That was then. \u201cI\u2019m an angel but I could be a killer,\u201d he raps on his second album, Djandjay. \u201cI became a dragon from a caterpillar.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI named the record after my late grandmother, who was the matriarch in the family, because I\u2019ve inherited her boisterous energy, the \u2018no shame, be proud\u2019 [attitude], always encouraging people around her to get up and dance,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis new project was definitely a lot about finding myself, finding a new sound, finding a way through music. It\u2019s like trying out different outfits, different genres; punkiness, craziness, some electronics, just sonically trying to elevate from Gela.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sitting in the green room of an empty Melbourne theatre, Danzal Baker certainly presents as a new man. The whole country saw him reborn two weeks ago, gleaming in head-to-toe white at his commanding AFL grand final performance. No breakdancing. Just standing tall and declaiming. Not a silent soldier, my pigment is my pride, I\u2019m like red dirt, gold chains, blak knight, thick skin.<\/p>\n
\u201cThick Skin I wrote after the referendum result came out,\u201d he explains, referring to 2023\u2019s defeated motion for an Indigenous voice to parliament. \u201cI was in the middle of working on the record, and when that happened, the atmosphere was heavy and dark and eerie and it was just killing the vibe.\u201d<\/p>\n
His producers Pip Norman and Rob Amoruso suggested he \u201cjust write music, get all these feelings out. And it ended up sounding so sick,\u201d he says \u2014 even before they marshalled that spine-tingling choir: Thelma Plum, Emma Donovan, Kee\u2019ahn and Jada Weazel. \u201cThe first time I heard it I got teary, full goosebumps,\u201d Baker says.<\/p>\n
War Cry is another soldier\u2019s tale, inspired not by the #BlackLivesMatter movement as such but by the shortsighted response closer to home. \u201cI know what it\u2019s like to be a trending topic,\u201d he says, \u201cand it does not feel great. I got lots of messages saying, \u2018Why are you not using your platform? You\u2019re not saying anything!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
He shakes his head. \u201cIt\u2019s very uncomfortable to even try to come up with a statement about something that\u2019s happening over in the US, when people should also be recognising that we have issues in our own backyard with Black deaths in custody.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\u201cI want to take my language everywhere. Not just to teach it, but to share the pride of it,\u201d says Baker Boy.Credit: Jason South<\/p>\n
The personal toll of that pressure is on the record too. With verses from Minneapolis rapper Pardyalone, Running Low paints a hectic picture of road burnout, fickle friends and sky-high expectations. \u201cThe bottom side of those ARIAs [Gela won six] is there\u2019s a couple of pointy bits you gotta watch out for,\u201d Baker says, laughing.<\/p>\n
But it\u2019s the general attack of the album \u2014 heavier sonics, lyrics pressing harder and faster against the beat \u2014 that propels Djandjay forward. And while king-hitters like Ziggy Ramo, Briggs and Yirrmal bring muscle from all over the continent, Baker Boy\u2019s secret weapon remains the power of his own tongue, and the very act of using it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn Djandjay I\u2019m rapping in three languages: my father\u2019s language, my mother\u2019s language and English,\u201d he says. \u201cI was going crazy, writing lyrics in the studio and being like, \u2018What the heck did I just write? This is insane!\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cI know people that don\u2019t understand what I\u2019m saying, but I know for a fact that family back home, when they hear it, they go, \u2018WHAAAAT?\u2019\u201d He slaps his knees, collapses in laughter. \u201cFor them it\u2019s a mic-drop moment, that sort of vibe.\u201d<\/p>\n
The electrifying sound of his Yolngu and Burarra rapping speaks to the essence of Baker Boy\u2019s mission, and the fine line it walks between a world that measures success in ARIA Awards and the aspirations he holds for the community he still calls home.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want them to [realise] that they can 100 per cent be better than me,\u201d he says. \u201cI want them to see me and go, \u2018If he can do it, I want to do it. We\u2019re also talented. We shouldn\u2019t be worrying about having English as a second or third language. We can still thrive, and we can still secure our dreams\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Baker](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/45c90a5b241e6e19a0de2f506ee3d1dd44b192a8.jpeg\")
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Baker Boy, pictured at the ARIAs in 2022, with the ARIA award for album of the year for Gela.Credit: Hanna Lassen\/Getty<\/p>\n
At school in Milingimbi and Maningrida, \u201cEnglish was one of my weak points,\u201d Baker reveals. He laughs about memorising sentences he could roll out to impress his classmates. The learning curve continued at Shalom Christian College in Townsville, where Indigenous kids from all over the country brought more languages still.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was kind of the quiet kid, but I still had a few words that I knew how to basically navigate through everything. But having a lot of people around me that spoke in English helped \u2026 especially when they were mob themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n
Those years \u2013 boarding school, dance classes, leadership programs, working with the North Queensland Cowboys\u2019 school incursions, \u201cYear 13\u201d courses in panel beating, construction and health \u2013 widened his sense of possibility. But the power of communication kept calling.<\/p>\n
\u201cI look at all the other cultures, the Japanese pop or the K-pop or Desipop and all that stuff. When you hear some of them rapping in their native tongue you go, \u2018Yeah, that\u2019s it\u2019. Spanish rappers and stuff? That\u2019s dope. That stuff inspires me,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
He remembers playing the Riddu Riddu Sami festival in Manndalen, Norway, back in 2018. \u201cOne of the things that freaked me out was learning that in their school curriculum, they talk about Indigenous Australians! And I\u2019m just like, \u2018What?\u2019 We need more people talking about Indigenous culture in school curriculums in Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n
He shares a dream that maybe Arnhem Land\u2019s Garma Festival might similarly expand its sights some day. \u201cIt would be so sick to have a lot of Indigenous people from around the world to come in and show off their cultures. That\u2019d be epic.\u201d<\/p>\n
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He\u2019s ambitious for Djandjay, like any artist would be on the eve of their second album. But beyond the inevitable considerations of chart success and festival stages, his true goals seem simultaneously more grounded and much, much bigger.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith the Gela record, Baker Boy is all happy, exciting, dancing, always positive, always bringing people together and stuff. On Djandjay, I want to show that I\u2019m human. I can show emotion. I can be vulnerable, I can be angry, be proud and be comfortable in my own skin,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to make sure everyone can hear it like that, and go \u2018Wow, Australia! There\u2019s heaps of languages there\u2019, and be proud of one of the oldest living cultures in the world. I want to take my language everywhere. Not just to teach it, but to share the pride of it. The way my grandmother taught me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Baker Boy\u2019s Djandjay is out on Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Normal text sizeLarger text sizeVery large text size In the beginning was Djandjay \u201cDaisy\u201d Baker. Long before her…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":196757,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[64,63,447,134],"class_list":{"0":"post-196756","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-celebrities","11":"tag-entertainment"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196756"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196756\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/196757"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}