Chela Upholds Beauty and Power in Queer Romance in “Hard 4 You”
Australia’s trail-blazing artist Chela delivers romance through a lens of protest and liberation. Chela prides herself in holding a rebellious power in her love life that’s equally beautiful as it is empowering – and that is exactly what queer romance means to the songstress.
Chela is back with another queer anthem in time for Pride Month “Hard 4 You.” Her forward-thinking pop sensibility is on full display in “Hard 4 U,” with an undeniably catchy hook layered over nostalgic guitar riffs and shimmering synths.
“‘Hard 4 You’ came about at the beginning of the pandemic when I was falling in love with my next-door neighbor,” Chela says. “I wrote it with production duo DNA over a Zoom session whilst I was in Perth visiting family, and it all came together rather quickly, that's when you know you are onto something good!”
“Hard 4 You” releases alongside an official music video, co-directed and produced by Chela and Genevieve Gorman Deane. A multi-disciplinary creative, Chela pours as much of herself into her videos as her music, and she was excited to incorporate queer romance into the video for the first time – enlisting the help of fellow Sydney-based creative Lydia Kivela as her on-screen love interest. The music video was filmed across Sydney, featuring locations such as Pleasure’s Playhouse in Chinatown, a gay-run venue Chela art-directed, and the Ace Hotel in Surry Hills, where Chela runs a weekly queer night.
“I can safely say, had I seen this music video when I was in my teens, my queer awakening would have been much clearer,” Chela says. “I've never had more fun making a music video, it felt like just a bunch of friends doing what they love as work, and that's the kind of environment I'm so honored to have created. I hope that joy comes through in the video.”
As a true hopeless romantic at heart, Chela writes through a rich, profound lens that is inspired by her relationships. To her, it comes naturally and feels “extraordinarily liberating.”
“I'm glad that the world has become a gay a place that's become a safe place, but there's still so much more work to do,” Chela says. “If I fall in love with someone, I'm all in and I think a lot of people are afraid to love someone that fully. I think that to stop oneself from falling in love to its deepest extent is to not experience the most important purpose of why we're here.”
[UNPUBLISHED]: Thank you for sitting down and talking to Unpublished Magazine. Our readers would love to get to know you and your music more. For any readers who aren’t familiar, what inspires your artistic style and creative persona?
[CHELA]: I have been dabbling in pop music since I was a child when I was very inspired and influenced by artists such as Janet Jackson and Prince. In my teenage years I became quite an angsty teen and obsessed with rock n’ roll music and punk bands such as The Hives and The Strokes and I became a Riot Grrrl for many years. I would say that what I'm doing now is a mixture of all of those influences I've been into in my teenage years. I'd like to think that I look a little more on the punk side, but I sound a lot more on the pop side and so therefore, it's something different.
[UNPUBLISHED]: Say if someone hasn’t heard of your music yet, which song would you introduce them to that encapsulates your style and maturity the best?
[CHELA]: My new song “Hard 4 You,” because if you're trying to present how you've evolved and with each release, you become more yourself. That feels like the best representation I could possibly put forward.
[UNPUBLISHED]: You recently released a new single “Hard 4 You,” what is the inspiration behind the song?
[CHELA]: I wrote that song roughly three years ago when I was fully in love with my next door neighbor whose window I can see from my blinds right now. We can see each other's bedrooms from our windows. It's very intense. We did break up, but it felt like a potion. It was the way that I was feeling at the time, mixed with grief. My Nana had just passed away and she was like a parent to me and so I was in Perth for her memorial and I was feeling extraordinarily emotional and deep. I was yearning for this person who's next door, and so that song came about really easily because of that
[UNPUBLISHED]: What did the creative process for “Hard 4 You” look like?
[CHELA]: I started the song over Zoom because of the pandemic and there were a lot of Zoom songwriting sessions happening. My producer and I already had a really comfortable and beautiful experience working together so we already felt really comfortable with each other which is why I think “Hard 4 You” came so easily. There's so much value in face-to-face. We're lucky that we had that experience already because “Hard 4 You” came out over a few hours on Zoom. When I came back to Sydney, we were able to get into the studio and that only took three more sessions for us to record my vocals properly, recording some guitar, and the song took a very natural, very easy progression to what it became.
[UNPUBLISHED]: “Hard 4 You” also has an accompanying music video that obviously touches on queer romance. What is the inspiration behind the music video and how was your experience filming it?
[CHELA]: I realized that I had never had a love interest in any of my videos before which I think was actually because I wasn't out, and the only person I wasn't really out to was my mom. My mom is very conservative, so I only came out to her at the beginning of the pandemic. I felt like I could be myself in public or in a public sphere that she would witness and she's still not completely on board. It’s still a challenge and also a rebellion to be myself despite her opinions. I think there's a lot of power and beauty in that, so in making a queer music video I think it was a protest in a way that I could be myself. I think showing one's pride in a video in such a beautifully cinematic, romantic video is empowering. I think that it's such a piece of high-quality work that really encapsulates what romance is like so I'm extraordinarily proud of it. It's everything that I could have dreamed up. I wanted to show what queer romance felt like to me and it came together so perfectly.
[UNPUBLISHED]: You touch on a lot of queer themes and romance in your work. How does it feel to be putting yourself out there in such a vulnerable way?
