Australian Singer Alex Cameron Wrestles with Sex, Family, and Masculinity on Miami Memory

Alex Cameron is a hard man to pin down. In the past, the Australian singer has performed as a host of characters—a failed, aging musician, an online lecher, an obnoxious homophobe—to call out toxic masculinity. He specializes in an off-kilter rock and roll that dabbles in self-parody; Henry Rollins, who counts himself a fan, compares him to “an ever so slightly more well-adjusted Scott Walker.” On his new record, though, Cameron sets the masks and irony aside to sing from the heart. Miami Memory, out this week, features the most personal work of this consummate caricaturist’s career. It’s also some of the best.

What changed? He fell in love. After his last record, Forced Witness, Cameron moved to New York and started dating artist and actress Jemima Kirke. She’s since been an essential collaborator (she’s appeared in four of his music videos and directed two of them), but most of all, she’s Cameron’s primary inspiration.

“Whenever I would try to write a love song, I would think, 'Ah, but I’m lying, I’m making it up, I’m exaggerating,' says Cameron. “Then I came to a point in my life where I realized I’d found, for me, the ideal muse. Finally I found a relationship where I could sit down truthfully and write like, ‘I’m in this, I’m living it, I’ve got the license to write about it.’”

Miami Memory is an unabashed love record that explores relationships at their most sentimental moments and their wildest extremes. The title track is a contender for the raunchiest song of the year, with lyrics about analingus and voyeurism; it’s a testament to Cameron’s talent as a songwriter that the track is as tender as it is graphic. It’s a balance that characterizes the album as a whole. His interest in social critique is still there—he’s still wrestling with the problems in modern masculinity and sexual culture. When he sat down with GQ, he spoke passionately about political correctness and activism in the sex work community. But above it all, Miami Memory is an earnest portrait of 21st century romance.

GQ: On your last two records, you’ve usually written in character, but this time you seem to have stepped back to sing more as yourself. Is that fair to say?
Alex Cameron: Yeah, I think so. I’ve always really wanted to write love songs, but I had always felt I never had connections with love songs because they’re sort of manufactured to manipulate emotions.

[Jonathan] Rado, who produced it, reminded me while we were making the record that it was bizarre that I was making a love record because maybe two or three years ago I said to him, "I don't know if I'll ever get to make a love record because I just don't know how to do it." He said, "You've always wanted to do it, and now we're actually doing it. We should take a moment to realize that."

What are some love songs that you like?
I really like “No One is to Blame” by Howard Jones. I like “ Paper Thin Hotel” by Leonard Cohen. I like Marianne Faithfull’s “Why’d Ya Do It.” I think that counts as a love song even though it’s her abusing her partner for cheating on her, because it’s still coming from a place of love. I like love songs that are aware of the spell of love, that it’s something we’re subject to. We don’t control it.

What was Jemima’s role on Miami Memory?
I have to find a reason why I'm writing a record. “Who's the audience? Who am I writing for?” Jemima was exactly my audience. If I could make her smile or cry or do both at the same time, then I was doing something right. I mean, I'm literally writing songs for her. They're not all about her, but this album, I wanted it to be a gift.

So how has it gone over?
Well, she's very nuanced, and her taste is so honed. She's quite open with me. She has songs she doesn't like, and she has songs she loves.

Do you want to name names?
No way! But she does have a few songs she's like…”eh.” And then she has other songs which got the desired effect. I remember I played her “Miami Memory” and I looked up and she was crying.

Were you together in New York while writing this record?
Mm-hmm. She would be asleep in bed and I'd be writing on the piano in the little living room area. She was there the whole time.

Were you actively seeking her feedback as you wrote?
Very much so, yeah. I would play her songs that were one quarter of the way done. I had never really done that with anyone before.

“Divorce” is obviously a song about difficulties in a relationship. Was it uncomfortable to share that?
Nothing was difficult to play for her. I felt really good about that song because I was going to be able to present it like, “Hey, this is what’s going on in my mind when we’re having an argument. This is how stupid I can get.” You know? And how indignant and just self-destructive. This is how shallow my threats are. I was like, “Here, look, you can see. I’ve done something, here’s proof.”

Your single “Far From Born Again” is about the modern sex work industry. How did you become involved in that issue?
Jemima has a collection of paintings of sex workers, acquaintances or friends that she has an interest in painting. So for a period of time, we were around, socially, a lot of sex workers, just getting to know them as people.

At one time, I interviewed a sex worker. Her main gripe was that they're spoken about like commodity, if they're spoken about at all. And the reality is, they're spoken about less in mainstream media than the treatment of livestock or animals. People are more comfortable sending their 18-year-old kid to the frontline in war than they are letting their child go into sex work.

