Interview with Sydnee Carter

Interview with Sydnee Carter

If you haven't yet heard the voice of Australian singer/songwriter Sydnee Carter, then mark my words, you truly are missing out. Very rarely am I left speechless by lyrics and vocals but upon listening to her audition for the Australian X Factor and her debut EP, that is exactly how I felt.

I recently chatted to Sydnee (despite the time difference between Ireland and Australia!) talking about her X Factor experience, what she's been getting up to since then and what her plans are for the future.

But first... let's hear how she got involved in music!

"I guess when I was little, I always looked forward to being the centre of attention, I always wanted to just dance for my family and friends or sing or tell jokes or even hurt myself if I had to! I was at the shops one day and I saw this guitar in the window when I was like five or six and I was just like 'I need to have this' so my parents got it for me for my birthday and that's really how I got started in music."

In 2014 Sydnee auditioned for the X Factor, performing an outstanding rendition of 'Youth' by Daughter which resulted in a standing ovation not only from the audience but from all four judges and merited exceptional feedback. Sydnee explains why she applied for the audition.

"I took it upon myself to audition for the X Factor because over here in Perth I wanted to go to this University called the Western Australia Performing Arts Academy and in order to get in you have to do an audition and I had never done anything near an audition, like I had pretty much just sung in my bedroom or sung in front of my friends, so I thought auditioning would be a good way to get experience and feedback. I never really intended to get past the audition at all, I just thought I would do the audition, get some feedback and it would help me prepare for the audition for the Performing Arts Academy when I finished school."

That audition has over one million views on Youtube and rightly so, you can check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPW1znwXc_c! I put the question to Sydnee as to whether or not she had any idea of just how well the audition was going while she was on stage!

"It was a little bit weird because like, I think I was so full of adrenaline because you're so hyped up backstage because all these people who work on the show are like 'alright, you're going out in two minutes or you're on stage in thirty seconds' and then it kind of becomes real to you so when I walked on, everything went numb because I was so in the moment and I was thinking to myself that this is an opportunity I have been given here so just give it everything you've got and just do your best so that was kind of my focus the whole time, I didn't worry about stuffing up, I didn't think about what could go wrong, I just thought 'do your best and whatever happens, happens'"

Well what did happen was something that Ronan Keating described as being "really, really special" and Sydnee advanced to the live shows and she described her experience to me.

"I guess I had no idea what to expect because what you see on TV is completely different to what it is backstage. There are so many people involved in making the show and putting the show together. It was pretty intense and the schedules we had for the live shows were intense because we would be out at like 6am and back around 8:30pm so for a 16 year old, that was quite intense but I loved the experience and I met so many new people and it was pretty cool. But I felt like I didn't really get a chance to show Australia what I could really do because I didn't get songs that really showcased my potential or anything, I kept getting songs that probably wouldn't have been my first choice, getting costumes that wouldn't have been my first choice. I'm not complaining that I came 9th but I would have liked just one more week to show people that I was more than just this product they were making me into, I'm actually Sydnee Carter that can turn songs into my own version and stuff like that." 

Living in Ireland, I didn't have the luxury of watching the X Factor in Australia live so I had to do all my catching up on Youtube and I did notice a number of comments agreeing with Sydnee regarding the song choices, so I was curious when she left the X Factor did she have the determination to release her own stuff and show the country what she was truly made of?

"When I left the show I thought, 'you know what, I've got some momentum here' and I just needed to get things happening. I already had a few songs that I had already written before X Factor and when I got back I had missed out on so much school and seeing my friends so there was so much for me to write about and so when I got back I ended up writing another two or three songs and I met a really amazing producer when I was over in Sydney for the X Factor and so when the show was over, he [Ryan] was eager to do something and get my music out there by making an EP, so me and my mum flew over there and we literally had four days and in that time we smashed out all the songs, got them recorded and made the end product absolutely incredible."

The EP has got an incredible amount of plays on Spotify and the end product really is o
utstanding but Sydnee admits that the reaction to her debut EP grew gradually and her parents played a huge part in its success.

"It gradually got there, I mean it was so much hard work and I certainly wouldn't have been able to do it without my parents. My dad and mum put so much effort into keeping that exposure and momentum from the show going, trying to establish a new fanbase so like pretty much more than half of my fanbase have no clue that I was on the X Factor, they just liked me because of my new EP, like my actual music, not the X Factor and I wouldn't have gotten that many plays on Spotify or downloads on iTunes or views on YouTube without the help of my parents."

I still think it is incredible that Sydnee is only 18 years old and already has achieved what she has achieved, the future is bright for the Australian singer/songwriter and we will be hearing a lot more from her in the coming months and years.

"I ended up getting in to the Performing Arts Academy that I spoke about earlier and I have plans to release some new music in March or April so that's in the works at the moment, it's all been recorded, we're just waiting for it to be produced and mastered and stuff and that's when we will look at releasing it. Also, my parents and I are starting a record label, our own independent one, so that's really exciting and we're looking into doing a tour in the second half of the year!"

EOIN!