Sycco

When Sasha McLeod named her musical outlet Sycco (pronounced “psycho”), she wasn’t referencing a mental state but rather the psychedelic colours she hopes to conjure. And she’s done just that, right from her hazily layered 2018 debut, “Starboard Square”. Born in Brisbane in 2002, McLeod juggles guitar, bass, drums and vocals while producing herself—not unlike Tame Impala, whom she has covered. McLeod scored her proper breakthrough in 2020 with “Dribble”, a swaggering slice of pop released when she was still a teenager. Between its synth-laced thump and dislocating vocal echoes, the song foreshadowed both the mind-bending contours and intimate confessions found on Sycco’s First EP the following year. “Wanna switch up all my bad routines,” she admits against the breathy bounce of the lockdown-inspired “My Ways”. Foregrounding her Torres Strait Islander descent, McLeod co-curated the inaugural program of Australia’s First Nations-focused BLAKSOUND conference in 2021.