(Image:Supplied)
We had the wonderful opportunity to meet up with Matthew, Juliet and Ben from South African electronic band GoodLuck. Their new single Find Me In The Forest is a lead-up track to the launch of their 3rd album The Nature Within due to be released today!
This is what they had to share:
Q: You guys have been around for quite some time now, what was the inspiration behind starting the band and how did it all begin?
Ben: It began after I had booked a gig, Jules and I were in another band making acoustic pop music and basically I had always wanted to make electronic music so we booked a gig due two weeks away without any music or any knowledge on how to produce electronic music. (We’ve always just kinda winged our stuff as we went along and it’s worked out for us) SO from that very first gig (Which was terrible BTW) we just kept going and going.
Q: What are the biggest or your favourite perks that come with doing what you do?
Matthew: Travelling the world, getting to see beautiful places, meeting beautiful people and getting paid to do that, also getting to experience the different scales of staying in all these cool, random and weird places. You just never know what to expect.
Julez: Definitely travelling and getting toTry out all the different exotic foods, the different places we stay- sometimes we get to a place and it’s like “OMG, Is this us”- You just get to experience so many things
Ben: I think it’s very cool to see how different cultures work in different societies, like you get to see how different people respond to modern society and it gives this incredible overview of how humanity can live together and work together. You definitely get to learn what to do and what not to do.
(Image:Supplied)
Q: Your favourite performance to date?
Matthew: Mine isn’t always the biggest but if I must be honest, I would think that the residency that we have in Plett. It’s just a good family vibe. Everybody is there to just have fun.
Jules: For me, it definitely has to be our first performance in Holland which was actually our first trip overseas, nobody knew our music and we were just barely breaking through in SA. We played a little festival for about 2000 people in the woods after the headliner – naturally, we thought everybody was going to leave but they stayed. At the end of the show, they were singing our songs back to us. It was so crazy because we knew they’d never heard our music before.
Ben: For me, it was the concert that we played in London at the Battersea PowerStation. There were about 25 000 people- we were under the impression that the crowd would not receive us well but they went wild! It was the best show ever.
Q: What inspired “The Nature Within”?
Jules: The album was made all over the world, recorded and written in 16 different countries ranging from India to Seychelles to Norway. There’s also some African influence from countries like Zambia. What’s different about this album is that we’ve always been inspired by nature but basically, this album is more about feeling and human nature and stories we can tell about the human experience.
Q: Following the year-long journey it took to create this album, what is next for Goodluck? Back to the studio or taking a break?
Ben: Basically our current efforts are strictly for South Africa and then at a later stage we’ll have a bigger focus on an international scale so there are no breaks right now. Hopefully in February. One of the hardest things as a musician is that you have to force yourself to take some time off.
Q: Who is your fashion inspiration?
Matthew: I tend to look at what’s currently trending. Nobody really knows this but I have a lot of Great Gatsby inspired blazers in my cupboard so some random Fridays I just rock out wearing a full on 1920’s inspired suit.
Julez: Vanessa Hudgens’ bohemian style and light, easy things to move around in when on stage.
Ben: For a while, definitely a Durban surfer type of influence. I was mostly in slops and board shorts but now I’ve found a little inspiration from Matthew’s enthusiasm for fashion.
We can’t wait to get our hand on GoodLuck’s latest offering. Get your copy out on shelves today!
Words: Mawatle Mpuru