INTERVIEW: Luna Vexa On Preparing For The Biggest Show Of Her Career (So Far)

Luna Vexa. Photo supplied.

When Melbourne pop artist Luna Vexa released her album, King Of Eve, last year, she couldn’t have imagined that she’d finally be playing the launch show for the project all the way in June 2021. However, that’s exactly what’s happening, and she’ll finally be launching the album at the Prince Bandroom, Melbourne, on June 25th.

I spoke to Luna about preparing for the show, as well as how the last 12-18 months have affected her. She’s also sent me some behind-the-scenes photos from rehearsal, so you can get a sense of what it’s like to prepare for such a huge gig!

Firstly, can you introduce yourself and your music?

I'm Luna Vexa, an alternative pop singer and songwriter from Melbourne. My signature infuses oceans of harmonies, hard-hitting and moody soundscapes filled with dreamy textures. I like to keep it edgy and belt it out too! I recently released my album King Of Eve during the COVID lockdown which has been an interesting experience! 

You’re playing a live show to launch your album, King Of Eve, at the Prince Bandroom on June 25th – can you tell me about the story behind the album?

Yes and I am so excited to finally be playing live again! 

Absolutely! My album dives into what it felt like for me to fall into a lot of 'lust', boys who broke my heart and fantasies I had. The title track King OF Eve is about achieving your dreams when all the odds are against you - ignoring any limiting beliefs. The world is an illusion - we can create our own realities, the power is in our hands. 

Illusions is also one of my favourite tracks on the album and one of the main concepts throughout King of Eve. Every song has a hint of ‘illusions.’ There are various meanings and secret messages encrypted in the song. Robotic voices begin the track and paint an image of a picture-perfect, utopian world. The first verse touches on how women are viewed as objects, as ‘doll-like’ and ‘anime.’ I mention that a quintessential universe is a mundane experience, a fabricated matrix that is unstable with no roots grounded in reality.

We are gassed by lies because illusions are everywhere and fatal to any relationship. Expectations must vanish for infinite growth and for the deepest love to flourish. The illusions we tell ourselves are destructive. We need to keep catching our limiting thoughts, so we can become more than what we have been told by society our entire lives.

When it comes to putting together an album launch show, versus a normal gig, what are some changes that you’re making to your live show?

It has been pretty intense putting all this together independently! Usually, with your average gig, there is much less production, you might have in-house sound and there is definitely less pressure. 

With this album launch show, I've really gone all out so there will be a great light show along with an incredible sound technician. First, I locked in the venue which was amazing. It's a dream of mine to play at the Prince! There also has to be a lot of research on who you should play a show with to make sure that the audience will really enjoy all the acts together, a budget put in place for production, payments and so on. 

My live show is going to include a live drummer as it really brings the electronic sounds to life, I get to turn up the volume on certain harmonies and synths I like that you might not be able to hear in compressed records. 

I am THRILLED for people to hear my album in a setting where I get to really fill out the room with sounds and get to do what's most fun for me - belt my lungs out! I'm a very energetic performer and love to entertain and engage with my crowd. It's going to be a roaring, big post-covid party! 

Obviously, many artists haven’t been able to tour as consistently as normal over the last 12-18 months – what emotions are you feeling about playing a headline show like this one?

The only emotion I feel is excitement! I get a huge buzz from playing live and don't feel nervous at all, even though this is my first show back since COVID happened in 2020! I used to get really bad stage fright and really struggled internally before I played a set, like so bad I couldn't breathe properly. Once I turned my focus onto making it about the audience and being an entertainer for them, my energy changed massively. I think not being able to play and aging helped also that stage fright - ha!

When you’re preparing for a headline show, can you talk me through your rehearsal process, and how you plan out what’s going to happen on the night?

My drummer Vin and I have been rehearsing for the past month! Firstly, we put together the electronic backing tracks and changed the different levels of the sounds (harmonies, synths, bass etc) and removed the lead vocals. 

We test it out in the rehearsal spaces together until it sounds right for us then on the night or production rehearsals our sound tech will make it sound even better.  

The set-list has been written and we run through it, if something feels off in the energy then we change a few songs around before show day. On the night we start with my songs people know and end on a big energetic bang! 

On the day of a performance, what does your pre-show routine look like, and do you have any particular superstitions before you play a set?

I'm a little bit of a diva ha! I get my hair and makeup done usually late morning sometime to get it out of the way, get all our gear to sound-check and then do a bit of testing a while before people start showing up. 

No superstitions but I am a very big believer in manifesting your reality and positive affirmations or flipping around negative thoughts. I refuse to let any anxiety or doubts into my mind.

For months I have been EFT tapping, writing affirmations and listening to meditations, repeating how successful the show will be and how happy the audience will be with the event. I also visualise how well it goes and feel that feeling in my heart and meditate on it. It's so important to me and has played such a big role in most of my successes up until this point, so I'm a big believer!

What advice do you have for artists out there that might be new to touring/playing live, and how have you found your live performance skills evolve over the years?

I think the more you practise with your band or rehearse the better you will be. Keep playing live as well because it is slightly different to just rehearsing. People don't get to live their dreams usually, so have fun when you go out there! Forget about how you look and make it about entertaining the audience because that's how you will relieve a lot of anxiety. That's also how my skills evolved!

Finally, what are your next few steps, both personally and music-wise?

With my music career after the Prince Bandroom show I was planning to tour the east coast, but with the state of COVID still being in the unknown, I might release a new single instead. I love to really show up in different ways and surprise people. When people think I've gone soft, I love to come out with something harder and edgier. Keep them on their toes! Ha.

Personally, in my life journey, I'm also going to be focusing on mindset coaching. I will be releasing some courses in the future about how I successfully crowdfunded nearly $10,000 for this album in 20 days and healing trauma to thrive in your life and maybe write some E-Books. I love helping others so I'm excited to get creative in so many different ways to keep myself busy!

You can get tickets to the Prince Bandroom show on June 25th here, featuring support from RARIA.

You can follow Luna Vexa on Facebook here, Instagram here and Twitter here.