Travis De Vries is a Hunter-Valley based descendant of the Gamilaroi people who has been co-hosting a satirical advice-style comedy podcast called Broriginals with his brother Texas.
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That doesn't mean, though, that you should take this advice literally.
"We generally don't give any advice worth taking," the 31-year-old podcaster, writer and contemporary artist tells Weekender, laughing.
He'll be speaking today (Saturday, June 1) on a panel called What I Wish I Knew as a part of the Audiocraft Podcast Festival in Sydney.
"The premise was to write a letter to your past self before you started the podcast and talk to your past self about what you would have done differently and (tell yourself) what you've got to look forward to," he says of his presentation.
Audiocraft is an Australian-based full-service podcast agency De Vries got involved with during a mentoring session. Audiocraft ran a boot camp with Spotify for Indigenous podcasters and proved to be a helpful resource for De Vries.
"Audiocraft do a whole bunch of things. They like to produce and upskill people," De Vries says.
"They work with a bunch of different large organisations; it's a couple of people who used to be on the ABC. (It's) all run by women, and they're awesome.
"The podcast festival is their big crown jewel each year. It's targeted towards the podcast makers rather than the audiences. There's (already) so much out there for audiences to engage with. To have something dedicated to the people making, sharing, networking and upskilling together is really cool."
He and Texas approaching the first anniversary of starting Broriginals. Before this he produced a podcast at the Sydney Opera House called Deadly Voices from the House.
He and his brother put out one episode per week for their 2000-plus subscribers. It's free, and De Vries recommends listening from a few episodes in.
"It's targeted first at Indigenous people and then people who are allies or woke people who don't take themselves too seriously," he explains.
"We're self-help gurus from the Dreamtime and poke fun at a bunch of different things like the bureaucratisation of Indigenous identity. People can write in and ask for advice from us, and we can tap into your unique cultural heritage. We use that as a jumping off point to riff off each other and improve."
He brought up how now everyone in Australia does a "Welcome to Country" and how there are suddenly all these rules around what it means to be Indigenous. He said non-Indigenous people are sometimes afraid to get involved.
"(Our podcast) is like Dear Abby if someone really cynical took the reins and was self destructing a little bit in a positive way," De Vries says.
"Sometimes people write in with serious questions that do need a soft touch. We do the outrageous fun thing and then dial it back and have a think and use some of our lived experience to help people a little bit."
He and his brother have a unique cultural perspective and one that they enjoying sharing. They grew up between rural NSW and rural Queensland and have a lot of experience being the "other", living in rural farming towns with drug problems.
"In both our towns we grew up in, we were one of three Indigenous families, but we're also not dark skinned. The families we grew up with, we were really close to them, but we had friction with non-Indigenous kids," he says.
Then he and his brother went to Naisda College on the Central Coast, an all-Indigenous dance college.
"We weren't necessarily accepted as Aboriginal. You get the double-edged sword of always being the other," he says.
De Vries produces his podcast at his home in Muswellbrook. He lives on an acreage and has an art studio. He regularly commutes to Sydney for work and to be close to his partner and just launched an exhibition in Sydney at Gallery Lane Cove which is eventually coming to Muswellbrook.
"It's such a nice drive from the Hunter Valley until you get on the M4. It's really nice to stay connected to the hustle and bustle of Sydney, but not be there all the time," he says.
To learn more about De Vries and his work visit his website, travisdevries.com.