A Hippie, A Feminist And An Entrepreneur Walk Into Bondi Pavillion

“In high school I didn’t even know that you could do anything in the industry that wasn’t Britney Spears. There aren’t a lot of really strong women that I saw growing up.  I thought it was either you had to be a celebrity or nothing.”

Anita Meiruntu, the woman behind Alphamama, wants to raise a generation of empowered female musicians – and she’s attacking this challenge from all directions. This year she is speaking at the Bondi Wave Industry Conference, which, “sadly, unusually” has an all female panel of speakers. “It’s still something that’s very out of the ordinary and we have to look at and talk about. When it’s all men, that’s normal,” says Meiruntu.

"Like, ‘oh she’s a chick guitarist’. No one ever says ‘oh, he’s a dude guitarist’."

“It can still be a novelty factor – that’s a fact – like, ‘oh she’s a chick guitarist’. No one ever says ‘oh, he’s a dude guitarist’. That’s a fact we can’t really get around at that stage, and the only way we can combat that is by encouraging more women to become musicians – take it on as a career, not just a hobby.” This is Meiruntu’s goal for her talk on Friday.

Her vision extends to music once again becoming a uniting force in breaking through “social complacency”, throwing back to the real-time change caused by musicians from the ‘70s during the “Make Love Not War movement”. “I’m really interested in when the musician and the entrepreneur and the activist combine. That’s the new triple threat of this era; people who are passionate about the state of the world and really want to bring about change and transformation,” she impassions.

Meiruntu is one part feminist activist, one part charging business woman and one part flower child. Combined, these elements formed God Queen – a collaborative, multifaceted project aimed at lifting up women (and men, it’s open to “anyone who identifies with any gender”) in the industry through a “community… a tribe [in which] we support, empower and encourage each other; share skills so that we can do something on a global scale.”

It’s her solution to the Mean Girls-esque culture among Australian female professionals whereby we scrutinise and weigh each other up as opposed to supporting one another. “In our industry there’s a tall poppy syndrome. Actually, it’s very unique to Australia in that we don’t readily support and encourage each other - we tend to feel that, because we’re big fish in a small pond, there’s not a lot of spots for us, so there is a tendency to kinda look at each other through squinty eyes and go ‘oh, what are you gonna do that’s going to take away from what I have’.”

Artists such as Alice Night, Ines, Hannaka, Sarah Conner and more are involved in the movement that holds “woman circles” (also open to any gender), artist showcases and even 12-week music entrepreneur mentoring program run by Meiruntu. For those inspired by her talk, she is hosting an Immersion Sound Lab event later in the evening.

“Essentially the aim of that is to give participants who are really passionate about what they’ve just heard to get involved. We’re going to do a [writing and recording] session and they get to contribute to actually creating music together. Showing [participants] the process of what it’s like to write a song, what it’s like to working with an engineer, a producer, musician and what the rights and roles are in those positions.”