BIG WETT On Her Empowering, Edgy New EP 'RISK IT': 'I've Always Had An Anarchist Spirit'

The electro-pop libertine BIG WETT is back, freakier and even more unrepentant, with her libidinous second EP, RISK IT. And chatting with the unfiltered star is still a riot – The Music's latest cover story carries an NSFW advisory. "Babe, okay," a gleeful BIG WETT exclaims. "Someone take a photo! My phone is on 69 per cent just as this interview is starting – and that is my anal number."

The outrageous BIG WETT – whose mysterious persona is as much about maintaining intrigue as privacy – is Zooming from her Naarm/Melbourne pad with "a bit of a lag." The blonde singer/rapper is wearing shades, a demure pearl necklace and a sporty red jacket.

Behind her, she has a shelf of books and miscellanea, including religious iconography. On the wall is a picture of James Dean, the original rebel without a cause, and WETT acknowledges the irony. "Why do I need a cause?" she protests. "Oh my God, stop giving me rules. Everyone's so boring."

Since breaking out with her signature X-rated anthem EAT MY ASS, the local LGBTQIA+ icon, who identifies as pansexual, has gone global. She was among several Australian rising stars listed in the 2025 NME100. "I'm always kind of so shocked when my name pops up on these things, because this whole [project] started as a bit of a joke and as a way to have a laugh," BIG WETT admits. "But, then, I'm always like, 'Yeah, fucking right!'" She quotes a popular meme: "I accidentally girlbossed too hard."

BIG WETT was a mischiefmaker in childhood – "the little punk kid" who copped detentions at school and was grounded by her parents. Later, she abandoned tertiary studies, various vocations and a conventional band.

WETT knows what it is to have a "feeling of restlessness." She conceived her transgressive solo career on a whim during the COVID-19 pandemic. In late 2021, WETT uploaded EAT MY ASS to triple j Unearthed – and it went viral. She brought her queer burlesque show to BIGSOUND, subsequently emerging as a festival draw at Splendour In The Grass.

In early 2023, BIG WETT announced that she'd signed to Play It Again Sam and hit The Great Escape in the UK. At the close of that year, WETT's debut EP, PU$$Y, arrived with more bangers extolling sexual liberation and partying.

Despite her insouciance, BIG WETT demonstrated artistic integrity from the outset. On PU$$Y, she eschewed the hyperpop trend, instead hybridising Peaches' electroclash, '90s rave and dirty rap. "I wouldn't say that I do one kind of music," she says. "People always ask me what my genre is, and I'm like, 'I honestly don't know.'"

WETT listens to a spectrum, only disliking screamo. She gravitates towards electronic dance music and hip-hop. "I've always loved to rap and talk shit and that whole attitude." However, WETT's credo is punk. "I've always gotten in trouble," she stresses. "I've always had an anarchist spirit." Still, WETT has a secret fervour for "love songs," confiding, "I am a bit of a softie."

Today, BIG WETT's greatest influence is Kim Petras, particularly 2022's Slut Pop EP, which she holds is the German's best work and inspired her own maxim: "I make songs for sluts." "I just took that and was like, 'That's kind of the music that I write!'"

But, aside from last May's deep house loosie SHE GOT THAT THING, BIG WETT seemingly vanished after PU$$Y. In fact, she was criss-crossing Europe with her horny live shows – winning over more "Wetties". WETT extended a summer jaunt. "I was sitting on a beach one day about to book my flight home to Australia in winter and was like 'Fuck that.'"

BIG WETT had highlights throughout 2024, most notably a performance at Pitchfork Music Festival London alongside Swedish sensation COBRAH. She also remembers an underground club gig in Berlin at Lunchbox Candy as having "a really sick vibe."

