Exclusive Interview with Vanity Milan
This interview is available to listen to on Spotify, click below to take a listen or keep scrolling to read.
Vanity Milan, welcome back my dear to Spill the Tea! A lot has changed since we last spoke over a year ago, how has life been since appearing on RuPaul's Drag Race Series Three?
Well thank you so much for having me Michael, it's been such a long time since we've actually spoken, this is the interview that needed to happen after Drag Race that didn't happen, you know I’m a grown woman now, a lot has changed and I can't wait to share that with the audience. You know, a lot of upcoming things that are starting to happen that I’m excited about.
What was one of your favourite memories from the show?
I think in general it has to be the whole show, as you can see from the beginning until my final exit, the growth in me from episode one to episode nine was amazing. I enjoyed every moment and I enjoyed every lip sync, it showed what I can do, possibly not sewing but it definitely showed what I can do and when it comes to performing live. I think that was very important for me to show so that I can continue getting booked.
Definitely, make the coin! Of course before the show you weren't a stranger to competitions, how did Drag Race differ from other competitions that you've done, like The Crown which of course was the reason why we first spoke?
I mean to be honest with you The Crown was very similar to Drag Race, the only thing is it's not on a worldwide platform where everybody can see it, it’s done in the club so that we had competitions every week. We had to prepare things that we had to do, obviously the bottom two had to lip sync etc, I just think there was a lot more preparation for Drag Race because it is on a worldwide scale, it's the biggest stage of drag and a lot of people are watching! You have to elevate a lot more from a local competition because there are going to be a lot of people talking about your looks, how your makeup is, how your snatching is. It's a very big stage and there's a lot of people that will be talking about Vanity Milan from Drag Race and not that Vanity Milan from The Crown.
How did you manage the feedback from social media critics, which of course they know more than the judges **insert eye roll**. How did you deal with that sort of feedback that you were receiving from the show?
I'm a person who loves to take critiques whether you're a fan, whether you're someone who's close to me, I actually take a step back and look at my drag and I’m like, what can I change to elevate the look a little bit more and be with the times. You know the fast-moving drag industry, how can I continue to be unique because we could all lip-sync if we need to, but what can we do to change. I’ve always taken critiques on board for elevation of costumes or to try and be a little bit more funny. I'm here for critiques but just leave the negative ones out of my comment section.
On the show you were part of the winning team during the girl group challenge, had you ever sung before you went on the show?
A little bit, but I’ve been told not to by someone very close to me and I won't mention any names but everyone can sing when they're in the shower, but I have a background in performing arts so I’ve been singing but it's taken a long time to come to terms with the confidence in live singing and singing in front of people. Before that it was just me in a bedroom or a shower and pretending like my name is Beyonce, but we've all done that right?
I mean I did it right before this call!
Okay you know, our little Beyonce experience concert in the shower, living our best lives. I haven't really done anything like that before Pick ‘n’ Mix.
Is that what sort of made you want to release music after the show or had you considered doing that before you went on thinking, oh after it I might release some music?
Music has always been a passion of mine as well as dance and performing arts, in a general sense I've never had the contacts or the connections to go to someone and say, hey look I want to create a track, I think being on Drag Race and doing the girl group challenge kind of gave me that swift kick I needed to say hey look I want to start making music and who can help me or where do I need to put this money into to get my music jumping. I'm so thankful that I found someone who is an amazing producer that can help me produce what I wanted.
As we're talking about making music let's talk about the single, your new single ‘Miss Milan (don't play with me)’ is out now, how would you describe the track?
I would call it a bad b*tch anthem, you can take Miss Milan out of the track and put your own name in it. It's meant to uplift, it's meant to give you that confident boost that you need. It's about telling people who have ever doubted you, don't play with me because I'm not the one to be played with.
