Briggs: The rapper went from being 'mega broke' to breaking through

Virginia Trioli: What about "I never ... "

Briggs: I never compromise my integrity. Man's got to have a code.

Virginia Trioli: Who taught you that?

Briggs: Omar off The Wire.

Virginia Trioli: Oh, well now we're getting somewhere.

I'm Virginia Trioli and welcome to You Don't Know Me, the podcasts in which I asked some of Australia's biggest names seven big questions.

Briggs: Just a caveat for everyone: I didn't read these questions. I did the bad.

Virginia Trioli: Because he doesn't do his homework. 

Briggs: I'm a bad student.

Virginia Trioli: This episode: he's a rapper, he's an actor, and a self-confessed bad student. Briggs, welcome to You Don't Know Me. 

Briggs: Thanks for having me. 

Virginia Trioli: Because you're a self-described terrible student. 

Briggs: Yeah, yeah. That's like one of my things I wish I was better at. And I see my mates going back to uni and doing courses and PhDs and Masters and things. And I though, 'Oh, that'd be great.' And then I remember how I was at school. I was terrible. Bad student.

Virginia Trioli: What was going on at school for you? 

Briggs: I hated school. I hated school from the start until I finished. I managed to finish, I got my VCE, begrudgingly, mostly out of spite.

Virginia Trioli: Because they weren't believing in you and you though, 'Oh, I'll show them.'

Briggs: They didn't want me there at all.

Virginia Trioli: Right.

Briggs: Yeah, the first school that was at, Shepparton High, did not want me there at all.

Virginia Trioli: Why?

Briggs: Um, I don't know. I don't know if I didn't fit the granite look of the place or what. I guess I was just too handsome and I was too distracting for the other students.

Virginia Trioli: Well, that's a reasonable explanation, I think. And your second school?

Briggs: Ah, they were all right. Still same kind of drama. I just didn't really fit into that school system very well.

Virginia Trioli: Not all of us love school. And I wasn't a huge fan of it, either. But really, the main reason we ended up going or staying or turning up each day is because of our mates. It's because we want to be there for friends.

Briggs: Yeah, nah. I had mates in school like you'd have mates at work.

Virginia Trioli: Right, okay, you don't want to hang out with them.

Briggs: Nah, nah, there were all lovely. But they just weren't my mates.

Virginia Trioli: Was music in your life from the beginning?

Briggs: Yeah. Yeah, I was an annoying kid. I was just like, I was obsessed. I was obsessive about things I liked. Music, movies, especially cartoons. I was obsessed.

Virginia Trioli: Did you have an instrument from an early age?

Briggs: I had a guitar, and that's what I learned to play on. I wish I'd learned piano because I feel like you get a better grasp of music and notes. Looking back, I wish I could go back and be a better student and learn piano

Virginia Trioli: 'Now,' he says. All your teachers are tearing their hair out listening to this right now.

Briggs: If they have any left.

Virginia Trioli: When did it all come together for you? So what was the first song-

Briggs: I'm still waiting.

Virginia Trioli: Oh, rubbish.!I'm not copping that from you. You've got record labels, you've got massive success as a singer, as a performer, as a comedian, you've been on ABC TV shows and others, you've got a kids book, so no false modesty from you, Briggs.

Briggs: I'm still waiting. I'm still like, you know, I've still got to wash my own clothes and stuff. I'm not there yet. I still gotta make my own food.

Virginia Trioli: Well no one said you were Twiggy Forrest.

Briggs: Yeah, well I'm trying.

Virginia Trioli: Let's get to our questions. "You'd never know it, but I ... "

Briggs: You'd never know it, that I have a real passion for food. That's my happy place. 

Virginia Trioli: Okay

Briggs: But I don't post too much about it on my socials or anything like that, because it's the one hobby I haven't monetised yet.

Virginia Trioli: But there's still time.

Briggs: Still time.

Virginia Trioli: Do you cook?

Briggs: Yeah. I'm a big fan of Italian stuff, like pizzas. I got a pizza oven from my mate. He hooked me up, my mate Guy (he's from Shepparton too) from Leonardo's in Carlton.

Virginia Trioli: Right, yeah.

Briggs: He hooked me up with this great pizza oven and it's changed my life.

Virginia Trioli: You've talked about Shepparton, you were born in Shep, you're a Shep boy.

Briggs: I was born in Echuca, actually. I grew up in Shepparton.

