Australian singer-songwriter Mia Wray has returned with the new single ‘Isn’t It Funny’, a track that continues the introspective songwriting direction established on her recent release ‘When We Were Young’, arriving after one of the biggest touring periods of her career. The song follows Wray’s appearance on Ed Sheeran’s 17-date Australian and New Zealand stadium tour earlier this year, exposing the Melbourne-based artist to her largest audiences to date.
by Paul Cashmere
The release adds another chapter to a sustained period of momentum for Wray, whose debut album Hi, It’s Nice To Meet Me helped position her among Australia’s most closely watched emerging pop artists. The album earned a nomination for the Michael Gudinski Breakthrough Artist category at the 2025 ARIA Awards and also received recognition through a shortlist placing for the Australian Music Prize.
‘Isn’t It Funny’ was written with Sydney songwriter and producer Xavier Dunn, whose previous collaborations include work with Peking Duk, Hayden James and Jack River. The song centres on the slow emotional drift between close friends, examining the discomfort of recognising affection still exists even when a relationship no longer functions in the present tense.
“This song is about two best friends slowly outgrowing each other, how someone can go from feeling like family to becoming a complete stranger,” Wray said in a statement accompanying the release.
“Xavier Dunn and I wrote this song together, and I was drawing from personal experience around that kind of loss, that strange feeling when you run into someone you once did everything with and feel that painful throb in your chest because you miss them deeply, but also know that if you sat down together today, you’d barely recognise each other anymore.”
She added that the song acts as “a kind of telepathic hug” directed towards people no longer present in her life, describing it as a reflection on unresolved grief rather than conflict.
“Sometimes love is still there, but the connection isn’t, and they no longer belong in your life the way they once did,” she said.
“In some ways, I think losing a friend can hurt even more than a romantic breakup. There’s no clean ending to hold onto, just a slow grieving of someone who’s still out there, living a life that no longer includes you.”
Musically, the track continues Wray’s movement away from her earlier folk and blues-oriented material towards polished contemporary pop while retaining the emotional directness that first drew attention during her formative years on the Australian live circuit. Wray initially emerged from Queensland’s Sunshine Coast music scene after winning the People’s Choice Award in Telstra’s Road to Discovery program in 2012. Early releases including the EPs Mia Wray and Send Me Your Love established her as a songwriter grounded in acoustic traditions before her signing to Ivy League Records in 2021 accelerated a stylistic shift into pop production.
That evolution became more pronounced through singles including ‘Work For Me’, ‘Never Gonna Be The Same’, ‘Monster Brain’ and ‘Tell Her’, each broadening her audience through support from triple j and streaming platforms. Her debut album Hi, It’s Nice To Meet Me, released in March 2025, consolidated that trajectory, balancing large-scale pop arrangements with autobiographical themes around identity, relationships and self-perception.
The album cycle also marked a significant period personally for Wray. In early 2025, she publicly came out as gay while promoting new music, a moment that aligned with the increasingly open discussions of queer identity present in both her songs and live performances. Fans attending her headline tours during the past year frequently adopted coordinated outfits and themes, helping cultivate a strong community atmosphere around the shows.
Industry support for Wray has continued to expand internationally. Alongside touring with Australian acts including The Rubens, The Teskey Brothers and Vance Joy, she has also appeared on European dates with UK artist Maisie Peters and supported Spacey Jane during overseas touring commitments. Her recent run with Ed Sheeran represented another major step, placing her in front of stadium audiences across Australia and New Zealand during Sheeran’s Loop Tour.
At a time when Australian pop artists are increasingly building global audiences through streaming and international touring before achieving traditional commercial benchmarks at home, Wray’s trajectory reflects a broader industry shift. Her catalogue has now accumulated more than 50 million streams, while endorsements from figures including Elton John and playlist support from Spotify and Apple Music have helped position her beyond the domestic market.
Wray’s latest release suggests the current creative cycle remains active following the release of Hi, It’s Nice To Meet Me. With ‘When We Were Young’ and now ‘Isn’t It Funny’, she appears to be leaning further into emotionally specific songwriting that prioritises personal detail over broad pop abstraction. For an artist who has steadily evolved from acoustic beginnings in regional Queensland to international touring stages, the latest material indicates that transition is still unfolding.
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