INTERVIEW: Peach PRC releases debut album 'Porcelain': "This album kind of changed my life"
Interview: Shalane Connors
Image: Cybele Malinowski
Published: 3 April 2026
It is no secret now that Peach PRC (real name Shaylee Curnow) is one of Australia’s greatest pop artists. From global TikTok star to music star with over 250 million streams to her name, Peach has become a phenomenon in barely five years.
Today she releases her debut album Porcelain and it sees Peach move to a new level, both creatively and personally. To start with, it see her openly claim the ‘PRC’ section of her artist name., which stands for ‘porcelain’ (the ‘Peach’ comes from the Super Mario Bros character Princess Peach). Creatively, the album sees her sound develop and mature into more nuanced sonics. Famous for her fabulously camp, energetic electro-synth-pop like ‘Josh’ and ‘Forever Drunk’, Porcelain certainly features that sound but expands her soundscape with elements of rock, country and electronica that adds extra weight to Peach’s superb lyricism.
“I’m in the middle of becoming someone else,” Peach says. “The last time I did that was years ago, when I became Peach Porcelain from Shaylee, and entered into the world of stripping and everything that came with that. Now, it feels like I’m in another porcelain stage.”
Produced with Konstantin Kersting (Tones and I, Milky Chance, Mallrat), Larzz Principaato (Dua Lipa, Tate McRae, Halsey), Harry Charles (King Princess, One Republic, Renee Rapp), and Space Primates (FIFTY FIFTY, Alesso, Stray Kids), the album was two years in the making. Peach initially struggled to create the album, but found the creative push she needed when she embraced nature.
“I was just in a lot of grey, sterile places, trying to be creative, and it wasn’t working,” Peach says. “So I found myself outside a lot. Being out in bushland, it really opened my eyes. It inspired a lot of self-growth, even outside of my artistry. It inspired me to reflect on how I’m a part of nature, not separate to it. I’m a natural being too – I have cycles that bloom and fall and all these things, just like the flowers and the trees.”
The album opens with ‘Piper’, which instantly lays out how Peach’s sound has developed. The swirling synths and pop sensibilities are still present, but it has a more refined electronica-trip hop sound that you just want to sink into. Peach’s inspiration of nature and whimsy is clear in the lyrics: ‘Hear the panpipes play / It’s happening / And it’s like paradise here / And now I can never leave I fear.’
The second track and recent single ‘Eucalyptus’ follows with similar sonics and also has a lyrical focus on the spirituality of nature, but this time is sees Peach reflecting on her previous work, specifically her 2022 single ‘God Is A Freak’, and how she has grown. ‘I know that I said all that shit about god / I think it probably pissed him off,’ she sings. ‘I know I’m just a wandering spirit / But if you want this forest can be my religion.’
‘Pink’ is the first of several songs that take a brutal look at Peach’s life before her music career took off, in this case her troubled relationship with her mother, a relationship she continues to explore in the next track ‘Hold If For Her’, which sees Peach reconcile in part with their past: ‘Now it’s only a little grief that I hold’.
‘Back To You’ combines pop with rock and the chanty vibes of early 2000s pop-punk, while the first single ‘Miss Erotica’ is a glorious reminder of Peach’s brilliance at creating no holds barred, intoxicating synthpop.
‘Oasis’ begins with a definitive country twang transforming into dancepop and again explores the blurred lines between religion and nature - ‘Why would I wait for heaven / When just outside it’s a technicoloured earth?’
The closing songs of the album take on a deeper, more melancholic feel. While it is certainly not the first time on the album Peach has opened up with vulnerable, raw lyrics it feels like they cut much deeper on the final four songs. ‘I Wouldn’t Mind’ is a shimmering electronic ballad that grapples with the concept of how people often have to hide their true self because of the way society judges those who are different. ‘I’ll fight the man in the sky if he’s real / Just so you can hold my hand…How could a love that’s soft be something wrong?’
