Bimini has spent enough time in meetings about what Bimini should sound like. The drag queen and RuPaul’s Drag Race UK series two finalist has taken matters into their own hands after four years with a major label, an unreleased album, and plenty of suggestions about becoming ‘more palatable’. Brain Riot Records is their new independent label, and “Live My Life”, arriving on 6 November, introduces an album made with the freedom to be filthy, funny, furious, and occasionally all three at once. Drawing on punk and dance music, it promises plenty for anyone who likes their night out with something to shout about.

For the working-class fashion obsessive from Great Yarmouth, humour has long been a way of getting a point across. Before their finale dress appeared at the V&A, Bimini was carrying a paddling pool around East London pubs for an animal rights performance involving a cow costume, Fergie, and oat milk. That instinct runs through the music too, whether reclaiming a homophobic insult on “Tank Top Bum Boys” or demanding a moment’s peace from a world that always wants something.

Elsewhere, their award-winning podcast, The Pieces with Bimini, makes room for conversations about identity, creativity, and the occasionally impossible business of resting. Here, Bimini talks to 1883 about taking back creative control, dreaming up a question for Madonna, challenging anti-LGBTQIA+ broadcasting, and why queer people deserve the freedom to be ordinary, silly, and terrible at karaoke.

What designers or artists are your primary inspirations for your looks?

Westwood, McQueen, Galliano, Mugler. I love looking at something and thinking, how the fuck did you even come up with that? Westwood especially, because the politics were in the clothes. And McQueen could make something beautiful that also made you feel a bit uncomfortable. I like that.

Then Madonna, Bowie, Pamela Anderson, Kate Moss. The bimbo thing is very deliberate for me. I quite like looking like someone people might underestimate. Gives you a bit of room to surprise them.

But honestly, a lot of it is just looking around. Bermondsey Street is great for that. Someone’s got a lamp on their head and you’re like, actually, I see it. Students, people on the bus, independent designers. Gloria Jane Royer, from Margate, made something I wore the wrong way round, and they messaged saying they loved how I’d worn it. Very generous of them.

What has been the funniest or most surreal experience you’ve had whilst in drag?

I mean, I used to take a paddling pool to work.

I had this animal rights number where I’d come out dressed as a cow, talk about artificial insemination, strip down to a bikini, and jump into the splits while someone poured oat milk over me. To Fergie, obviously. There was a lot going on.

The paddling pool was because I was doing it in little pubs. You can’t just turn up and flood someone’s venue with a dairy alternative. Sometimes I didn’t tell them I was doing it, but I did have the pool. I wasn’t completely unreasonable.

So, that was me, going round East London with all my drag and a fucking paddling pool. People talk about drag being glamorous. Sometimes it’s working out the transport arrangements for your political striptease.

I did something for the Leigh Bowery exhibition at the Tate, dressed in a Leigh Bowery look, which is not my usual aesthetic at all, but Leigh’s the OG. Went to the party after and ended up in a photo with Countess Luann, Tilda Swinton, and Boy George. It ran in the papers the next day. I still don’t know what was going on in that picture.

How did it feel having your Drag Race finale dress featured in the final room of the V&A’s Fashioning Masculinities exhibition?

Completely surreal. That dress has done very well for itself.

Ella Lynch made it, and there it was in the final room alongside Harry Styles’ Gucci and Billy Porter’s Christian Siriano. You don’t make your Drag Race outfit thinking, well, this should look nice in the V&A.

I was really proud. Proud of Ella’s work and proud to see drag given that space. There’s so much skill and imagination that goes into it.

I’m a working-class person from Great Yarmouth who grew up obsessed with fashion. Having something I’d worn become part of that history is still quite difficult to get my head around. Lovely, though. A very nice thing to be confused about.

You’ve launched your own label, Brain Riot Records. What can you say or do in your music now that you felt you couldn’t before?

I can release the fucking music. Very exciting development in my career as a recording artist.

When I was on a major label, I sat in a six-hour meeting where they showed me everything that had been written about me online. There was this pressure to be more palatable. The album I was making never came out, and I spent years being pulled in different directions. Try this sound, work with this person, be a bit more like whoever’s doing well this week. That does get in your head.

There’s music from that time that I love. I don’t want to pretend otherwise. But I wanted to make an album and tell a story, and now I can. I can be political, filthy, ridiculous, vulnerable. Sometimes all in the same song. The new album came together in about two weeks.

Being independent is a lot of work. Fucking hell. But at least I’m making the decisions, and I feel excited about the music again. I’d really missed that.

With “Tank Top Bum Boys”, you’ve taken a homophobic insult and turned it into something people can dance to. What appeals to you about using humour and pleasure to fight back?

