The South African live superstars ruffling feathers on their way all the way to the top
Interview : Dan Prince
Boys welcome back to DMCWORLD! You are enjoying another tough summer in Ibiza, where are you right now?
“Well, actually right now we are in Barcelona airport on our way back to Ibiza…it’s boiling hot and we just ate some weird Tapas… Last night we played Get a Kool Festival in Marseille, France, with Fatboy Slim and Dutch DJ Bakermat, who just did a really nice remix for us. We almost didn’t make it there as our flight was canceled because of airline strikes, but we hired a car and did a 6hour high speed drive to Marseille from BCN, arriving minutes before our show. It was crazy, but you forget everything when you look out at thousands of smiling faces dancing to your music. Nothing is going to stop us playing our gig if we can help it!”
Congratulations on ‘1 Million Views’ hitting the top spot in your home country, your fourth No. 1 in a row!! You must be ecstatic?
“It’s a great feeling to get so much support back home. Things are starting to break out for us internationally but it’s the people who know you best that can be your harshest critics so to get that kind of love from them is great. Four number one’s in a row is pretty cool too. Sometimes that kind of thing can be a little surreal to be honest. We have covered a lot of ground but it’s the work still to be done that keeps us hungry. We’re bringing a new sound and style to the table and we love a challenge.”
Official video : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5cOAb2mSWU
You posted an interesting post on your Facebook site in June, asking your fans whether you had overstepped the mark with your video, some saying that you were dissing EDM, some actually getting the joke! Now that it has all calmed down, what are your thoughts on the whole situation – even deadmau5 got involved in your hilarious robot dig…
“Well Deadmau5 as usual is one step ahead of some of his fans who were freaking out properly online. He’s a sharp guy and he knew exactly what we were trying to say. For him to give it 10/10 and say it ‘was pretty much what is going on right now’ made us stoked. Basically, we feel it’s important to not forget why you started making music in the first place. This scene is not a popularity contest. Or at least it shouldn’t be. This Music is the thing we all love so much and should be treated with respect. It’s not about musical taste, that is a personal thing. But playing premixed sets, buying likes, cheesy product placement and just the general uneasy feeling that some areas of the scene have lost their way is the main inspiration behind the video and song. It definitely wasn’t a diss of Daft Punk or Deadmau5 like some people are saying, they are completely missing the message. We grew up listening to Daft Punk and they have always been huge inspirations for us anyway. You don’t have to agree with us but if you take it the wrong way then maybe the truth hurts?”
How was Naples at the weekend, any hangovers celebrating the news?
“Haha. Nothing too mad…but Naples is a crazy place. We like to play a game of ‘spot the car that still has its side mirrors’ when we are there. It’s a very long game. Not really surprising with such narrow streets. Playing on the beach is one of our favourite kind of shows to do, and the crowd really appreciates the musician side of what we do. Never mind the amazing food, whenever we go to Naples we love trying out the amazing seaside restaurants there. You are never disappointed.”
You have just played at Uncaged at the all new Eden club in San Antonio. Tell us about the night…
“It’s really cool to see what the guys have done with the place. They took an old club that had kind of become part of the furniture in Ibiza and totally gutted and transformed it all in two months. Amazing Void soundsystem, pulsing LED’s embedded in the walls, and the best in everything. It’s exactly what San Antonio needed and it’ll easily give the other big clubs a run for their money as far as facilities go. We’re also pretty excited to see the new Booom (Previously Bomba) opening down the road from Pacha. We had it on good authority that the custom Pioneer sound system they are putting in they are calling the best club sound system ever…big call but can’t wait to play there and the lineup is looking insane. It’s good to see new blood in Ibiza and that can only be good for the club goers and the island in general.”
Where else has kicked off for you this summer in Ibiza, Blue Marlin sounded wicked…
“This summer we are doing Blue Marlin monthly residency on Sundays which goes completely mental, as well as some Friday dates at Booom Ibiza interspersed with all our shows across Europe. Ibiza is kind of our base as we like to escape winter in Cape Town…and this endless summer scam we have got going is working out rather well.”
Talk us through a typical live set in summer 2013…
“Well we only play our own productions for the most part. So Goldfish, Goldfish, unreleased Goldfish, Goldfish edit, Goldfish remix etc, is where it’s at. We love making new edits of our stuff for every show. It’s a tricky balance making music that you want to listen to for albums and then adjusting that for the dancefloor. We really try to make music that is timeless as a lot of dance music is so disposable. The track is hot for 3 months and then no one wants to hear it again. So it’s great to see songwriting making a return in dance music and you can always dub it out or make an extra pumping festival mix anyway.”
