Rock audiences are always looking for what’s next, especially when it comes to women pushing the genre forward. Two decades ago, it was Paramore, led by Hayley Williams. More recently, artists like boygenius, St. Vincent, Japanese Breakfast, Willow, and Courtney Barnett have carved out space on their own terms across indie, alternative, pop, and traditional rock. Now, Ecca Vandal is stepping into that lineage with her upcoming album LOOKING FOR PEOPLE TO UNFOLLOW, out May 22 via Loma Vista Recordings.
To put it mildly, Ecca Vandal is shock value personified. Her bright blue hair and micro bangs, eclectic vintage style, and inconceivable vocal range (that shifts from soulful riffs to guttural scream-singing in the same bar) are only part of the draw. On paper, it might read like a rock artist starter pack, but in practice, it never feels forced. When she steps onstage, there’s a clarity to who she is. There’s no posturing, no performance of identity. And in that, there’s an unspoken invitation for listeners to meet her with the same honesty.
A Sri Lankan Tamil–Australian artist, emerging from Melbourne’s DIY punk scene, Vandal has built a reputation for high-energy performances and a sound that resists easy categorization. Pulling from punk, hip-hop, jazz, and electronic, her music moves with intention, often exploring identity, power, independence, and self-expression without settling into a single lane. Drawing from artists as different as Nina Simone and Fugazi, Vandal has long leaned into contrast. This time, that instinct is sharpened into a central idea: subtraction—letting go of what drains your energy and distorts your sense of self.
“The systems. The trends. The illusions of connection. I find empowerment in being loud and noisy, especially as a woman in this global moment who grew up in a culture that told me I could not be those things,” she says.
That mindset shows up immediately in the song rollout. Her latest single, “SORRY! CRASH!,” lands with a kind of unfiltered energy that feels intentionally untouched, resisting the urge to be polished into something more digestible. It follows earlier releases—“CRUISING TO SELF SOOTHE,” “BLEED BUT NEVER DIE,” "BLEACH," "MOLLY," and “THEN THERE’S ONE”—that together point toward a record that supports saying what you feel exactly how you want to, delivery be damned.
A powerhouse lyrical anthem, “BLEED BUT NEVER DIE" is a breakout song on the record. It showcases various aspects of her vocals, including a smooth singing voice in the bridge following a rock-n-roll heavy chorus. The stretched lullaby-ish lyrics "I'm done with fools like you" juxtaposed against the scream chorus is subversive for a stereotypical rock song and it works excellently.
“CRUISING TO SELF SOOTHE" is a fan favorite record. The high-pitched shriek paired with the pumped-up electric guitar and intense drumming that opens the song pulls you in immediately! Vandal is almost saying, I won't and can't be boxed in.
The song “THEN THERE’S ONE” has a distinctly different flair. Coming in at just 1 minute and 19 seconds, she gets straight to the point. With just vocals and a synthesizer, she showcases the musical appetite of her South Asian culture in electronic form.
A big part of Vandals message comes from how the album was made. She recorded and produced the project alongside Richie Buxton in his childhood bedroom in bayside Melbourne.
“We cut out everything that didn’t serve us, the timelines, the metrics, the pressure to ‘stay visible’ online. We tuned out of the feed and turned inwards," she says.
"In Richie’s childhood bedroom, we built a tiny home studio, four walls that became a universe. The internet was painfully slow, so we were truly disconnected from the online game. Deep in bayside Melbourne, far from our inner-city friends, that little room became our whole world for nearly two years. It held all our chaos and all our clarity, a little ‘playpen’ where we could live, play and experiment like teenagers again. We started making things with our hands again, tangible, imperfect, and real. We wanted to celebrate long-form, the idea of an album as a whole body of work, while the world was chasing 15-second snippets and algorithm-friendly noise. So we left behind the room packed with industry chatter and opinions, and created our own little haven. And honestly, it was magic. The best decision we’ve ever made.”
That sense of intention—of pulling back to move forward—sits at the center of LOOKING FOR PEOPLE TO UNFOLLOW. Even as Vandal steps onto bigger stages, including her upcoming Coachella debut later this month, stage show at Lollapalooza, and a tour supporting Deftones, the project feels grounded and deliberate. It’s less about being everywhere at once, and more about choosing exactly where and how she wants to be heard.
Follow Ecca Vandal on socials (Instagram, Twitter, YouTube).
