It’s a question she gets asked often, but 27-year-old musician Plum Green answers it cheerfully – is that your real name?
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“Plum is the name my mother gave me,” she says.
“She said that when I was born I had a fat little round face. She felt that it matched her idea of who I was.”
The Melbourne singer-songwriter is touring with her latest EP Karma. Compared to PJ Harvey, Beth Orton and Patti Smith, she was born in a squat in Brixton in the UK, grew up in New Zealand, and presently calls Melbourne her home.
“My grandparents were Jewish, their name was actually Zhizlovski. They escaped the Holocaust from Poland to England and were given the name Green, because colours were easy to remember and learn if you don’t speak English.”
Her music is dark and luscious. Having released an eponymous EP in 2008, then The Red in 2010, and her crowdfunded album Rushes in 2012, Green tours relentlessly.
Her latest release began as a four-track cassette in a stark Melbourne bedroom not long after Plum Green and guitarist and producer Daniel Cross relocated to the city three years ago. Her background in music goes back much further.
“Both my parents are musicians, they were always playing music around the house a lot and there were musicians over. They were friends with a couple of belly dancers they used to play music for. I’ve always been around it although my mother is a much better singer than I am,” says Plum Green.
“My dad Michael Green plays pretty much every single kind of wind instrument: the saxophone, clarinet – anything.
“They introduced me to Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Bob Dylan, that sort of thing. I think it still influence my work, although it’s a little bit difficult to say exactly what my inspiration is. Anything blues related. And I listen to a lot of black metal. It’s influenced my music – though not so much the growling and the screaming.”
“I started writing songs when I was about 10. They were awful, absolutely shocking – kid’s stuff. But I managed to win a few awards. And it just developed into this intense obsession when I started to play guitar in high school. I would lock myself in my room and teach myself tabs.
Plum Green is playing at Babushka Bar in Ballarat on Saturday August 13, supported by Siren Song and Zarah.
