For rapper and songwriter Miss Kaninna, performing on the Dark Mofo stage in Hobart is a chance to connect with fans in her home state.
The First Nations artist grew up on Bruny Island, south of Hobart, and premiered her first single Blak Britney at the festival’s 2022 iteration.
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“Dark Mofo and MONA in general have been so supportive, probably one of the biggest supporters of my career,” the neo-soul artist said.
“I haven’t had my own headline sold-out show here before.
“The fact that I’m from here and I’ve come back after three years of creating my career and it’s sold out is so wild to me.
“I never thought I’d have that kind of support in Tassie.”
Tickets for Miss Kaninna’s Dark Mofo show sold out in just over an hour. (ABC News: Selina Bryan)
Miss Kaninna went on to be named 2023 triple j Unearthed Artist of The Year, performed internationally and was the first Indigenous woman to be nominated for an ARIA Award for a debut single.
Her Dark Mofo show was the fastest of the festival’s lineup to sell out — taking just over an hour.
“I was like, ‘oh that’s actually hectic’ because I know that the Tassie mob and a lot of fellas down here, we don’t get tickets ’til the day before, so they’re going to be pissed,” she said.
The release of Miss Kaninna’s debut mixtape ‘Blackprint’ will coincide with her Dark Mofo performance. (ABC News: Kate Nickels)
It’s a big week for Miss Kaninna, having announced her debut mixtape ‘Blackprint’.
“The album is supposed to be the reclaiming of space and the reclaiming of our ‘blakness’ and not allowing the white lens to water down our culture or water down our anger as well,” she said.
Tasmania’s Dark Mofo festival is attracting international performers. (ABC News: Selina Bryan)
‘It had to be her or no one’
Miss Kaninna’s Dark Mofo support act is Hobart-based experimental J-pop project エミエミ (emi emi), fronted by Emi Doi.
Emi Doi fronts experimental J-pop project エミエミ (emi emi). (ABC News: Selina Bryan)
The pair met in 2019 when Miss Kaninna’s music career was starting.
“What surprised me so much about Emi was that she’s just 100 per cent herself. Having Japanese pop in this country, let alone in Tassie, would just be so f***ing difficult,” she said.
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Miss Kaninna said she wanted to back a female artist who was trying to make a cultural change.
“It had to be her or no one else,” she said.
“[Emi] centres a lot of the Japanese culture in the music. That’s just so important to push into people’s faces for the multicultural Australia that we really need.“
Emi Doi says (ABC News: Kate Nickels)
Doi admits she was nervous and excited to be performing with Miss Kaninna.
“She’s just the most staunch, generous person and I admire her and her artistry so much, but also her politics and the way that she talks so unforgivingly about the things that she cares about,” Doi said.
Dark Mofo, which runs annually during Tasmania’s winter, began in 2013.
Festival organiser Dark Lab said more than 50,000 people travelled from interstate or overseas last year to attend.
エミエミ (emi emi) band member Charlie Pyecroft said the festival was a great opportunity to showcase local work.
“It’s always been an awesome festival for supporting local artists and musicians, and giving them a platform in front of an interstate audience,” he said.
Charlie Pyecroft with Emi Doi, who says the Dark Mofo platform is a “significant opportunity”. (ABC News: Kate Nickels)
Doi said playing with Miss Kaninna on the Dark Mofo stage has been the most significant moment in her music career.
“It’s quite challenging being a Tasmanian artist,” she said.
“You have that additional barrier to reach new audiences, you have fewer venues to play in, you have fewer industry experts,” she said.
“To have a place to perform, that alone is very significant opportunity for local musicians and artists.
“Performing alongside these massive, massive names; without this context, there’s just no way you would have the opportunity to be on the same bill as these artists, let alone play with them.”
One of this year’s headlining names is Daveed Diggs, a cast member in the original Broadway musical Hamilton who played the dual roles of Marquis de Lafayette and Thomas Jefferson.
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“We’ve always been really interested in it,” Diggs said.
The US actor and rapper’s hip hop group clipping. has been seeking to play at Dark Mofo for more than a decade after one of the band’s members knocked back an invitation in 2013.
Daveed Diggs is the vocalist of the experimental rap group clipping.. (ABC News: Mahalia Carter)
“Jonathan [Snipes], one of my band mates, his last project was called Captain Ahab and [Dark Mofo] had invited him a long time ago,” he said.
“He actually wrote them back, ‘I don’t do that project anymore, but I have this new project clipping.’ and sent them all our stuff and they were like, ‘this is great, but we already have a rapper this year’.
“That was 2013. We’ve been trying to figure out how to get to this festival since then. It’s always seemed like a great one.”
The band’s appearance at year’s festival has formed the anchor point for their first Australian tour.
Dark Mofo wraps up on Monday with its annual Nude Solstice Swim.
The annual mid-winter festival draws large interstate and overseas crowds to Tasmania. (Supplied: Dark Mofo)
