CELLO Talks About Freedom and Embracing Creativity Duality on "We Do What We Want"(When We Want When We Want To)"
Punk Head: That opening line feels like a door being slammed shut. What are you refusing to go back to right now?
Cello: I wouldn’t say that I’m refusing to go back to anything. More that I’m embracing another side of my artistic persona and expressing that alter ego. I think as an artist it’s always good to evolve and be in the creative flow, this is just an evolution of one part of me.
Punk Head: “We Do What We Want” sounds communal rather than individual. Who’s in that “we” for you?
Cello: For me, that “we” can shift depending on context. I’m a solo artist, I haven’t got a fixed band yet so it can be literal or internal, like different parts of the same person (my different personas for example as in the music video) but sometime’s it’s aspirational—a way of speaking something into being, like claiming belonging to a group or mindset you’re still growing into.
Addressing the “we” in the room is more inclusive as well. It invites the listener into the song, so that the experience is a collective one rather than individualistic.
Punk Head: “Vitamins” and “We Do What We Want” seem to sit in very different emotional worlds, one observational and satirical, the other immersive and visceral. How do these songs connect within the larger arc of Kung Fu Disco?
Cello: Great question. Kung Fu Disco is largely about connection within the human experience and how each of us feels within that. Are you happy? Are you lonely? Do you feel anger? Are you heard? Both “Vitamins” and “We Do What We Want (When We Want When We Want To)” orbit the same core tension — control versus freedom — but approach it from opposite emotional poles.
Punk Head: There’s a fascinating push and pull in your work between discipline and release. You’ve got this rigorous classical background, but the music itself feels intentionally loose, even chaotic. How do you negotiate that tension when you’re writing? Is it something you consciously shape, or does it just emerge?
Cello: It’s a bit of both—designed and discovered.
The discipline is always there at the foundation. My training doesn’t just switch off; it informs how I hear structure, pacing, harmony, even I’m not thinking about any of that, and sometimes you’ve got to fight that. When something feels loose or chaotic, it’s usually not random—it’s more like I’m choosing where to let the seams show, where to let things fray. The beauty in a lot of the music that I love lies in the imperfections and the things in the track that sound raw and real. It’s important to keep that in the music as well because that’s what ultimately makes it human.
Punk Head: Be honest: are you more likely to write a song in a basement or on your allotment?
Cello: Well, I’d say it’s 50/50. As a musician, I can end up hanging out in a lot of dark spaces, so sometimes inspiration will strike there, and other times it’ll be mindlessly weeding my lettuces. You must just always be open to receiving what the universe has to tell you
