyboard on and off the Frankston line train. At seventeen I reached a crossroads where I had to choose between going into composition or a ‘serious’ job and continuing to sing, and I felt quite alone, almost like I was doomed to fail. But then I watched an interview where Lady Gaga was discussing how she was constantly told she would never be the leading role, the blonde bombshell, the star of the show, and that she wasn’t cut out for music, words that had been spoken to me just a few days earlier, and watching her cut down anyone projecting their doubts onto her, and listing her successes gave me hope that maybe if I’m that persistent (my family would call it stubborn!) that I’ll get there too.
Michael Hutchence – in high school while everyone was discovering Edward Cullen and the Hemsworth brothers, I stumbled across the INXS Live Baby Live at Wembley Stadium DVD. I was completely draw to (in love with) Michael Hutchence, his stage presence, his energy and confidence, his vocal delivery, and his use of metaphor in his lyrics. I bought so many biographies about him, books studying his writing, I was and still am a bit spellbound by his energy. I’m still devastated by his passing
Ray Charles – when I was a child I listened to three or four Ray Charles CDs on repeat, I had no idea he was blind I just enjoyed the music, and thought he really loved wearing sunglasses (oh to be eight years old). But once it was eventually pointed out to my child self by someone older and wiser, I was mind-blown to put it shortly. I started practising piano with a blind fold over my eyes, practising in the dark just to see what it’s like to play piano without any sight. It drove my family insane but I think it made me a better musician and helped me develop my ear. And also now as an adult, looking back at what he was able to achieve as a disabled black man in the middle of the Civil Rights Era in America is nothing short of inspirational.
Is there a certain film that inspires you and why?
In a lot of ways I’d say I’m inspired by every film. I wanted to be a film score composer for the longest time growing up, it’s really where I wanted to work so media has always been a big part of my life, I’m very easily moved by good cinema, particularly by good soundtracks, and I think they all move me in different ways. If I’ve watched a biographical film on a musician or artist, it motivates me to create my own music and to fight for my work in a similar way to that artist. Or sometimes I’ll be so touched by a narrative or a character that I want to write about them, about the part of their story that wasn’t old, or maybe write from their perspective. I’m a cinephile through and through.
What city do you find the most inspiring and why?
I think for me I’d have to say London, I spent a week there two years ago and I just couldn’t stop writing, and I think I could attribute a lot of that to the feeling that there was so much going on, 24/7, people everywhere and there’s so much history all around you in that city. One afternoon I just sat down on the steps of Trafalgar Square watching a busker and this crowd of people hanging off his every word and it was actually not just the city and the never-ending culture but also just the fact there was so much music, and so many active supporters on every corner that I found really inspiring. It almost calls you to create.
Who is the most inspiring person to you and why?
There’s so many, but the first one that came to mind maybe just because of the time of year is Princess Diana, despite her struggles with mental illness and fractious relationship with the power structure she married into she was able to reach out and touch millions of people that felt lost or troubled, she did incredible work for children in war-town countries exposing the dangers of landmines, and by shaking the hand of a man diagnosed with AIDS at a time where it was highly stigmatised in the media. She had no political agenda, no personal reason, she just wanted to help people – she drew from her own personal suffering to connect with others at their darkest and genuinely wanted to help them through. That kind of empathic love for others is inspirational to me.
What were your inspirations when writing your new track?
Funnily enough, and perhaps unexpectedly considering my earlier answer but it was actually a Netflix documentary on Amy Winehouse (Amy, 2015). I was really taken aback by the revelation that Amy’s partner checked her out of rehab because he wanted someone to get high with. I thought about it for days afterwards, how it seemed as though she was more addicted to him than the drugs, but he was just as toxic. It’s where the concept of loving someone like an addict came from for me and I ended up writing this song a couple of days later in the middle of that 112-day Melbourne lockdown in 2020.
How would you like to inspire people?
I never presume to be inspirational, I think I’m a pretty average human being living in a pretty weird time, but if I were to inspire anyone to do something I think it would be to understand that you can literally do what you want to do, you can be a musicians if you want to, you can write songs if you want to, there are no limitations on yourself except the ones you place there – if you want something, just keep working towards it. And to anyone already out there making music I would say that the only thing you have to do is create the best representation of yourself through your art – you don’t have to try to become anyone else, you just need to embrace who you already are. God I sound like Dr Phil.