“I would call it a bad b*tch anthem, you can take Miss Milan out of the track and put your own name in it. It's meant to uplift, it's meant to give you that confident boost that you need. It's about telling people who have ever doubted you, don't play with me because I'm not the one to be played with.”
How's your fans reaction been to the track?
Amazing! I think at this present moment in time we are on over 5,000 streams and it's only been out for three days so I’m really happy, the fans love it. Apparently it's on their playlist as their number one repeating song which I’m super ecstatic about because I was so nervous to even release it.
I must admit, hands up, I am one of those people that it’s on my Spotify on repeat playlist.
It's like a motivational speech, if you ever go to the gym and you want to like run the hell out of a song, that'd probably be the song that you run.
We must quickly talk about the artwork for the single, now the colour in the background of the artwork (orange for anyone who hasn’t seen it) is that a little f.u to some critiques you might have got on the show?
Orange is my new favourite colour apparently, I was just paying homage to the fact that I want a lot of orange looks, orange looks good on me, it looks good behind me! I wasn't throwing any shade to anyone. I've taken that criticism as orange looks really good on me so I just wanted to kind of pay homage to Drag Race in giving me that colour.
Growing up what sort of music influenced you?
All types of music, I grew up on old school reggae because of my parents and my background but then as I grew up it was more like Beyonce and Destiny's Child, the typical British UK girl and boy bands. I have a very eclectic taste, it differs, I can go from classical music if I’m feeling classical to a bit of rap or R&B. It differs on different days.
As a dancing queen (which we saw on Drag Race) are we going to get a killer music video to go with the track, is that on the cards?
Yeah, I mean I haven't even thought that far because I didn't even know that this song was gonna be like that popular, I know I have a platform and I know I have a lot of fans that follow me but I never thought you know people would like it as much so I didn't even think okay, a music video, but now you say it there should be a music video.
There should be! I hope so, I’d love to see it. So does that mean that you haven't considered dropping more music or now do you think you will you will drop some more after the success of the single?
There's 12 more songs in the tank!
Oooooo I like the sound of that!
I haven't stopped creating music since I've created this first one it's literally been like go! I think an EP will be sufficient for now and then we will see where the music goes. I'm just getting into the music business, I'm still trying to understand it myself. It's quite difficult because I didn't know that I could announce it a week before and get it on some editorial Spotify playlists. I was just like, let's release it because it's amazing and I love the track. Now I’m knowing a little bit more about the business and how to promote It a lot more to get it heard by a lot more people. I'm definitely gonna focus more on that when it comes to the next one.
I mean look at the success of this one without it.
The more you learn the better it can be.
Exactly, now before I let you go I’d like to play a little game with you called ‘Piping Hot Tea’ which is basically just some quick fire questions that need of course quick answers back, don't worry it's nothing super scary at all! Would you like to play?
Let's go let's do it.
Out of your series three sisters who took the longest to get ready on the show?
Choriza May!
What's the first thing that you do after getting out of drag?
Uh, McDonald's.
Favourite song to lip sync to?
Don't play with Miss Milan!
Best thing about performing in drag?
Corsets.
…and the worst?
Wait did you say the best?
Yeah the best.
So it was the corset as the worst and the best thing is the audience.
What is your guilty pleasure?
Chinese
Finally, did you love sitting down with us again for another interview?
Always I love talking to you.
There we go that's what I like to hear, that's it all done, you survived the little game.
Yay.
As you know from our last interview the way I like to round up the interviews is by giving you a chance to give a shout out to another queer performer so that can be a drag king, queen or anything in-between or simply just a queer artist.
I'd like to shout out to the whole drag community, kings, queens everybody in-between, we're doing our damn thing out here and making our mark in the world as being amazing queer people, so let's keep doing that, raising our voices and raising each other up in every single way!
To read our first interview with Vanity Milan pre-Drag Race click here.
Photos with thanks to Vanity Milan / Owen Vincent
Note: Some of this interview has been edited from the original transcript to help with readability.