[CHELA]: As I said it feels powerful because I think if you don't have all of the support that you necessarily want or need, there's an extra element of protest to your work. It feels so liberating because I've written songs about various women in the past and have not been able to necessarily show the deeper meanings behind the songs, but that isn't a regret to me because I believe in mystery. An element of mystery, being the most beautiful essence in the world. It's very much something that's lost in our current day of social media and constant invasion of privacy, so I always thought it was fun that there were songs out there that people had no idea what the meaning behind them was. It does feel extraordinarily liberating and different to be exposed and thoroughly myself in a world. It just feels natural. It feels comfortable. I'm glad that the world has become a gay a place that's become a safe place, but there's still so much more work to do. We still need to write songs, release videos, and keep churning out the content that makes the younger queers feel safe. I feel like queer artists need to saturate the market with content for themselves, but also for the younger generations. It's just so important.
[UNPUBLISHED]: “Hard 4 You” is a song of liberation. What is your favorite aspect of the song, is there like a certain lyric or message that you gravitate towards the most?
[CHELA]: I think that a lot of people love the lyric ‘Call me a freak’ because I think that it's reclaiming a word that's been used so often for queer people that they're freaks or anyone on their LGBTQ+ spectrum that were easily seen as freaks.
[UNPUBLISHED]: What messages, emotions or story do you hope listeners can take away from “Hard 4 You?”
[CHELA]: I'm such a hopeless true romantic. If I fall in love with someone, I'm all in and I think a lot of people are afraid to love someone that fully. I think that it's always a pendulum, but I'm sensing that people are really afraid of commitment at the moment, and I'd like to inspire people to just fall in love despite how hurtful it might end up being because I don't necessarily believe in the one. I think that life is full of chapters and I think having children with someone is a forever commitment, but otherwise, I think if things end well, then it's been a successful relationship. I think that to stop oneself from falling in love to its deepest extent is to not experience the most important purpose of why we're here.
[UNPUBLISHED]: Let’s talk about fashion. You have a really beautiful style, especially in the “Hard 4 You” video it is definitely more editorial and a darker aesthetic. How would you describe your style and what inspires it?
[CHELA]: I had already come up with the idea of doing my hair in little ties because I like having a costume and an aesthetic that I can stick to when I'm on stage, which I only really formulated during the pandemic. During the pandemic, I was very close to quitting music because it was so hard. It's always been hard to be an independent artist because people don't pay artists much money. The journey is extraordinarily challenging. I decided that if I was going to keep doing music, that I would have a persona on stage that would allow me to put on the outfit and see my music as a project that I could step away from, and making that boundary for myself was really important for me in order to move forward. So having that hairstyle and a schoolboy inspired aesthetic as my costume was a concept I came up with when I released “Hard 4 You.” My references included Angus Young from AC/DC and Kylie Mole who was this 80s television personality who would dress up in a Pippi Longstocking aesthetic and do comedy skits. I don't like taking myself too seriously, so I couldn't think of anyone who really adhered to or committed themselves to a school aesthetic in the modern pop sphere. I really wanted to honor those artists from the past in particular because there's something special about someone who's a bit older pretending to be a school kid. I think it's a good reminder because we all need to be reminded about our inner child every day. We're meant to be exploring and not going to work and working nine to five and being serious because life is so stupid. I think that we need to be reminded constantly about our inner child and to be playful. I'm so lucky I get to do that with my friends.
[UNPUBLISHED]: As soon as you started naming your references, especially Angus Young, I can instantly see the vision. I think that's such a beautiful and playful thing to commit to and be able to express, not only through your style, but also in your music.
[CHELA]: Georgia Harper, who was my hair stylist, made my blazer out of an old school blazer from the thrift store and attached a tie to it. Lydia, who plays my love interest, wasn't wearing anything related to that concept. I wanted the entire video to give dystopian romance, and they were the main elements in coming up with the overall concept.
[UNPUBLISHED]: How are you feeling in this current era of your career and what does the rest of the year look like for you that you would like to share with Unpublished?
[CHELA]: I feel like I have hundreds of songs of demos and ideas and things that I want to turn into a record, but to be completely honest with you, I wanted to see if these two songs did anything because making a record puts you in debt as an independent artist unless you're with a label. I've been so lucky to have the support of Spinning Top Music. It looks like I will thankfully be able to make a full-length record which would be a dream.
[UNPUBLISHED]: What can listeners expect from you in this new era of music moving forward?
[CHELA]: Obviously it's a lot more open. I have a pretty cheeky side of myself that I really love to share because every person has darkness. How could you not in this world? But with this project, I have outlets for that, such as visual art, I play bass guitar in a grunge band called Children Collide. That music is pretty heavy and I really really enjoy that as an outlet for my darkness and for my anger and sadness about the world, but also for my joy because I find grunge music quite joyful to be honest. With this music in particular, I really want to encourage joy, cheekiness and not taking the world too seriously.
[UNPUBLISHED]: Is there anything that I didn’t ask that you would like to add to the interview?
[CHELA]: I'm planning on moving to New York next year. I lived in LA for six years, so I'm really excited about moving to New York. I'm trying to work out how that's going to look and how I'm going to make that work. I really do miss the states and I think that there's freedom in the States. In Australia, there's a ceiling and it's really easy to keep that ceiling and in the states, you just feel like such a tiny, tiny fish in a huge pond. I find that so inspiring. I really love feeling lost. I feel so lucky to call Australia my home because I feel so incredibly safe here. I miss that lost and inspired feeling because you're surrounded by so many more creatives. I'm looking forward to getting back to that space.
