The Endless Quest

Photographs By Chance Warhol

Sydney/Los Angeles based musician ILUKA opens up about coming to terms with her unconventional life, a magic garden, and her latest album, “Queen of Turbulent Hearts”.

Sydney, Australia

Photographs taken in Los Angeles, USA

Who is Iluka and what is your music about?

Iluka is me, originally just my middle name and now all-encompassing of my music and creative world. The songs I write are about cracked hearts and cowboys and sinners and star-crossed lovers and the sweet abandon of youth in all its glory and confusion. They’re about bitterness turned into beauty and innocence turned into a kind of wisdom and most of all, they’re always about hope… even if it’s just a tiny slither peeking through a crack in the pavement.

What was your journey as a musician like in your early years? How were you influenced?

My Dad is a songwriter and musician, now a guitar builder too, so as a kid I was always surrounded by music. There was always a guitar in the corner of my room and I began banging on the piano for hours as a 4-year-old singing these non-sensical ditties with this wild grin and a dishevelled blonde bob. These progressed into writing more fully formed songs that I would record on Dad’s 12 track desk from when I was 7. He’d play the instruments at that point and I’d write the lyrics and the melodies. We recorded albums and albums worth of songs together which is pretty special…

How did growing up in Australia nurture your creativity and music?

I spent a lot of time as a kid growing up on a property outside of Sydney in an area called the Blue Mountains where there was miles and miles of green rolling hills to roam around in, daydreaming and exploring and getting up to trouble with my older brother. There was ‘the magic garden’ which was the garden next to the house and there were horses that I’d ride with Mum through the pine forests and there was the endless jamming with Dad out on the veranda (a porch for you) then my favourite part – the lying out under the stars at night with Dad as he’d tell us about the different constellations and planets up in the sky. It was truly magical and allowed my creativity and music to pour out so uninhibited. I think I always had a lot of big feelings as a kid, feelings perhaps I didn’t know how to communicate except through creativity and music. Having the space to explore those parts of myself that were perhaps otherwise quite daunting to some, really made me who I am today.

You are sharing your debut album, "Queen of Turbulent Hearts". What is this album about? What kind of story are you trying to tell?

This album is a culmination of the messy, strange, turbulent but beautiful journey I’ve been on as an artist. It’s about coming to terms with the unconventional life that I’ve chosen for myself. It’s about the endless quest for the muse no matter how dizzying it may be and inevitably being okay with getting burned in the process. It’s about love in all its mysterious forms and the breaking of the heart in all it’s unbearable throbbing. It’s about the longing and the fragility of it all. I want to live in a way where I’m unafraid of feeling it all, so that those expansive feelings become my music and hopefully help others to feel something too. Whatever that may be.

How does this album show your growth as a musician?

If you were to hear the first song I recorded as a 7-year-old next to the songs on the record, I think you’d (hopefully) hear a big difference! I think just growing up and having your heart broken and experiencing real grief and getting burned by life in general has infused my music with a kind of richness and vitality that definitely wasn’t there before. I think the more of life you experience, the deeper you can cut through in your art. That’s how I feel anyway.

What was the recording process like? What were some highs and lows?

The recording process was fragmented and messy because a lot of it was done long distance. My producer is in LA and I was meant to be there in person working on it, however wasn’t able to get back over from Australia when the world went into lockdown. Somehow though we made it work and pulled all the pieces together. I think one of the highs was finally meeting him in person when I was in LA a few weeks ago because we had spent so much time together virtually but had never met in person! I’m am so proud of what we made and what we achieved during such a strange time in the world so it was a really lovely moment.

What is next for you?

I’m currently on tour in Australia and then will be heading back to the US more permanently in July for more shows and to start working on the next album.