Virginia Trioli: Yes that's very true, grew up in Shepparton, you're quite right. But it features hugely in your music along the way, as well. And there's a wonderful quote of yours that I want to read here, talking about your very first record, The Blacklist and then the second one Sheplife. "I said to Jay [your production partner] when I was working on stuff for the Sheplife album, 'If The Blacklist was the punch in the face, Sheplife is why I punched you in the face'."

Briggs: Yeah. 

Virginia Trioli: Great description there. What does that mean?

Briggs: Sheplife was a bit more introspective. And it wasn't as blatant as when we did the A.B. Original record, but it spoke about an Indigenous kid's experience growing up in a country- in a rural city. Blacklist was me in my first opportunity to speak to the world, and a big middle finger. Sheplife was when I really thought about 'I've got their attention, what they'll want to say?' So yeah, it was, you know, I hate explaining myself, but ...

Virginia Trioli: ... But there was a need to do so with that record, you thought?

Briggs: Yeah, I figured, like, I just felt compelled to talk from that perspective, because I don't feel like a lot of people had heard rural, country Victoria in that sense.

Virginia Trioli: It's a different opportunity. I was re-reminded yesterday, something Beyonce said quite some time ago, but it really still lasts, which is that, 'No one writes albums anymore.' They drop songs, and then they drop another song, and then that song wears out, and they drop another song. But the idea of writing an album, a selection of works that is a conversation, that is a statement, that's something, to her, is unusual now. Whereas I grew up with albums only. And the big master statement from the artist. So, that record was something like that for you wasn't it?

Briggs: Yeah, for sure. I don't put out as much music like that because I take my time on a record, when I do make a record. I'm an album artist, because that's what I grew up on. That's what I like to do.

Virginia Trioli: All right, how about, "The fork in the road I almost took was ... "

Briggs: Fork in the road. You know what? I was nearly going to be a tram driver. 

Virginia Trioli: Really? 

Briggs: Yeah, but I didn't go to the induction.

Virginia Trioli: So how far through did you get and how old were you?

Briggs: I would have been ... I was living in Melbourne so I would have been like 20. And we got there, interviews, rah rah rah. And then I was on my way to being a tram driver, but I just didn't go.

Virginia Trioli: Couldn't do it?

Briggs: Nah, nah, I always hated jobs. I always hated having jobs.

Virginia Trioli: What brought you to the doorstep of being a tram driver?

Briggs: Being mega broke. Super duper broke. I had to save up to be broke. I couldn't put money in my bank account because the bank would take it because it was in the minus

Virginia Trioli: Because you were in debit.

Briggs: I was broke.

Virginia Trioli: So who suggested trams?

Briggs: I reckon it must have been one of my old man's mates, who was like, 'Be a tram driver. I've got a mate who will put you through and rah rah rah.' I was gonna do it, and then I was like, 'I can't do this.'

Virginia Trioli: All right, so there's that moment. You've got to go for the induction, you've got a job waiting for you, guaranteed paycheck, and you turn your back and walk away.

Briggs: Yeah. I didn't even turn my back. I didn't even show up.

Virginia Trioli: Didn't even show, right? What happens then?

Briggs: I can't remember essentially what happened, like blow for blow after that. But it was just, I never really felt like music was out of the question for me. And I knew what I wanted to do. I knew what I wanted. And I'd always had jobs but not careers, you know what I mean? I had jobs to not have a job. I think Cormac McCarthy might have said that in an interview and I really spoke to me. He had jobs to not have a job.

Virginia Trioli: Yeah, right.

Briggs: So I worked jobs for like a few months. And then I'd leave it because I want to go on tour or do a show, and then, you know, the flexibility would come into question. Because I was just obsessed. I'm an obsessive kind. When I like something, that's all that's in my head. Like if I was driving trams I'd be dangerous. Because all I'd be thinking about is making tunes or the next idea that I have to work out.

Virginia Trioli: Well, at least you'd be on rails and you wouldn't be able to so to take some unexpected corners, you'd have to go in a particular direction.

Briggs: Yeah I've seen the ads.

Virginia Trioli: What about "I always ... "

Briggs: I always listen to things, watch things, read things twice. If I'm watching a new show that I enjoy, or even I don't enjoy, but it's a show that I know I need to analyse and dissect, I watch it at least three times.

Virginia Trioli: So you're always on the look for something that's going to stimulate you, or challenge you, or be the model that might be interesting or different?

Briggs: Yeah

Virginia Trioli: The thing that's going to help you. 

Briggs: Yeah, I'm just looking at the structure of things and analysing how it works and what they're doing with story, especially.