In August, BIG WETT unleashed HOLD UP UR BODY, the bouncy lead single from RISK IT. She flew home for the Antipodean summer, teaming with Brit DJ/producer ABSOLUTE., as the BIG WETT ABSOLUTE EXXXPERIENCE at Summer Camp's spin-off warehouse party TRAMP and Heaps Gay – the pals then dropping CLUB TRAXXX VOL. 1.

RISK IT catches BIG WETT as lascivious – and comic – as ever, albeit with an edge. Pop's female artists have long resisted patriarchal gender roles by promoting sexual empowerment – funk trailblazer Betty Davis igniting moral panic in Black communities in 1975 with Nasty Gal. WETT, too, has experienced pushback.

She voices a new defiance in the big beat NO REGRETS, its hook "no regrets, no mistakes, no heartaches," and the techno CRAZY, dedicated to her "haters". Above all, on RISK IT, WETT emphasises agency, self-actualisation and self-love.

BIG WETT is aware that some perceive her as a novelty act – a dismissive term, often applied to non-male performers, that has endured in the poptimism era. But she's reclaiming 'novelty' as another word for 'new'. "People don't take me seriously – and I kind of love it," WETT declares, laughing. "I don't wanna be taken seriously… It's like, 'Yeah, I am a novelty, but the novelty will change.'

"I think people intend ['novelty act'] to be reductive, especially to a woman, but I don't see it. Their intent is to be reductive, and my impression is I'm not offended. That means people are paying attention. I'd rather be a novelty than average or forgotten. So I'm happy with that. Call me anything – I'll take it. You're still talking about me."

Besides, a novelty act is entertaining – BIG WETT cites Lady Gaga's "spectacle" at Coachella with its "extra showbiz and performance and pizzazz" as an example of artistic gimmickry. "Who would not want to do that? Why wouldn't you want to get up there and give absolutely everything? I don't understand… Everyone that's not 'novelty' is boring, in my opinion. I've never said that before – but fucking write that shit down."

Novelty implies "camp", too. "The gays never do anything less than 7,000 per cent. So, if I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it right. I'm gonna do it to the utmost ridiculousness – with intention." As such, BIG WETT constantly switches up her show. "At one point I was pulling a string of diamonds out of my vagina on stage and now I don't do that anymore."

But BIG WETT isn't prioritising image or exhibition over music, and sonically, RISK IT represents an evolution of her dissolute disco. TOP OF THE CLASS is Detroit ghettotech – a regional variant of Miami bass or booty music that WETT reveals is a favourite style. "I want every second of the song to have a sound – and some people would call that 'busy'," she reiterates. "I call it 'entertaining'."

Tracks like the strip club bop PONY (RIDE ME), evoking Ginuwine's 1996 hit Pony, stem from the PU$$Y sessions, "but," BIG WETT adds, "I think my sound, and my personal preference, has progressed since then." She re-entered the studio and "updated" her demos.

Overall, BIG WETT has "kept the same energy," she assures. "It's still very in essence of the first EP, but just kind of grown up a bit – if you can call sniffing poppers in the club 'growing up'. It's still definitely very playful. I still wanted to include some silly lyrics and the same themes of going out, partying, sex, fun [and] being silly in there – because what else would I talk about? It's from the heart."

Initially, BIG WETT collaborated primarily with Confidence Man's Reggie Goodchild, but she's expanded her pool. She cut CRAZY with Aussie expat DJ/producer Strath, formerly part of Nick Sylvester's GODMODE stable.

BIG WETT revels in creative exchange. "I think, just being a solo artist, it can get a bit lonely and insular sometimes; always having to be the last point of call on everything… It's also stressful 'cause I'm like, 'Fuck, I would love someone to just help make a decision for me.' And so, in the studio writing with someone, it's fun to bounce ideas off each other and kind of get in a zone and really 'G' each other up."

As a performer, BIG WETT celebrates sex positivity, but post-#MeToo, consent, establishing boundaries and providing safe, inclusive communal spaces are all central to her messaging.

