Abbe spent her late teens and early twenties performing in rock venues and studios across Australia, touring around the country in various solo and band incarnations.

Throughout her career, Abbe has been an ARIA, WAM, AIR, AMP winning and nominated artist and a dedicated member of the LGBTIQA+ community.

[4] One of their early tracks, "The Bomb", which was co-written by May with her bandmates,[5] won the Western Australian final of national radio station, Triple J's Unearthed competition in October 2002.

[4] The Fuzz issued two extended plays, Dead on the Road (2004) and Take the Money (November 2004), and a studio album, 100 Demons (8 August 2005).

In October 2005 Dylan McCardle reviewed their CD launch of the latter for PerthSounds.com, which was "a return to simple but powerful formula that is rock 'n' roll ... a night where female vocalists came to the fore, and Abbe May is certainly amongst the cream of the crop.

[7] The Sydney Morning Herald's reviewer, Bernard Zuel, found the EP was another "hugely impressive release" from "Perth's blues-rock guitarist/tear-down-the-walls singer";[3] he cited her description of the title track, "Every line is a euphemism for oral sex.

[3] In 2008 she formed a side project, The Devil & Abbe May, which was a "more country blues outfit",[3] with Douglas, Archer, Pickett and Stone, joined by David Craft on vocals and harmonica; and Jesse Woodward on banjo and bass guitar.

Cate Summers at theMusic.com.au felt May had "made a swift U-turn on her previously guitar-heavy style, and this new album highlights her subsequent transition towards what she’s labeled 'doom pop'".

[13] Mess+Noise's Kate Hennessey noted that May is "strong, talented, irreverent and sexual; aspects of being a woman that are so rarely role-modeled in a holistic way – or in a way that talks to me – that I want to defend her against comments that seem irritatingly reductive" and despite some fans' fears that "ditching the blues muse and aspiring to a mainstream pop aesthetic would leach her authenticity.

Australian digital radio station site Double J said, "Abbe May has been open about this record being her first after coming out, and these short, oblique moments add plenty to that narrative.

[25] Music from Abbe May's "Mammalian Locomotion" single was used in the U.S. television series Entourage ending credits – Season 8 Episode 6, air date 28 August 2011.

[26] Music from Abbe May's "Cast That Devil Out" single was used in the Australian television series Packed to the Rafters – Season 5 Episode 9, air date 12 June 2012.