Virginia Trioli: What's been one of the most useful things for you recently, either a TV show or something that you've read that you thought, 'Ah, I didn't think of that. That's a nice approach.'?

Briggs: You know what, for a while I kept watching this Japanese film, Throne of Blood. It was by Kurosawa.

Virginia Trioli: Oh, right, okay, yeah!

Briggs: It's Macbeth, essentially. 

Virginia Trioli: Oh of course!

Briggs: So I was watching it without subtitles because I kind of know Macbeth. So I was just trying to see how they tell that story that I know, and if I can catch on to what's happening in the scenes and stuff like that.

Virginia Trioli: I've not seen that Kurosawa. Is it very different from the Macbeth text?

Briggs: No, it's not. It's really close, like, super close. And it's really beautiful.

Virginia Trioli: All his films are.

Briggs: It's like watching a painting, you know what I mean? It's something special. For me, watching that, and the translation of that from Western to the Japanese - because cultures tell their stories differently because they have different cues anyway but - for me, it sparks my interest to be like, 'I wonder if I can apply these things to Aboriginal stories, and our culture, and how we tell stories, and what our Macbeth might look like, and stuff like that.

Virginia Trioli: That's a great provocation. I love it. What about "I never ... "

Briggs: I never ... I never compromise my integrity. Never. Not once I've turned down more money than I've ever made.

Virginia Trioli: Give me an example.

Briggs: Betting companies, anything like that. Yeah, I can't do it. Alcohol, I don't promote. I drink, yeah, but I can't promote.

Virginia Trioli: I can imagine they'd come with a fair bit of money attached to it.

Briggs: Yeah, it's hard.

Virginia Trioli: For Mr. In-The-Negative Broke all those years ago, that'd be a strong memory.

Briggs: Yeah, hard, for sure. For sure. People who don't know about being broke, like, being broke sucks. You know what I mean? Never, you can't know. The financial freedom to be creative is something else. The fact that I don't have to dig a ditch, or drive a tram, you know what I mean, is paramount to my creativity.

Virginia Trioli: It's a deep fear, and the terror of just not having the money is absolutely real. Does that stay with you? Is that like a reminder?

Briggs: Yeah, it's well work all the time and do two things at once. And the scarcity, you know what I mean? I've got to remind myself that it's okay, and it's gonna be alright. But it's that hustler in me that drives me to be always looking and creating.

Virginia Trioli: But the hustler's got boundaries of integrity around him. I mean, there's lines you won't cross.

Briggs: You have to. Man's got to have a code.

Virginia Trioli: Yeah. Who taught you that?

Briggs: Omar from The Wire.

Virginia Trioli: Oh, well, now we're getting somewhere.

Briggs: Nah, my dad, my parents, mum and dad, my family, for sure. That's what it is. And just being able to sleep at night, you know what I mean? I'm bad at it as as it is. So anything extra on my mind is only going to add to the weight.

Virginia Trioli: Just going to increase the tension. What about, "The time I got it terribly wrong ... "

Briggs: I was actually talking about this with my mate I'm writing with at the moment. Around when I dropped a song called Life Is Incredible, a couple of years ago, it was a single that I just put out. And it was kind of in response to Pauline Hanson, and the hard time she was having been white in Australia. And it was satirical. I had this song about what life would be like as a blackfella living white. It was my approach to the rollout, I got it wrong. Because I was too proud to explain myself. So I expected people just to get it. To understand my position.

Virginia Trioli: Were you copping a bit of backlash?

Briggs: Like I always cop backlash. I drink a glass of water and I cop backlash. But it was the backlash I got that was ringing true with me.

Virginia Trioli: Isn't that an interesting moment? When you know you've stuffed up. when the criticism comes, and you go, 'Ooh, I think you're right.'

Briggs: Because I had that in the back of my head. Could have been much better.

Virginia Trioli: Has it stayed with you now?

Briggs: Yeah.

Virginia Trioli: The context matters.

Briggs: If you don't learn, you're an idiot.

Virginia Trioli: You're going backwards.

Briggs: Yeah, I'm a bad student, but I learn.

Virginia Trioli: He's disproving his own theory here, folks, that he's a bad student. 

Briggs: I just learn different.

Virginia Trioli: Don't we all! Briggs, what about "It's a small thing, it's a little thing, but I'm still so proud that I ... "

Briggs: When I won the AMP Music Prize, with Trials when we did the A.B. Original album, I took all that money that I got, the half of it, and I donated it to the Rumbalara Footy Club juniors.

