“I had to make a choice to leave Australia, in terms of wanting to follow my heart with music,” Cumingsays. “It was a hard choice to make because I really wanted to be received well in my own country, to make music and live a really pure, beautiful life in Australia. But I had to follow my heart; the music. I feel really honoured and humbled that I now have communities around the world that have taken me in and appreciate what I’m doing. I’m really looking forward to putting some more energy in back down there, at home in Australia. Ultimately, it’s where I’ll probably want to end up again.”
Taking time to think about the aspects of the Australian culture he misses most, Cuming reflects fondly on the simple things. “The main thing is the way of life, the general attitude towards the world,” he says. “It’s a really beautiful thing, the way Australians think and feel. I come up against small amounts of conflict in my life because I see the world in that Australian way, yet I have to live in a city of 18 million people. My general feeling is, ‘Let’s hang out, let’s connect, let’s take care of each other, let’s enjoy what’s around us, enjoy life.’ People get wrapped up in so much – commercialism, corporate worlds and money. I really miss that attitude Australians have and I also miss, more than anything, the sea and the environment, especially Byron and the areas I grew up in.”
Nevertheless, when it came to the creation of his debut solo album, Dawn, Cuming was able to take a psychological trip back home, which allowed him to find solace and stay focused. The result is a record that is instantly reminiscent of his 2014 EP, Berlin,but that also brings listeners in closer than before, making it feel as though he’s whispering his deepest secrets to us.
“I had to take some time to get back to a raw place where I could make some Ry X stuff,” he says. “I rented a house up in the mountains north of LA and really tried to get simple again by going back into the water, surfing, meditating and yoga. I just tried to simplify it so that I could have enough space in myself to write from the same place that I had written the EP. It took a while but I think I found a thread and I just followed it. I didn’t expect that the record would be so raw and stripped. I loved that it ended up being a really honest album.”
Cuming has been involved with various other projects, such as The Acid and Howling, and he acknowledges the importance of collaboration. However, he especially values the creative freedom he finds in his solo work.
“I create a thin limitation because I try not to step on the other projects’ toes,” he says. “I think the main difference is that when I sit down to write with Howling, with Frank [Wiedemann], or with the boys from The Acid, we are sitting around synthesizers, drum machines and computers. With Ry X, especially on this record, I loved just sitting down late at night with an old nylon string guitar or at a piano and going back to a really honest place lyrically. Not that the other projects aren’t honest, but they are maybe not as personal. I talk about things that I maybe wouldn’t talk about in my life in general.”
BY PHOEBE ROBERTSON
