ILUKA is an Australian indie pop-star who isn’t afraid to speak her mind In her debut album, “The Wild, The Innocent & The Raging.” This album reflects her ability to not conform to others’ expectations, and is a myriad of her pent-up rage as well as an intimate insight into her creative mind from start to finish. In a celebration of femininity and authenticity, this album is a fearless retelling of her story through her endeavors of moving from Australia to Los Angeles and the continuation of self-discovery.

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In an exclusive interview with The Teen Magazine, I talked with ILUKA all about her album in the days leading up to its release- it's visual, sonic worlds, and the process behind it's creation. As a young woman, listening to ILUKA talk about the importance of authenticity was so refreshing in a world where one-dimensional personalities are put on a pedestal. Talking with her felt so natural, on top of being a phenomenal artist she truly is such an amazing person I had gotten the chance to speak with.

“Being a little messy is so important as women because we are so socialized to think that we are supposed to have it all figured out-the one-dimensional, the, "this is who I am" cut out perfect version when we're multidimensional. I wanted that to come up in the album-the true messiness of being preachy, then saying that, “I don’t know what the f*** I'm doing, do I belong here?

The Meaning Behind the Title

The title of this album itself strikes you as soon as you see it- "The Wild, The Innocent, And the Raging". Those three words represent their own complex stories throughout the album. But, to ILUKA, the one that resonates the most with this record is wild.

“For the first time in this record I felt like I had this freedom to express and be angry, or-kinda uninhibited, unchanged, a freedom. Freedom in the sense of writing a song like "Hard To Love Me", made me think "this is a very scary thing to say" cause obviously it's a fear and shadow of mine that I am too much and hard to love. What I really love about that and in general is being wild and being able to say all of the scary things.”

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Breaking down the Album Cover: 'Wild' Girlhood

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Overview

Just at a glance at the album cover, there's so much to unpack. From the the horse’s expression, the vastness of the desert, and, the gothic nature of her outfit, ILUKA had a very in depth and complex vision for how the cover had represented the whole album in itself.

She gave me very well thought out and passionate responses as to what each of the elements of the cover represented. She told me in general, it represented the ragy world that encapsulates “The Wild, The Innocent, and the Raging”- relating the cover back to songs such as ‘Cry Evil’, and ‘Wings’. She said to me that, “in a “woman-gone-made sense”, it [the cover] perfectly suited the sonic world.”

Element 1: Setting of the Desert

"The tone of the album is this vastness, so that was the first thing that drew me to the image we were going to, I wanted the landscape to be vast, I wanted to be outside so I could feel the scope of this vastness to go with the lush sonic worlds and the whole album.”

She said that the metaphor for the desert as a “Wide expanse of nothingness” was a telling of where she felt when she started the album, having nothing, and building from there.

Element 2: Her outfit and Witchy appearance

As she donned a beautiful long black gown, designed and created by a close friend, ILUKA herself represents the gothic elements of the album contrasted with its background. She told me the dress represented the “exploration of dark, more gothic places in the album,”. Contrasting with the background, she said it captured the perfect “witchy saloon vibe”.

Additionally, she also told me that she styled all of her own clothing as well as pulling from her close friend's designs for the visuals of this album!

Element 3: The Horse, “Chip”

"I've always been a huge horse girlie,"

She laughed as she told me the story of how the dusty surroundings of the album cover came to be. She had explained that Chip, the horse in the photo, had grown restless as the picture was getting ready to be taken, and, he started kicking up dirt and putting his head donw. She told me the result was, "An image of wildness and freedom" that she had strived for this album to be a symbol of.

She described the addition of a horse as a metaphor for,

“freedom, wanting to break free from something, and again, ties to the certain Americana nostalgia".

The Perseverance of her Artistry and The Creative Process

ILUKA is very vocal when it comes to difficult conversations and saying, “all of the scary things” as she's grown as an artist. During the creation of this album, She had been told by her old management to not release the track, 'Haunted One'.

But, she did anyway.

“I didn’t have a label anymore, or any kind of team, and I was going through a breakup in this city where no one really knows me. So like, who cares?” -ILUKA

Releasing the snippets of 'Haunted One' completely changed the trajectory of the album's creation, and led her to find her voice amid the chaos.

