The Melbourne-based duo 2charm talks about the intricacies of queer love when it suffocates on small town streets and how it is born anew in ecstasy under the blinding strobe lights of European dance floors. Created in collaboration with Ninajirachi, 1tbsp and Simon Lam, their debut album, star scum city, is just the ideal soundtrack for a summer rush.
Hi guys! How are you? Your debut album, star scum city, was released a few weeks ago. Are you happy with the reception? 
We’re good. We’re in Austin at the moment and we’re nearly at the end of our South by Southwest jaunt. We’ve done three shows the last three nights and we have our last one tonight, and then our headline tour continues after that. I think it exceeded our expectations in a way. It’s music that we made for fun, something for us and our friends, so to see it be received so well by fans and to also get good critical acclaim has been awesome. We’re very happy. 
boyfriend is such a perfect summer song. Like some other tracks, it is produced by Ninajirachi, but in this one I have a doubt that has been running through my mind: is she singing with you too or it’s just heavily modified vocals? How was the experience of working with her?
There are no Nina vocals on boyfriend. We slowed and pitched the song down four keys and recorded my vocals in and then put it back to the original tempo and pitched it back up. That’s kind of how we got that vocal tone for a lot of the song.
We do have some other songs that we’ve been making with Nina that have her singing, which I’m really excited for people to hear. Working with her on the album was incredible. As I said just before, we were doing it for fun and after our first time working together, we realised that we have a special creative connection, so we kept making songs whenever we had time and availability to do it. I think she’s the best producer in the world and an amazing songwriter, so creative.
To be honest, this is one of my favorite LPs of this year so far, just euphoric and carefree pop music. I think the record was mostly inspired by your time in Barcelona. What makes it such a special city for you?
There's this song on the album, you’ll never be alone in barcelona, that was inspired by going to Primavera Sound in 2024 the night that Omar Apollo, Lana Del Rey, Troye Sivan, Arca, Sega Bodega and Hannah Diamond performed. But specifically, it was in the later part of the night when we saw Arca, Sega Bodega, and Hannah Diamond that we were feeling particularly transcendent. It was a really epic, beautiful experience. 
You are from Brisbane, which is more populated than Barcelona, but from your perspective, what do you think is the main difference experience-wise for a queer person in Australia and Europe?
It’s hard to make a general statement because we only know our own lived experience and it can come down to the school you went to or your family. Being in both places now, it’s maybe more comfortable to be a queer person throughout Europe generally than in Australia, but we’re pretty lucky with the people that we’re around. We live in Melbourne, the most progressive city in the country and culturally very accepting.
Ironically, your tour doesn’t have a stop in Spain. I think that has to be solved, right?
We’ll make it to Spain sometime, hopefully soon!
I see a hint of Piece of Me by Britney Spears in the melody of paris (to get you out my head). Thinking about it, Blackout is the ultimate pop club album, so I can see a parallelism with this record. Was it an influence for you?
Yeah, absolutely. Britney has always been my favourite artist. I remember seeing her music videos and having my mind blown. As I’ve gotten more experience in music production, I’ve really come to appreciate how incredible the production in her music is, especially on Blackout, where she was the executive producer. I also think her melodies, the rhythms and the way that she delivers the lyrics, everything about her vocal performance, is so incredible. It’s definitely an inspiration and something that I aspire to.
girls is so much fun and a total hymn if you pay attention to the lyrics. It’s also refreshing that the song is made a hundred percent by a gay-girl synergy. In your opinion, do you feel safer and freer working with women and queer artists in the studio? 
I think socially, I love being around girls and queer people, so I guess it would make sense that the same goes for creating music. I love, love the guys I work with as well though. It comes down to personal connection. I saw a tweet the other day about woke2.0 being music made by female producers with male singers and how that’s literally 2charm and Nina. 
Apart from Ninajirachi, if you look closely to the credits, you can see Troye Sivan and his usual collaborator Leland in chateau. How did that happen?
Troye hosted a songwriting camp in Sydney a few years ago; we started writing a song and, although nothing ever came of it, there was a part of one melody that I really liked. When I was in the studio, I found myself humming that melody, so I repurposed it into chateau with Nina. So it wasn't like we were all in the room together making the song or anything but it ended up being this collaboration that happened in parts over the course of a few years.
Is there any other artist or producer on your wishlist that you would like to work with?
We’d love to work with Danny L Harle, I feel like that would be a really good fit. PinkPantheress is another one. We have a special thing with Nina, 1tbsp and Simon Lam, the three producers on star scum city, so I’m not trying to branch out and work with other producers. But if Danny L Harle or PinkPantheress ever wanted to, we’d be super keen.
Have you ever spoken to them or did you have any feedback from them?
Not as of now, but I know that PinkPantheress is a Ninajirachi fan, so maybe 2charm next.
What are your plans for this and next year? 
It’s looking like we’ll probably come back to the UK and Europe later in the year. We’ve started working on new music as well, so we’ll see how that comes together. So far, the new songs are feeling really good. We’re having so much fun, we just want to keep it going!
2charm---Press-Shot-1-(by-Casey-Garnsey).jpg