“It’s awesome,” she says on her current hefty touring schedule. “When I looked at all those dates I thought it would be quite daunting and tiring, but I don’t feel tired at all. I’m just excited to tour.”
In terms of original compositions, it’s not just Get Ready that’s being thrown into the mix. “I guess I’m playing a few more of my own tracks, ones I haven’t released yet, and putting them into the set. I’m still playing stuff I like, it’s just a set is always changing,” she reasons.
Though both acts had been well established in their respective Sydney base, Wonderland’s team-up with Fishing was a result of a happenstance festival meet-up. “Well I’d already made the track and I wanted it to be an instrumental, but people suggested I should get someone to rap on it. I sent it to friends in New York to have a go at it, but to me it wasn’t right. I didn’t want to put anything out that I thought was good but not amazing. I bumped into the Fishing guys at Groovin’ The Moo and I showed them the track and asked if they were interested in rapping, because I heard they ruled at that. Two days later they sent me an amazing vocal back, reminding me a little bit of Beastie Boys, a little bit of Das Racist. I knew that was probably the right fit.”
Alison Wonderland’s shift from solely DJ work to a production output was a natural move, as she explains. “Well funnily enough, I’ve been producing as long as I’ve been DJing, just never under the name Alison Wonderland. I would put stuff out and no one knew who it was, and if they liked the music, they liked the music. There was nothing there to influence their opinion on it. [DJing and production] are very different. When you’re writing music, it’s very selfish. I go crazy, everyone goes crazy, but in a good way. You need to be that way to bring out the stuff inside you that wouldn’t normally come out. Then you have to hyper-focus on things like snares and kicks, that drives you a little mental. But in terms of what I select to DJ, that’s the stuff I love and makes me want to dance. I’ve always thought that if I’m excited about a track, then maybe other people will be.”
Wonderland’s creative output is shaped by a refined palate, encompassing a broad and passionate musical intake from across the globe. “I’m always a big fan of hip hop, so I’ve been playing that for a long time. There’s a lot of bad trap music out there, but there’s also some good stuff that doesn’t have those bad fuzzy synths,” Alison assesses, pausing to let out a sigh of disgust. “I’m very open minded in what I choose. If I really like the track, I’ll play it and find a way to work it into my set. I’m really liking Ryan Hemsworth a lot. Then again, at SXSW I was exposed to more music than if I was just checking blogs and Soundclouds. I really got into Rat King. They’re amazing. I went and saw them at Glass Lounge a few weeks later because I loved them so much.”
With Get Ready gaining plenty of traction, Wonderland has a renewed focus when it comes to the next evolutionary step. “There’s an album in the future, so that’s a big goal of mine. Then there’s the plan to do a live show after the album, so hopefully people like it. They’re my short term goals. But my goals are to learn as much as I can about my craft, just keep working every day. Finding out new things, to me, is a big achievement because there are so many things you can learn along the way when you’re producing. I just want to get these songs out there,” she declares. “It’s like waiting for an egg to hatch, and now it feels like I’ve been waiting too long.”
BY LACHLAN KANONIUK