“Everyones like, "Did you have this plan for even with the visuals [for the album]-and to be honest, seeing how many people were connecting with it kept it going. It made me think- what if I kept showing up even more and what is authentic to me. There wasn't a team being like, “we're gonna do- this, this, and this”- After ‘Haunted One’ I started writing ‘Cry Evil’ and I'm saying all of these things that needed to be said that I wouldn't have if I had a team, or if I was in Australia.”

This became the catalyst for what the album would grow to be, and,

“The more I kept showing up unapollagetically and uncensored, it led to the next thing and the next thing.”

Fan Connections

As a result of the popularity of 'Wings' on Tiktok, ILUKA had created an open verse challenge in which her fans could duet/stitch the Titktok of her first verse and add on their own renditions. When asked about her favorite versions and from the fans, she said the personal ones.

"That’s what it's all about”, she told me as she stressed the importance of community and building a space within all of her music for her fans. She said that the trend fostered a deeper connection of fans that communicated with her personally how 'Wings' had helped them, and how they related it to their experiences.

When asked about how she wanted her fans to feel after listening to the album, she told me most importantly that she wanted them to feel free,

“Free to be authentic and to express, whether that is rage, or joy, just to feel in their body and free to express authentically and show up in thier own unique way.” She told specifically in Witch Girls, shown in the music video and in the song itself- it’s a, “celebration of, you know, inner freak and weirdness, and just having fun with it!”

An “Outsider” Perspective

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As our conversation continued, she opened up on how the idea of being an ‘outsider’ influenced the creation of her album. Throughout the record, she told me that she questioned where she belonged in the world- her own, Los Angeles, and sonically as she built the album. She admitted that she often “danced around not feeling like I quite fit.”

She told me that she’d always loved theatricality. Growing up being a sensitive person she felt she needed to express herself in big ways in areas where she felt she couldn't. She revealed how that feeling of having to be smaller, and ‘dile it back’ contributed to her feeling like an outsider,

“I always felt, coming up in the indie music scene in Australia that I needed to rein it in--almost saying the thing. This is the first chance where I didn't have to reign it in. Even the scope of the sonic world is big and expansive. That's just from being in a place where I can let it all loose.”

Instead of shrinking herself, she was able to utilize her ‘outsider’ feelings as a force of creativity to structure the album’s sonic and visual senses, taking reference from the world around her, and allowing these childhood feelings to guide the universe as it was created in this record.

Creative Influences-Visually and Sonically

Music videos and World Building

“The Wild, The Innocent, & The Raging” is an album so beautifully crafted from start to finish, and it takes you to this gothic, romantic realm with each listen. I was honestly blown away even before listening to the whole record in its entirety- her close attention to detail in both aspects is unreal.

I had told her that every music video she had released- 'Cry Evil!', 'Girl On The Run', 'California Boys', 'Crucify Me', 'Hard to Love Me', and 'Witch Girls' all felt like watching a movie, not just a music video. I would 100% recommend watching each and every one of them after listening to the album in its entirety, it elevates the whole experience of being immersed into the world she had created and turns it into its own cinematic universe!

When our conversation dove into the process of the creation of the videos, she explained,

"First, going off what I originally felt when I wrote that song and what mini movie was playing in my mind and then I'll start to pull off visual references. For different songs, I'll often watch some films that are in the world."

She told me that after that stage, she’d move to Pinterest where she’d create vision boards and references for what she’d wanted,which led into the wardrobe. The story would naturally start flowing as the visuals world was set in stone.

Film and Visual References as noted

'Cry Evil' -Suspiria (1970), The Holy Mountain

'Witch Girls'- Bewitched

'California Boys'- Simply, “rolling around Santa Monica and Venice”

For the music videos as a whole and influenced by references of Sophia Coppola films like Marie Antionette, she stressed that she wanted the introspection of the female gaze and girlhood to contrast with the dark sonic world she’d built upon in the album.

The Record as a whole

When it came to creative influences as it pertained to the sonic and conceptualization of the album, she explained how Los Angeles helped her tap into the creativity behind the work, utilizing more contrasting elements to display the versatility of her album,

“It’s always sunny but the energy inspires me through gothic literature and fashion-Everything's very old here- when you think of Hollywood, it carries so much history..”

I was so intrigued in the way she’d framed Los Angeles, a city that I, and, many readers alike would assume to represent sunny skies--with dark gothic undertones. The contrast made the world building of the album in its own more jaw-dropping.