There's been discussion about Gen Z uneasiness over sex scenes in films like Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer, with media commentators assuming that Zoomers are prudish or puritanical.
Similarly, BIG WETT has followed the controversy surrounding It Ends With Us, and the continuing discourse on workplace safety in showbiz.

"I'm just so grateful that that shit is being talked about," she states. "It's such a male-dominated industry, same as music, that we need to talk about it from both points of view. It's just important that these conversations are even happening."

Yet BIG WETT posits that collective anxiety about sex, or the culture of sexual abstinence, is prevalent because young people are spending more time online and losing social aptitude – a scenario exacerbated by "late stage capitalism," and the cost of living crisis, as everyone stays home.

A Millennial, BIG WETT laughingly concedes that she's now that "older person" – though she isn't judgmental. "I'm not saying that I think young kids need to go out and do drugs and have sex and get drunk, but I'm saying lowering your inhibitions can be fun sometimes – like it can help to express yourself and to kind of let your hair down.

“If you're always stressed, worrying about something on your phone, looking at 'not reality' life, you're not talking to anyone in real life – it's not helpful. I don't think it's gonna end well. I think probably some people just actually do need to smoke weed; relax." WETT mocks herself for the "rant", sighing, "We're fucked essentially. Everyone's fucked. We're all doomed."

Philosophising over, BIG WETT will soon return to the road. She's again heading to Europe mid-year. But WETT has decided against travelling to the US due to the Trump administration's arbitrary border control measures. "I mean, I was planning on going… Nah, not right now, I don't think, yeah. Fuck that. I want to be far away from that for the next four years!"

Regardless, BIG WETT has viewed footage from Coachella (where, coincidentally, the now UK-based Reggie DJed with Confidence Man on The Do Lab stage) and was perturbed by the sedate festival-goers. "I'm like, 'What the fuck is with the crowd?'" She doesn't mind fans filming at gigs, but won't tolerate them being passive.

"Oh my God, if people ever did that in my shows, I'd be literally screaming at them, 'Why are you not fucking dancing? You're here to have a good time. Like, what, you put Coachella on a payment plan to go and stand there and not participate and not dance, not sing? Oh my God, grow up!'" WETT can be bossy when it comes to inactivity. "I don't allow it and I never will."

BIG WETT's sets pivot on interaction. "I always think about my shows, and live music in general, 'Yes, you're there to see a performance as someone in the crowd, but also, me as a performer, I'm there to see the crowd perform just as much – like the show that you guys give me will help me do a better show for you.'"

At any rate, BIG WETT isn't forgetting her Day Ones, promising a flamboyant homecoming. "When I come back to Australia, I'll be doing a bunch of headline shows around Oz – and then it'll be Oz summer, so it'll be party time."

Equally welcome is news that BIG WETT has more music in the pipeline. She's written tracks with Bimini Bon Boulash, the English drag queen, a runner-up on RuPaul's Drag Race UK and DJ at TRAMP. "They're just an amazing person – hilarious," she enthuses. The pair hope to complete a Yuletide song, THE 12 GAYS OF CHRISTMAS. Plus WETT touts a remix of EAT MY ASS.

Quiz BIG WETT about the prospect of an album, and she hesitates. "I think I'll have to wait a bit for an album. I like just randomly releasing different kinds of EPs, because I like different sorts of music. I think an album would be a bit further down the track at the moment." But, she clarifies, "I'm definitely not opposed to it."

As she wraps, BIG WETT performed a DJ set at Eora/Sydney's Lost Sundays Block Party over Easter, stating that "it [would] be very fun, loose."

For all her hedonism, BIG WETT does have humility. "I'm just so thankful to be able to do this as a job and to get to travel and meet a bunch of hilarious people in all sorts of corners in the club, in different countries," she says. "So it's not a bad job. I think I'll be doing it for a little bit, if I can." Rebel without a pause?

RISK IT is out on Friday, 25 April, via Play It Again Sam. Pre-save the EP here.