Appearing at BIGSOUND in September, and a staunch Ableton user, we spoke to her about her creative workflow and motivation behind doing as much as she does!
Mincy is doing it all, being both a musician and producer, as well as running her own label, day parties and now leading workshops for female and gender non conforming musicians, allowing them a leg up in the industry.
Mincy, thanks for taking the time! You’re a musician of course, while also running a record label, Extra Spicy, and Dayshift day parties. What motivates you to do it all yourself?
I’ve always been a big believer in creating your own opportunities. A lot of the time when it came to creating things like creating my label or some of the events I’ve run, those sorts of things didn’t exist when I started them here in Sydney. I’ve always felt super rewarded by welcoming other artists into the communities I build and helping them grow too which fuels a lot of the motivation.
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Can you speak a bit about your beginnings in music?
If we’re going to back to the real beginning, I played clarinet in the school band way back in primary school! But I unfortunately didn’t stick with it so a lot of that music theory knowledge got lost along the way. I have been fortunate enough though to come from a very musically passionate family – particularly my dad who has shaped a lot of my earlier listening with early electronic, rock and metal. That morphed pretty quickly into an obsession with dance music, and I followed that passion over to the UK where I spent many many years hitting every dance floor I could to soak it up. I came back from there and was ready to hit the ground running in Sydney.
Can you walk us through how a song starts for you, such as your new single “Bad Girl”?
I’m pretty low maintenance when it comes to how I create music – I work entirely on Ableton from my laptop with a pair of headphones – no MIDI controllers and no hardware. I don’t generally go in with much of a plan and just let it happen organically, Generally that means starting with drums and working my way out from there. With “Bad Girl” I went in with the intention to make something a little less club focused than what I would usually output, which worked! But sometimes I do end up making the exact opposite of what I set out to do.
How do you find people to collaborate with on your songs?
Most of the time the collaboration process starts online – I tend to find most of the artists I look to work with while scrolling around. Other times people have reached out, or have been recommended to me. A lot of the producers I work with are friends I’ve DJ’d with or hung around with long enough to know we are on the same wavelength.
Ableton workshops
What does it mean to you to be running beginner Ableton workshops for female and gender non conforming musicians and artists?
I’ve spent a lot of my career shooting online about trying to get more women into male dominated spaces in the music industry, whether that be DJing, producing or event promoting. After a while there’s only so much you can yap on about before you need to really do something to push forward positive change – which is where the workshop idea came from. I’m really looking forward to running these, it feels like we’ll be bringing genuine change to the scene, and the response has been insane already. It’s feeling like it might be the start of something much bigger which is really exciting, and having Ableton backing it has been a huge blessing to allow it to be accessible to everyone.
You’re showcasing at Bigsound in September, what can attendees expect from a Mincy set?
I’m looking forward to bringing loads of new music I’ve been working on behind the scenes! Lots of different sounds I’ve been playing with, some new collaborations, and really looking forward to being a part of the panel there where we will be discussing building communities within the music scene.
Keep up with Mincy and everything she’s doing to serve the scene here.