Because I refuse to let a miserable bastard decide how much fun I’m allowed to have.

The phrase was used by Boris Johnson in a column in 1998. It was meant to make people feel ashamed. But I’m quite happy in a tank top, I like boys, I like bums. You’ve basically described a nice evening.

Obviously, those words can hurt. When you grow up hearing things like that, you can start making yourself smaller without even realising you’re doing it. Being able to take it, laugh at it, and have a room full of people shouting it together feels good.

It’s a rage song, but it’s also silly. It’s under two minutes. We haven’t got time to get po-faced.

I think humour can get someone listening before they’ve decided they disagree with you. And being permanently furious is exhausting. I’d quite like to enjoy some of the life I’m fighting to have.

If someone knows every word of your “UK Hun?” verse but hasn’t explored your own music yet, which track would you play them first, and why?

“Live My Life”. If you’ve committed that verse to memory, I think you can handle another chorus.

It’s got that cheekiness, and there’s a lot of my personality in it. It’s loud, it’s fun, you can shout along. It gives you a good idea of where I’m at now.

I do love that people still know the verse. It’s a lovely, slightly bizarre thing, having strangers remember something you wrote. I’m very grateful for it.

Then put “Tank Top Bum Boys” on. By that point, you’ll have a fairly clear idea of what you’ve signed up for.

And I’d really recommend listening to my When the Party Ends EP from start to finish. There’s a different side of me on there, and I want people to hear the whole thing. I’ve got more than one mood, babes.

Congratulations on winning LGBTQ+ Podcast of the Year at the Gaydio Awards. What did being recognised by your own community mean to you?

Thank you! It means a lot to be recognised by our own. About bloody time, too.

I love doing The Pieces. I’m interested in people, and I like having enough time with someone that you can get past the answer they’ve given everyone else. Sometimes you’re laughing and then suddenly they’ve said something that makes you think about your own life differently. I want LGBTQIA+ artists, creatives, and activists to have that space.

I said at the awards that we have to stop the infighting. If we want fairness and equality for everyone, we’re not going to get there by constantly trying to one-up each other. We care about so much, but we have to find a way to work together.

And it’s the team, the guests, everyone who listens. They all make it happen. You can put a podcast out, but people choosing to spend their time with it is something I’m really grateful for.

On The Pieces, you ask guests about the experiences that made them who they are. Which conversation has most changed the way you see something in your own life?

Kae Tempest. We ended up talking about rest, which I’m apparently very interested in discussing and less good at actually doing.

We were talking about asking your brain to be supercharged all day, constantly making things, looking for ideas, and then getting annoyed when it won’t suddenly shut up because you’ve decided it’s bedtime. I recognised a lot of myself in that.

I’m always asking how I can improve things. Myself, my work, whatever. I can turn almost anything into another thing I’m supposed to get better at. Even relaxing. Which, when you say it out loud, is quite fucking ridiculous.

That conversation made me think about being a bit kinder to the part of me that makes things. Giving it some space without immediately asking what it’s going to achieve. I’m still working on that. Obviously, I’ve managed to make it another task.

Who’s your dream podcast guest, and what’s the question you’d be desperate to ask them?

Madonna. I’d try to behave normally for the first thirty seconds, but I couldn’t promise anything.

I’d ask: ‘Was there ever a version of yourself you wanted to become, but didn’t, because you knew what the reaction would be?’

We talk about her confidence and reinvention so much. I’d be interested in the doubt. The things she nearly did, the things she talked herself out of. When everyone has an opinion about who you should be, how do you work out which voice to listen to?

Then I’d probably derail my own podcast asking about Erotica. We’d need a longer booking.

Your political activism is inspiring. Is there an organisation you’d recommend people support to help advance trans and wider LGBTQIA+ rights?

Not A Phase. Danielle St James has been on the podcast, and I think what they’re doing is really important. They’re a trans-led charity supporting trans adults through things like peer support, social events, and fitness and wellbeing programmes.

Being able to go somewhere, meet people, and feel comfortable makes such a difference. Have a laugh, make a friend, go to a class without worrying about how you’re going to be treated. People need that in their day-to-day lives.

If you can afford a regular donation, brilliant. If you can’t, have a look at what they’re asking for, whether that’s volunteers or help getting the word out. Follow their lead on what’s needed. And keep supporting them after Pride month. They haven’t packed up and gone home.

I love your complaint-generation tool aimed at GB News. Which examples of its coverage of LGBTQ+ people have shocked you most? What do you think the channel’s popularity reveals about attitudes in Britain, and how much influence do you think it has in shaping them?

