In 2008, Phillipa Margaret “Pip” Brown was on top of the world. Signed to one of the hottest labels in the antipodes, receiving high rotation on triple j, and commanding equal parts street cred and pop appeal, Brown was set to explode.
Eight years later, Brown is only just releasing her third album. You probably know Brown better by her moniker Ladyhawke, under which she released a critically acclaimed self-titled debut album and the wildly popular single ‘My Delirium’.
After her 2012 sophomore effort, Anxiety, failed to live up to the expectations set by her debut, Brown more or less disappeared from the music space. Now, she’s returned with a new album a new outlook.
“Yeah, even the artwork is different: the cover is a photograph and I’ve never put my picture on the cover before, it’s always been art. It feels quite revealing,” she recently told the Sydney Morning Herald of her third album.
The cathartic and upbeat Wild Things — out 3rd June — with its lead single ‘A Love Song’ is a departure from Brown’s previous releases, a change Brown admits was precipitated by grand changes in both her life and her headspace.
“Back then I couldn’t get up in the morning, I felt miserable and I felt like had no reason to make music any more, no one wanted to hear my music.”
“I was in a bad head space, but realised it was so toxic: one bad hangover, one missed appointment too many. I knew I had to change something because it was my career and my life on the line and I really had to sort my shit out.”
“It was a real conscious effort for me: a year and a half ago I said I have to change my life otherwise I’m going to make the same record. So I stopped drinking, got really healthy, got in a really stable environment. I think living in LA is really good for me as well.”
“It’s a place to hit rock bottom but then really come up. It wasn’t really why I moved here; I moved here because it was exactly halfway between Europe and New Zealand and I wasn’t ready to come home, but I didn’t want to live in England any more.”
“But there were all these adult decisions and as soon as I changed all that stuff, that’s when I wrote my album. It came really easily.” However, the journey to that creative frenzy was certainly not easy.
“I think I went even more synthy and poppy this time around,” Brown says in a press release promoting Wild Things. “I feel good for the first time in 10 years. I actually have a clear mind! I have a wife. I feel stable. That is what I’m celebrating.”
“This album has given me a sense of purpose. Even if it took me months or years to get that purpose, as soon as I finished that record it was like an unbelievable weight was lifted off my shoulders.”
“Everything I wrote was all the stuff I was going through. I got it out of my system, exorcised it from my soul.” Wondering where Ladyhawke’s been for the past four years? Listen to Wild Things.
Having successfully fought back her demons, there’s only one hurdle Brown is now facing: the stage. “I just don’t like playing live, I can’t get over that. It’s so hard to get on stage,” she told Fairfax.
“It was quite weird because the last time I played I could only remember that in my mind I’m sure I was amazing, but it was probably really sloppy,” she says. “The thing is, I want to give the audience more.”
Brown, who is diagnosed with Asperger syndrome has never taken to crowd banter easily and part of her creative evolution has been a process of leaving the comforting shelter of the guitar to address the audience directly.
“After a song I used to freeze up and couldn’t say anything, but I was really trying to this time, saying, ‘Thank you, how are you guys doing?’ It’s so weird when I do it but I want more than anything to be an amazing performer.”
