Why Brendan Maclean Is Leading The Way For Queer Pop

At 6am this morning, Brendan Maclean's phone started going off the hook. His EP Funbang1 dropped on iTunes today and "of course I pre-ordered my own album. I clicked the charts and there it was in the top ten", he gushes, hands flailing. He burst into The Music's office around lunchtime giddy and excitable after drinking champagne all morning, joking that despite being the number one Australian album on the international charts (debuting at number four), he's just below Beyonce "where I should be". If personality and pizazz could earn you a buck, Maclean would be swimming in dosh today. Or something more sparkly — he's loud and proud about the EP being "very queer and very camp. I don't think Australia's had that since, I don't know, Sam Sparrow".

"You'd come into work hungover trying not to vomit inside this costume suit with kids banging on the back of your head." 

There's no better way to put it — Funbang1 is a 27-minute feast of bangers, exploding with sass, huge pop hooks and a taste of Maclean's side-splitting bitch-snipes, which you'll note in On The Door. He's honest, and this sets him apart more than anything else he does to pave his own way. "I believe in humour in music. Australia needs a little bit of humour in our pop music; it's so serious and calypso and you know, 'I'm drugged at a club' vibe at the moment," he illustrates. The track in question was written for featured vocalist Amanda Palmer during Sydney Festival: "We were in the Spiegeltent and her phone would just blow up every day like ten minutes before she went on, and I was like 'So that's gotta be management or PR right?' But it turned out to be all of her friends and industry people and festival people wanting to be on the door. And I just turned to her and was like 'Just tell them they're on the door minus four,' and she was like 'what the fuck did you just say? That's a song.'"

At 28, Maclean has seemingly avoided any semblance of the mundane — from his first gig as a stilt walker at Luna Park: "It was a pretty big reality check, like, you'd come into work hungover trying not to vomit inside this costume suit with kids banging on the back of your head," which preceded six years as a presenter on triple j, before nabbing the role of Klipspringer in The Great Gatsby with Baz Luhrmann. He remembers the audition with a laugh: "[Luhrmann] looked at me and he said 'Wow, you're so pale.' And then sat down to do the audition!" But he owes his "slow burn" success to two things: the new media environment and his mentors. "I had a bit of luck with Paul Mac and Stupid — that was the first thing I took to Paul — I slid an iPad under his door because I couldn't get him to listen to it!" he laughs. "Our relationship is a very special thing in Australia and in the world I guess: it's an older gay man who isn't preying on me for sex or for attention, he genuinely just likes working with fun songwriters."

If you're ever in a bad mood, follow Maclean on Twitter. Those who already follow him have contributed much to this recent success: "I just want to tell the people in their mid-20s who haven't engaged with their online fan group: they're the ones who are going to give you this career. Worry more about them and less about what Sony or Universal thinks of you, because Sony or Universal aren't going to buy your records, it's the fans." He speaks with perspective about follow counts for someone with 25.5K followers, considering the idea that likes and retweets don't equate to sales: "But," he announces, "someone who's in your community — people who dedicate all their time to their fans — those are the people that, if they post about you, you'll see results.

"I'd say this to any songwriter; yes, it's awesome that this independent record is on the charts, but I look at things like being queer, never being playlisted on triple j in ten years, never being programmed for a major festival, and this is the number one album for an Australian today. It's just breaking down the music industry idea that there's a way to do it. The truth is, the music industry has changed and I just keep laughing now, like, it's so clear that it's changed! Why can't you see that?! Why can't everyone see that it's not about a label any more, it's not just about a radio station!"

As for the new way forward, for Maclean it's all about bringing the love back to your community. "I don't need to move to Melbourne. It's different because queer music and cabaret music is… [Sydney is] my testing ground, and when I put it out people react and respond because it's family, it's community. And what I would say to all other musicians — please don't move from your community… We don't like to believe in ourselves very much. The music industry changed, but that doesn't mean you should stop making music. Come on Sydney, pull up your boots, go and see your friends and make some music. It doesn't matter if you don't sell out your gig. We all have shitty gigs."