Virginia Trioli: That was founded by Paul Briggs.

Briggs: Yeah, my old man.

Virginia Trioli: That's right.

Briggs: Bit of a conflict of interest.

Virginia Trioli: Nah, keep it in the family. It's your money! You can do what you like with it.

Briggs: Yeah exactly! It's my money.

Virginia Trioli: Did you really? Half of it? Right.

Briggs: Yeah, my half. I gave it away. Because I was just, I don't know, I felt weird.

Virginia Trioli: Keeping it.

Briggs: Yeah.

Virginia Trioli: Why?

Briggs: I don't know. It felt weird. I figured someone else could use it.

Virginia Trioli: Because it was a prize rather than money that you earned?

Briggs: Yeah, I didn't go out and get it. Someone gave it to me. I'm like, 'Oh well, I'll give it away.'

Virginia Trioli: The question is, "I's a small thing ... " So is that a small thing for you, giving away that money?

Briggs: Yeah, it was only 15 grand or something.

Virginia Trioli: Not nothing.

Briggs: Yeah, I know. But in the scheme of things. You know what I mean? That 15 goes further for those kids that it does for me.

Virginia Trioli: Tell us about the club, for those who don't know. Big part of your life. 

Briggs: It's an Indigenous footy club. I grew up in that club. All the blackfellas in Shepparton grew up in and around that club at some point, somehow. I feel like it's the the greatest example of self determination in the country. It's something special. And it's family. And it's the values from that club, they're our family values as a community. And that's what I talk about when I say I don't compromise my integrity because that's what we learned.

Virginia Trioli: How you football skills these days?

Briggs: Terrible. I can't even put a shirt on without catching a stitch. I sleep wrong and I wake up sore.

Virginia Trioli: If I put you on the ground, if I made you play a quarter, what could you do for me on the ground?.

Briggs: Just put me in the square and I won't leave. Just sit me down there, put me in the square. I could get a gig at Carlton.

Virginia Trioli: Oh! Did you say that deliberately to me?

Briggs: Yes.

Virginia Trioli: Thank you very, very much.

Briggs: Carn the 'Dons! 

Virginia Trioli: I'm inclined to wrap this interview up. In fact, I think I will. Briggs, "My secret pleasure or my guilty pleasure is ... "

Briggs: Professional wrestling.

Virginia Trioli: Oh, really?

Briggs: Yeah. Professional wrestling. Mainly from the 80s and 90s.

Virginia Trioli: Oh, okay. Fan of ... ?

Briggs: The Undertaker, Macho Man, Stone Cold and The Rock, Ric Flair. Yeah, I'm a massive fan. To me, it is like, it's the ... And even to this day, because it's still going, it is the quintessential classic circus. It travels around, does shows around the country. 

Virginia Trioli: It's vaudeville. And they are great performers.

Briggs: It's hilarious.

Virginia Trioli: It is hilarious.

Briggs: It's so funny. And it's just like the purest form of entertainment. It's music and fireworks and athletes and it's crazy. It's good fun. It's all syrup. There's not a lot of hard thinking to do

Virginia Trioli: There's no nutrition. It's just all the sugar.

Briggs: Yeah it's like a big bowl of Froot Loops.

Virginia Trioli: And here's you and your old man back watching stuff like that. How about that?

Briggs: Just having a beer and complaining about the storylines. Yeah, my guilty secret. You know, it's not so much a secret I'm very open. I wear my trash on my sleeves.

Virginia Trioli: I love to see it

Briggs: That and basketball cards. I'm a real collector.

Virginia Trioli: Oh, really?

Briggs: Yeah. I like collecting things. Records, basketball cards.

Virginia Trioli: You're a bit of a hoarder?

Briggs: Little bit, yeah.

Virginia Trioli: That house of yours a bit of a mess?

Briggs: I've got one room in particular. I call it the brain room because it kind of reflects my brain. And it's where I keep all the things.

Virginia Trioli: Don't go in the brain room!

Briggs: No, you can't. For your own safety.

Virginia Trioli: You Don't Know Me is presented by me Virginia Trioli. It's produced by Joe Sullivan and Julz Hay, with audio production by Michael Black. Next time, she made all of us want to move to the coast with the hit show Seachange. 

Sigrid Thornton: That Sigrid Thornton over there, she's behaving very badly, but she's not me! Watch out for her.

Virginia Trioli: Watch out for her indeed! The wonderful Sigrid Thornton will be in your feeds next week. Follow You Don't Know Me now on the ABC listen app, so you don't miss out and thanks for listening.