Musically, I'm like a child in a sweet shop. Or a guitarist at Billy Hydes. I want to try EVERYTHING. Concurrently, preferably. Cover bands, tributes, solo, duo or trio. Lead or BV's. Write and produce originals, play guitar, make orchestral versions of pop songs … you name it I'll give it a try.
This has it's pros and cons.
Big pro is that it's heaps of fun and I've met a ton of really cool people doing it. Have been part of a huge variety of different shows as a result and learned sooooo much. I'm so incredibly grateful for the experiences I've had, proud of (most) of the things I've been part of and humbled by the appreciation people have expressed for what I do.
Con is - people get confused and sometimes disappointed. Sometimes you're doing stuff that doesn't fit the picture they have of you. Or the picture of what a ‘real musician’ does. You're not cool. You're “selling out” (I'm quoting a real thing someone said to me, once). You're less credible. You scramble your ‘brand’. You get the idea.
For this reason, I've had this series of very separate musical “personalities”. I separated all the different kinds of music stuff I do. “Tangled” was supposed to be the place where I was a serious independent songwriter/performer/producer. Tangled didn't wear ridiculous wigs and sparkly boots. Noooo, she was strumming a beautiful acoustic guitar in some verdant setting, looking soulful and telling serious stories about life and learning. Pfft. Right on. That was just as much a construct as any of the other personalities - and probably the least honest.
In 2025 all the carefully curated and constructed boundaries between my various musical personalities started collapsing and blending together. Not only that - but the careful line I'd put between my ‘musical personalities’ and the actual me (Tanya Aquino - mother of two, drinker of wine, lover of fairy lights, plants and cats) began to blur. On the words of my song Queen, “How did you find me out?”
So I decided fuck it all and I'm just going to let it go (see what I did there, one last Tangled reference .. :)) and I went with it. And I write this in mid-2026, here we are, back here it started. With me, Tanya.
So that's why I stopped being Tangled. It began to feel inauthentic, curated. So now there's one persona, one place - from the most heartfelt and serious songs I might write … to the most ridiculous wig-wearing antic I feel like getting up to. All mixed together, all the colours - no curation and no constructs. No “brand”.
Let's see how it goes. Maybe it'll make brown. But then again, we might get lucky and it could be a rainbow.