So, when I asked the question of which movie reference and or media represents this album, and she answered with Frankenstein, I honestly geeked out. Even in my first listen to the album and from seeing its visuals early on, I related it back to that gothic world.

She told me that every song had its own “vibe”, but, specifically, she would call upon Guillermo del Toro’s dark romanticism in his films- their mystic atmosphere and depth apparent in her work. Naturally, this led us into the topic of his Frankenstein, a movie I am obsessed with, and its connection to Mary Shelley’s original masterpiece of Frankenstein.

We talked about the beauty of his movie, and, more specifically, the complexity of Mia Goth’s performance in the film. She told me that the coinciding ideals and portrayal of her character through each of the versions work in her visual world, and the album itself.Something she said really stuck with me in our conversation about Mia goth:

“I admire her [Mary Shelley’s] story as written by a woman,and I love the softness and feeling mistunderstood in a man's world;not made for her.”

The same energy I feel she described Mary Shelley doing with Frankenstein I believe ILUKA did in creating her record. The idea of Shelley’s urge to display the struggles of carving out a whole new identity in a world not meant for her, I see mirrored so beautifully in ILUKA’s work as well. Frankenstein and “The Wild, The Innocent, and The Raging” share the common theme of belonging and vulnerability that make them timeless.

Authenticity and “Taking up space” as a woman in the music industry

When asked about the importance of authenticity and ‘taking up space’ in an industry that hasn’t always supported women, she was quick to share her own experiences before relaying the importance of continuing to show up as one’s true self, even in a society that pushes for conformity.

"When I was starting out, It [the music industry] was such a boys club.To be in that space and feel like you were valid in that space felt like such a struggle."

She told me that her experience when she was younger involved lots of “cutting her teeth” as she came up in the Australian Indie rock music scene, and that she had to hold herself back from what she really wanted to do.

But, she emphazied heavily that times have finally been changing in a way that welcomes authenticity and makes more room for women in spaces predominantly male centered to discuss topics most shy away from in the music industry,

"I feel like we're in this moment right now, where there are a lot of female artists talking about these thigns for the first time on a larger scale." She went on to reference Florence + The Machine’s new record when talking about women who have fearlessly taken this path to express themselves without being held back.

For ILUKA, the most important part of her identity as an artist is to be authentic and true to herself, and, it’s something that she encourages younger artists to believe too,

“It's so important for a woman to show up in any way that is authentic to them. leads to a shift as a culture and for that person to just connect to the people they are meant to-I think it's magic when you show up in a way that's kind of, maybe scary, because it's so real-the right people, the people who need to connect to your music will find it."

“Wings” and her advice to the wild, the innocent, and the restless forging their path

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In her song, ‘Wings’, she says,

“I was 16 when they told me, ‘girl, know your place, this ain’t your world’....they said hush little girl dont make a scene, just cross those legs, forget that dream.”- Wings by ILUKA

I asked her, ‘What would you say to young girls right now who may feel they dont have the ‘permission’ to take up space or to chase their dreams?’

Her answer was honest, and, highlighted the harsh realities, “Society is all about telling girls to stay small and, I would say- “It's easy to say F*** it and go and do it, but I know how hard that is,” She went on to tell of her own experience, and, how she feels the best way to combat these restraints,

“I remember being at school and where i was seemed so far away from where I wanted to be and I was like- do one thing that scares me everyday that leads me to a life that's a little more in integrity, for me, like, entering a personal song into a performance at school,”

She continued with her final message,

“You don’t necessarily have to do one grand gesture, choose a little thing everyday that makes feel a little more in alignment with who you really are a little bit closer to who you want to be,”

Keep Up with ILUKA

Gaillet from Management

ILUKA is having an album release party on December 4th in Los Angeles, buy tickets here! You can also sign up for her newsletter and updates via email on the same website!

ILUKA's only just beginning, and, with the world building and creativity shown on her debut album, it's clear she's stepping into a new era that positions her as a rising force in indie alternative pop! Her aesthetics can only expand from here. Of course, Stream "The Wild, The Innocent, and The Raging" on Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple Music, Pandora, or, wherever else you listen to music! For updates on ILUKA and to keep up with her next moves, you can find her on Instagram as @ilukamusic and on Tiktok as: @ilukamusic.