‘The Palace’ is the album’s final reflection on Peach’s past, in this part her previous life as a stripper. It is a heartbreaking look at the pain behind the smiling face performing for ‘drunk strangers’. ‘Pretending I’m not here / Choking on smoke stains / They don’t know my real name…The only thing they didn’t see were bones and wisdom teeth / And I can’t bear to pull them out now.’
Penultimate track, and the album’s third single, ‘Out Loud’ is arguably the most heartbreaking song on the album. A gentle guitar based ballad that builds with intensity as the song progresses, Peach sings of being in a relationship with someone who is not out to her family and friends. It is a poignant, sometime desperate track as Peach tries to convince everyone around her, including herself, that the relationship will prosper, despite the lack of openness on her partner’s side. ‘If I’m patient, one day she’ll love me out loud…One day you’ll see / She’s gonna speak and love me out loud’. The pain, hurt and despair is brilliantly portrayed in Peach’s emotive vocal performance.
The album ends on the whimsical ‘Shirley Barber’ that is a fantasy story of a forest dwelling being. It is perhaps a metaphor for Peach farewelling her childhood and past self and moving into a new stage in her life. ‘One last tea party to part / I think she sees me now / I join her, we sit down and say farewell.’ The songs ends with a plaintive ‘There she goes’ as the album - and one part of Peach’s life - ends.
There has never been any question of Peach PRC’s immense creativity, but with Porcelain she has evolved as an artist and is solidifying not just her versatility and growth, but innate brilliance as a songwriter. We recently caught up with Peach to chat about the creation of the album, undoubtedly one of 2026’s musical highlights to date.
Hello, Peach, so lovely to talk to you. First of all, congratulations on your upcoming debut album, Porcelain. It's been two years in the making, it's an incredible milestone for any artist. How are you feeling about the release?
I'm feeling so excited and so ready for it to be out. I've been sitting on it for so long, so I'm just pumped.
You've said that much of the inspiration for Porcelain was derived from spending time in nature, in your newfound appreciation and adoration of the natural world. Talk me through that process of nature to inspiration to song.
I moved out of my apartment, the lease was up, and I was trying to buy a place. That took a long time of I didn't realise that was such a huge process! So for about a year I was looking and I was staying in Airbnbs and it was a bit depressing being in hotels and Airbnbs and stuff - a privilege, don't get me wrong, but still quite depressing. So I would go outside a lot, I'd go for walks down to the bush reserve and one day when I was down there, they had a sign about volunteering, and I was like, I'd love to, and now I volunteer down at the bush care reserve. I learned a lot about the plants and about the native fauna and flowers, it's so nice to be outside. I didn't realise how much art there is just existing already in nature. The flowers are art, and the trees are, there's so much inspiration everywhere.
I’d been stuck in this writer's block and rut of trying to keep up with everyone else in the industry, trying to think what's cool and what's popular, and what do people want to hear? Then I just removed myself from all of that, and really went within, and then became my own inspiration, and then nature became my inspiration, and it still is. It's just endless. Anytime I need inspiration for anything, I just look outside and I find it and it's been so amazing. This album kind of changed my life a little bit.
You’ve described Porcelain as your second evolution, your first being from Shaylee to Peach and the pink fairy world and everything that encompassed. Porcelain builds a bridge back to Shaylee, the creative, the raw human, and champions that side of you as an artist. I'm wondering how you think that's manifested in your musical choices, sonically, and which track felt the most like Shaylee to write?
Oh, that's a good question. I feel like it's been a transitional phase, and when I named the album, I hadn't even finished all the songs. I just was in this state of not knowing who I was. I felt like I'd been stripped of my identity, I didn't have the pink hair anymore, I wasn't this character, and I was like if I'm not this caricature of Peach, then who am I? I don't know what I am I had to disappear for a little bit and and find that, and I still don’t know and I’m still finding it. I had to make an album and put it out as part of the process. I was like I'll just make the album and tell everyone I don't actually know what I'm saying or who I am right now, but you can come along and watch me figure it out.
How do you think that's manifested sonically?