Miami WMC must seem like an eon ago, how difficult was it playing to an empty Ultra room due to the door fiasco…whilst playing to the cameras??
“That was weird. We were so stoked to play Ultra and but the fire dept wouldn’t allow the Ultra organizers to open the gates when our set started for some safety reason so we started playing to literally no one. The funny thing was there were about 35 000 people all watching online so even though we were playing to no one in front of us little did we realize that the online You Tube stream comments were going mental. Eventually the place filled up and by the end of it we had the place rocking. We got off stage a little frustrated until I turned my phone on to see that our website had crashed from all the traffic and our Twitter and Facebook had literally exploded. It was a great feeling. Big thanks to Ultra for giving us the opportunity to showcase what we do and hopefully we can take it to the next level next year.”
An interesting thing you said at the start of the year…”electronic music is a bit sterile at the moment”. Were you talking about the EDM scene in America which thankfully now is starting to expand into other genres, or the world’s dancefloors as a whole?
“Well it’s about what is getting attention and of course America has a huge influence on that. There is a lot of fizzy soda pop dance music happening, but that is bound to happen when a new market as big as the US ‘discovers’ or more accurately ‘rediscovers’ Dance Music. Things are already changing as all the new fans get over the initial gold rush and sub genres like ours are suddenly getting so much more attention as people start digging deeper below the surface. We’re just trying to bring back a bit of warmth and dirt to the classic electronic sound which can get a little kitchen fluorescent. Digital Music with an Analogue soul. There has never been a more exciting time to be a producer.”
London loves you and we love seeing you play live here. One question I have always wondered, when you play in our capital, how much of the audience is made up of South Africans?
“The first time we played London a few years back it was only homesick South Africans! But the show we played at Koko earlier this year was a great mix of people, and London is such a cosmopolitan mix anyway. It’s good to see the UK audiences embracing the Fish. We’re definitely keen on playing a lot more festivals in the UK. Aren’t enough days in the year!|”
How much of a ‘jam’ element comes into play with your songwriting?
“It’s pretty much how all our tracks start. We love jamming live on stage and that’s what happens when you are both jazz musicians originally, jamming is what it’s all about. That’s where the magic happens. So many times Dave has looked across at me and shouted ‘don’t forget that riff!’ while we are playing and that little part will become a whole new track. If you can see it working on the dance floor already in that moment then you know it’s something special.”
What is coming next from you studio wise…?
“We’re super excited to release our new album Three Second Memory. It’s all mixed, mastered and waiting for release in October at ADE. We’ve been playing the songs out for a while at gigs and it’s really cool to see how mental the crowds are going for stuff they have never heard from us before. It’s like having a big secret we can’t tell. We just want to get the music out there already! We are also working on a couple very cool remixes and a few big name collabs. That’s all we can say for now though.”
One of your big passions is surfing, how are you managing without the surf of South Africa?
“Are you kidding Dan? Twitchy would be an understatement. All our mates are posting pics of amazing J-Bay and East coast secret spots back home going crazy while we are surrounded by inch high ripples in the Med…it’s all good though, we do a lot of cliff jumping and stand up paddleboarding to keep the fitness up and wash off the touring and clubbing. If Ibiza had waves we’d move here permanently in a heartbeat. We like keeping that balance though and coming from Cape Town is what makes our music sound the way it does. Everything has it’s place in our lives and it’s all working out really well.”
You are obviously using Ibiza as base for your summer gigs, where outside of the white isle are you looking forward to these coming months?
“We’re in France, Germany, UK, Ireland, Ibiza etc of the next couple months, best thing is to check our tourdates on www.goldfishlive.com for all fishness.”
Away from the island’s clubs, where are some of the restaurants and beaches we can find you?
“The Fish Shack in Talamanca is probably our favourite spot. It’s just a little converted container on the rocks and there are only 5-6 different fresh fish options each day. The owners are super cool, it’s nice and informal and the food is simple ibicencan and super fresh. We’ve been going there for years. You can jump in the sea in between courses and that cliff jumping spot we mentioned earlier is just round the corner. Best hangover cure.”
And finally, you are a month into the new Ibiza season, have you seen a stranger sight than Simon le Bon in his Speedos yet?
“As surreal as Ibiza is…nothing has quite topped that story yet. Respect to Simon though, he pulls a speedo off well.”
