INTERVIEW: BEKS on her music and 'Drag Race Down Under': "We're always taught to be small and reduce ourselves and not be in the way...drag queens taught me to be big and bold and take up space."

Interview: Shalane Connors
Published: 29 July 2026

Australia’s BEKS is an artist that exemplifies versatility and creativity.

Raised in Bundaberg in rural Queensland, she first started performing as a teenager, with regular gigs on the country music circuit. Skilled at the guitar and drums, she would go on to study dance, eventually becoming a dance teacher. She then formed an all female punk rock band before launching her solo career as BEKS.

Initially embracing electro and synth pop, BEKS’s discography covers a broad range of soundscapes, and she can authentically inhabit almost everything, from synthpop shimmer on ‘Crush’, trance on ‘Young Forever’, the guitar ballad of ‘A Love Like This’ or a harder pop-rock-punk sound on recent single ‘Nice Try’.

Her 2025 single ‘Melodrama’, a pulsing electropop banger, received a surge in popularity this year when it went viral on various social media platforms, resulting in one of the highest streaming songs of her career.

A magnetic and charismatic performer, BEKS has built up a reputation for powerful live shows, as both a solo artist and also a DJ. She has recently performed sold out shows across Australia, London and Europe as well as appearances at SXSW Austin, Mighty Hoopla and Pride festivals across the world.

A fierce LGBTQIA+ ally, BEKS has also become a fixture on the queer music circuit in recent years, performing with an all queer band at her shows. In perhaps the pinnacle of queer culture, BEKS is appearing as a guest judge on Drag Race Down Under this month. Celebrating five years since the Drag Race franchise debuted down under, the 2026 season brings Drag Race stars from around the world onto the very first season of Drag Race Down Under vs The World. Screening exclusively on Stan, 11 queens representing their country will battle it out for the crown of Queen of the Mothertucking World and a cash prize of $50,000.

BEKS appears as a guest judge on the premiere episode, "Look Who's Back in the House!", which sees the queens create an outfit from scratch in the iconic Drag Race Werkroom.

Criss-crossing genres with ease while never being a slave to any, BEKS is an artist that impresses at every turn and never fails to bring joy - or the feels - with her music. Truly one of Australia’s most impressive musicians and artists, if you haven’t already now is the time to dive deep into her music. We recently met up with her to chat all about her career and appearing on Drag Race Down Under vs The World.

Hi, Beks, how are you? It’s a big week for you!
It is, it's a massive week for me. When you have a big moment. It's almost anticlimactic. You've been building up and building up, and then you're just like, ‘oh, here we go, it's gonna happen’.

So you are appearing as a judge on Drag Race Down Under vs The World. Is this is your first time judging on a judging panel in general?
Yes, this is my this is my first time being on the other side of the panel. I've never been in any drag contest or anything like that, but it was quite audacious to be sitting on a panel with [host] Michelle Visage and [judges] Rhys Nicholson and Lazy Susan, having to critique and roast my favourite drag queens from around the world. It was audacious.

I imagine that's quite difficult as an artist who has had to be on the receiving end yourself?
I'm not going to lie, it was liberating in a way because as a developing artist, I received so much conflicting feedback about my own art, and so for someone to trust me with my opinion, I took that really, really seriously.

You have a long history with the drag and queer community, they were the first community to embrace your work. How did that come about? What was it about your vibe and your music that you think resonated and created this synergy?
My creativity forced me to find a way to connect with a live audience. My background is in punk rock, and I had a lot of success in an all-girl punk rock band, and a lot of doors were open for me in Australia. I had endless live opportunities, and I think that that reflects the landscape that Australia has for bands. We are definitely more pub rock leaning, indie leaning, and so for pop artists like me to put themselves out there on an entry level, I just couldn't get a door open. All the doors that were open to me before were closed. So I had to be creative and think where else outside of the traditional live music venues does music exist? And that's when I reached out to Pride of Our Footscray, which is a community LGBTQIA+ bar in Melbourne, and I met my drag mother Joslyn Bosoms, who said, ‘All right, girl, you've got three minutes in between the drag changeovers. Good luck’. And that's really where my affinity with the drag community began.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but is it a chicken and egg kind of experience where you've been welcomed into this community, and it in turn flavours the work that you're putting out, because you have this wonderful big diva quality about your work.
Yes, I agree with you, and I think that having a grassroots experience with the drag community and the entire queer community, it lifted off the limitations for me as an artist. I could present myself as feminine and masculine at the same time. I could be over the top, and I still wasn't going to be the most over the top person in the room. It really helped me unlock and reconstruct the ideas that I had of myself as a woman. We're always taught to be small and reduce ourselves and not be in the way. The drag queens taught me to be big and bold and take up space, especially on my head with all of my wigs! They taught me so much about myself, and I'm so grateful to all of them along the way.