The Saturday Five on 20 June and Alex Armstrong Tonight on 5 July. On The Saturday Five, a guest claimed gay men were more prone to sexually abusing adopted children. Then on Alex Armstrong Tonight, a guest linked Pride with paedophilia. I was furious. These are old smears getting another platform.

And actual people are watching this. Parents, families, young queer people who aren’t out yet. You’re putting that into their homes. There’s a responsibility that comes with it, and calling something a debate doesn’t make that disappear.

I don’t think Britain is one enormous GB News comments section, thankfully. I wouldn’t take its audience as a verdict on the whole country. But I do think resentment is being cultivated. People are struggling, and they’re offered a minority to blame. Keep repeating that association and suspicion can start to feel reasonable.

I don’t know exactly how much influence the channel has. But I don’t think you can pretend there’s no consequence to what you broadcast.

That’s why my site has a complaint tool. People were angry and wanted to do something, but a form can be intimidating when you don’t know where to start. I thought, okay, I can help with that bit. Make the first step easier.

You’ve spoken about allyship as something people do, rather than something they call themselves. What would you like someone who considers themselves an ally to actually do this week?

Speak up in a room where it might cost you a little bit of comfort.

If your mate or someone at work says something transphobic, ask them what they mean. Especially when there isn’t a trans person there who’s going to be expected to do all the explaining. Don’t just sit there waiting for someone else to deal with it.

You don’t need a perfect speech. ‘That’s a pretty horrible thing to say about someone’ is a perfectly good sentence. You can borrow it.

Then choose something you can keep doing. Support a trans-led organisation, listen to what people are asking for, write to your MP about an issue you’ve taken the time to understand. And if you don’t get why Pride matters, come to one.

I’m interested in what happens when there’s nobody there to applaud you for it.

So much coverage of LGBTQIA+ lives focuses on struggle. What stories of queer joy would you like to see getting more attention?

Older queer people having lovely, complicated, ordinary lives. Falling in love again. Finding their people at sixty. Having a terrible date and getting a good story out of it.

And more from smaller towns. I’m from Great Yarmouth. There are people making things happen outside the places that always get the attention. Putting on a night, starting a group, making somewhere their friends actually want to go. Regional dancefloors count. The idea that only the exciting city rooms deserve protecting is rubbish.

Let trans people be ordinary too. A job, a laugh, a night out, a Tuesday. Let us be silly. Terrible at karaoke. Mildly annoying about whose turn it is to put the bins out.

We shouldn’t have to produce an inspiring account of survival every time someone points a camera at us. Young queer people deserve to see futures they might actually want. There can be a lot to look forward to.

Your forthcoming single, “Live My Life”, is the first from your upcoming album. It’s a headbanger that sounds like the love child of The Clash and Jamie T, with a sprinkle of Rihanna’s “We Found Love”. What sparked the track, where and when should we be blasting it, and what does it tell us about the album to come?

The Clash, Jamie T, and Rihanna is a very busy family tree. I’m happy with that.

It’s that feeling of everyone wanting something from you all the time. Your time, your money, an explanation. Someone’s always got an opinion on what you should be doing. The line ‘If they could, they’d tax my mind’ gets at it. Even your thoughts would have a subscription if someone could work out how to do it.

And you’re just there going, can I live my fucking life for a minute? I think a lot of people know that feeling. You’re tired, you’ve had enough, you’d quite like to have some fun.

Play it getting ready with your mates, on a dancefloor, on your way out of a long day. Headphones on public transport, babes. Everyone else is trying to live their life too.

The album is electro-punk, rooted in dance music. There’s a bit of Peaches, Lambrini Girls, and the Sex Pistols in there. There’s humour, there are things I’m angry about, but I’ve also had fun making it and I want that to come through.

I spent a long time being pulled towards different sounds and questioning myself. Now I feel like you can actually hear my personality in the music. I’m excited for people to get the whole album and spend a bit of time with it.

“Love My Life” is out 6 November with the album to follow.

The Pieces with Bimini is available it listen here and on all podcast providers. Follow via @biminibabes

Interview Nick Barr

Photography Becca Geden

Creative director, producer & stylist Olivia Ann Wolstenholme

Make-up artist Yong-Chin Breslin

Hair artist Kornelija Cecetaite

Nail artist KHANVAS & @gelonkhanvas

Set design Martha Grechko

Lighting Ese

Studio Flash Studios London

Set design assistant Islay

Styling assistants Nicola Morgan & Millie Kaye

Fashion interns Xaviobo & @liliumm__

Top image credit Leo Prothmann, Rick Owens, @frances__o, Hairy Mary, Sarah Garfield, Dead Good Jewellery, Pebble London, The Wildness Jewellery & Milla Giulia Badin