Sonically, it became about really natural sounds and being botanical with the soundscape. I wanted it to feel really unique and be its own thing. A lot of the songs were inspired by visual things, I used a lot of fairy oracle cards in my songwriting, and a lot of antique books that I've collected. I try to find inspiration in physical media that that puts itself on my path, rather than me looking for it. Things come to me and I go, okay, this is clearly inspiration for something, and I'll figure that out eventually.
Which of the tracks felt most like Shaylee to write?
I think ‘Piper’ was my favourite to write, because I got to co-produce that one. It was just me and my girlfriend in my bedroom on her laptop, and we used the fairy oracle cards, and just built this whole song based on the image and the story.
Has your songwriting process changed from what it was with your 2023 EP Manic Dream Pixie?
Yeah, it has. It started with just writing the song along with the chords, but now I do a lot of journaling, a lot of poetry, and I start with that. I try not to focus on letting it rhyme or making it sound like anything. I'll just stream of consciousness write what I'm feeling and along the way, there'll be something accidentally poetic that comes up. and I'll go that's the chorus, or that's the tagline and then I'll build it around that.
Beyond being your occupation, what does music mean to you?
Music is interesting, I think that I see music in a different way than most musicians - that sounded so pretentious, that's not how I mean that! For me, it's more about storytelling, it's a vessel for me to get stories across and paint images and create a visual world using sound. You sometimes hear things and you just have an image in your mind and I love doing that. Even with lyrics, it's about telling a story for me. That's my favourite part about music. I think most musicians, hear the sound, and that's what's important to them. But I don't hear music that way. I'm not very classical, I don't understand music theory. It's all just vibes.
What challenges have you faced in the music industry as a woman who's quite open in putting everything out there. Have you copped a lot of flack, or naysayers or mansplainers?
I mean, they are always there but they don't get it, and something I've had to understand is that I'm going to be misunderstood and that's part of it. But something that I've found really hard is being thrown into a world where you're expected to be quite charismatic and very charming, and I'm not great at it, and I have a hard time. I think a lot of artists are the same, people that are a bit creative and a bit out there aren't the most socially fluent. They're a bit awkward and not the best at being on camera. I find that part really hard about the music industry. I love the music, I love the art, I love creating, but the part where I have to be the product is quite hard.
You wrapped up your Wandering Spirit tour, what do you think is going to change in terms of your live performances with Porcelain?
I've really had a chance to figure out performing live now. When I first started, I had never really even sang in a pub or anything, so it was really scary to go from posting online to being on an actual stage, holding a microphone with in-ears, it's a whole new experience. I was really awkward for a really long time, and I dreaded it, I hated performing live. Then over the years, I started to figure it out, I've had help with like the choreographing and all of this stuff, but for this tour, I realised that it maybe needs to be less polished and not be so choreographed and structured. Maybe I'm not a polished pop girl, and that's fine, and I just need to be my own thing. I'm really leaning into my awkwardness and my uniqueness and just letting that shine.
What was your musical journey before Peach?
Music is something that I've always done since I was really little. Everyone that I grew up with, my mum and my family have always said I was always singing and songwriting since I was really little. I did the local talent shows, I went we had this competition in my city called Red Faces, and it was local TV, so that was really exciting for me. I actually auditioned for Australian Idol and The Voice and The X Factor when I was 12 or 13, and I got through to the producers, but then when I'd get there, I was so shy and nervous, I would shake really bad, and they would say ‘you need to go get some confidence and some lessons and then come back’.
And who were your musical idols?
My idols were the main pop girls. I'm such a sucker for bubblegum pop, I just love maximalist music. I loved Katy Perry, Kesha, Britney Spears, all of the pop girls.
How do you hope people feel upon listening to Porcelain? What experience would you like your fans to walk away with?
I always say that I just hope that they feel, I don't really care what they feel, I just hope it's something because it's up to them at that point. There's some songs on there that I wrote based on my newfound appreciation and love for the world around me, and I hope that maybe someone else will get that from it. But I want that to be on their own terms and their own experience. I'm just happy that they feel anything, even if it's negative!
Porcelain is out now via Island Records. You can buy and stream here.
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