You originally grew up in Bundaberg. Regional Australia is not particularly well known for being accepting to queer communities and drag communities, what has your experience been going back to your regional roots or the feedback you've had from your Bundaberg community?
I'm gonna tell you, babes, I don't talk to any of them, so I'm sure that they're probably looking at me, going, ‘She's lost the plot. Like, what is going on here?’ They've all gone on to have careers in real estate and have a lot of kids. I went in the opposite direction, so I hope that I shock them and maybe they don't even recognise me anymore!

I also grew up in the country, so I've definitely had that experience of people not understanding the world that we live in, that we obviously find completely normal in the city, now that we've learnt it. Sometimes I think it does take shocking the unknown into people to make them see.
As as an example, I just did a national tour, and visited a lot of rural and regional live venues with The Superjesus, and I had somebody filming my sets. I would deliberately tell them to keep rolling the camera after each song, and the banter in between from that crowd, which is a hands in pocket, we're here to rock, get the tinnies out, very straight crowd. was, ‘What the hell is this? What the f is going on here?’ It was really fun, because a lot of these crowds weren't exposed to drag culture, and I think it helped to bring awareness to how drag culture and punk music are actually very aligned in their ethos. It is about rebelling, and it is a protest against living in suppressed societies. I think it just showed them that punk and protest can be colourful and wild and interesting and weird, and still have the spirit of punk rock music.

I think they both represent this world of escapism as well. This larger than life nature, where people can go and have a true out of body experience, which I think is really important for keeping live music alive in Australia at the moment. We've got so many venues and festivals shutting down, but, there's such a strong drag community and queer community here in Sydney trying to keep venues alive. Divine Playhouse was shut down just the other week, it was providing ongoing employment to hundreds of artists, and was shut down in the first week due to people being homophobic, essentially. It is such an important sector of the live industry that's being threatened currently. Are you finding that also hitting the drag world in Melbourne?
Yes, I have, and I acknowledge that that is happening. I like to live optimistically that as the rise of AI and synthetic virtual experiences takes over our screens, that there will be a resurgence of live experiences and a demand for that. I'm banking on that as a live entertainer, but I could see that happening, and that's why I got my girl band together, and I now perform on stage and support more mainstream bands. I'm bringing that drag culture that was closed to me, and now it's almost come 360. I'm bringing that to more mainstream stages, and hopefully destigmatising some of the cliches about drag and some of the negative things that have been pushed upon the drag community.

You've had quite a a long musical journey, you were originally a drummer with Bec and Ben, and then the punk band, Rackett and now you've arrived at BEKS. Do you feel like you've arrived? Does this feel really right for you in the moment?
I'm grateful to everybody along my journey, but I feel the most authentic to who I am now. I used a lot of crutches along the way. Not to take away from my experiences, but there was a part of me that was insecure to stand on my own, and own my own lyrics, own my words, own my artistry. So I would embellish myself with bands and extra members. Now where I am is grateful for those experiences, but also I've slayed a lot of those insecurities, and I feel confident in my ability to hold my own art.

What's what are you most excited for audiences to see in this new season of Drag Race Down Under vs The World?
So we have an exquisite buffet of queens from all around the world. One of the exciting things that I got to witness as a judge was on the runway seeing the different ways that the queens would style their hair, style their makeup. The way that they would wear even a heel would be different from each each part of the world, and I found that that was really interesting seeing the variety. For me personally, I am excited for people that don't know me to discover more about who I am and and get to know me as an artist.

Have you got any kind of must-takes with you on the road for your gigs? Do you have a little token or a good luck charm or something like that?
Yes, I have. I bring Chinese balls. These little Chinese balls out of the dirt that expand in water, for my vocals. I put them in water, and they expand into these like fungal creatures, and you drink them and they do amazing things.

Amazing. Speaking of, what's coming up next for you?
I have some incredible remixes of my song ‘Melodrama’ coming out, working with queer artists all around the world on some remixes. I am performing at Amsterdam Pride, and then I'm coming home and performing at the Victorian Pride Awards. And then, that's up to you, Australia! I'm excited, I don't know what is going to happen next, but I hope that I'll be welcomed into a whole new community's arms, and people will get to know me more, and I'll get to do more of what I love, which is performing live and writing music.

Drag Race Down Under vs The World is streaming now on Stan. You can watch the trailer here.
Follow BEKS on Instagram, TikTok and her website