And I'm talking about a very specific type of sex work. It's not to be confused with forced prostitution or sex trafficking. This is very much the contemporary independent sex worker who sets their own rates and decides on locations and who their clients are,.

How would you describe your relationship to the idea of political correctness, which you touch on multiple times on this album?
I mean, political correctness, theoretically and used in the correct environment, is just evolution and intelligence. Accepting that things change and you have to adapt to the way that cultures shift. The idea of being more than tolerant, [which is] actually being understanding.

There does seem to be a difference between what it actually means to be politically correct and the way it’s used in the song “Bad for the Boys,” where the narrator complains about the “PC Brigade.”
Yeah. I would see when a man is challenged on his ideas that he will often resort to something like, “Oh, is the PC brigade going to come get me?” It's like “No, you just haven't thought about it enough.” So I think on the album when I'm using things like “PC brigade,” it's the idea of the uninformed man becoming defensive when his half-baked ideas are challenged.

The idea of political correctness being applied in the field of politics is quite good, but when you're talking about having your life ruined by PC culture because you can't use a certain word in conversation, that's dangerous. If I told someone that my name is Alex, but I was born Alexander, and they insisted on calling me Alexander because that's the way I was born, I'd be like “Sure, but you're a prick.” If someone has a realization that they're more comfortable—in fact, they are [a certain] gender, and someone is like “What were you born as?” it's kind of like what fucking business of it is yours?

You’ve called the album “the story of a couple balancing sex with contemporary family values.” How does that work?
I think it's difficult in the sense that when you think of a family that's comfortable with sex, you kind of think of this creepy nudist family who walk around in Tevas with their dick out.

You know, I think it's where I hope we're approaching an age where parenthood is valued more for the loyalty to the children as opposed to loyalty for an ancient family structure.

Parenting does seem to be an important topic for you—the album opens with the song, “Stepdad,” with a narrator addressing his stepkids. How has that interest developed?
Parenting has always interested me because I used to think that I was going to be a linguist. I wanted to go to university and study linguistics, and then I wanted to do speech therapy with kids. My mom, when she was working earlier in her life, worked with children with learning disabilities. So it's always fascinated me.

And I have, for whatever reason, a really strong archive of memories from my childhood that I can remember vividly. I didn't think it was that special until people started mentioning it, that it was bizarre that I was remembered these things. So I feel like I have a point of reference for how I would like to be treated if I was a kid.

I’m starting to realize the importance of the children in my life. I’m reaching an age where more and more people, friends of mine, are having children. I’m around kids a lot.

Your partner Jemima has children. Do you find yourself in father figure role with them?
I would say more of like a ... it's getting towards a parental role. Yeah, I don't know about necessarily father, but I'm definitely like an assistant parent. I’m learning on the job, big time. I just try to be supportive of Jemima. She's the mother, and what she really needs is support, not critique.

Do you like hanging out with the kids?
Yeah, I do. I like hanging out with Jemima's kids a ton. They're incredible characters. That's part of the reason that keeps me coming back after each tour. I've got so many things to look forward to. I've got Jemima and these young'uns that are just making a huge impact on my life.

All in all, it seems like you’ve really found this rare, wonderful relationship where you collaborate and communicate with your partner really openly. Could you offer any secrets on how to make that work?
Oh, goodness. One thing that I've learned about myself is no matter how bad it feels to answer a question... I don't know if anyone else can relate to this, but sometimes when I'm being asked question about my emotional state, I get very defensive.

And nothing good comes from silence. Sometimes Jemima will ask me a question, and I won't answer it. Even if I hold onto it for two weeks, eventually, I've learned to ... I'll bust back through the door and be like I've got to tell you the answer to that question because I just realized why I wasn't telling you, and it's horse shit. I think just being open to questioning in terms of discussions about emotions.

Even talking about it now is hard for me. I mean, it goes back to a lot of the stuff on Forced Witness. Traditional masculinity does not allow men to talk about their feelings in a lot of ways.

You really confront that at the end of the record. You close with this powerful spoken word portion, directly addressing Jemima. You don’t normally write with that kind of earnestness. Was that a challenge?
It was a voice memo. I was trying to write something that would go on the end of the record, and I recorded a few different memos and sent her that one, and she called me. I'm just trying to strike an emotional chord with her. And that was one of the toughest parts to write because I didn't want to be manipulative, I didn't want to be just writing for the sake of getting an emotion out of her. So I would aim more for baring myself to let her know what I really think, and hope that is in line with what she wants.

That song is about shallow jealousy and how to be with someone who has recently broken up with their partner. And so after writing a song that is kind of classic in its subject matter, I wanted to say “Hey, just so you know, I'm not fucking around.” I wanted to end the record to be like, this wasn't a fucking joke.

Can he feel his face now?

Originally Appeared on GQ