After releasing singles for the past few years, London-based psychedelic duo Goodvibes Sound released their first album ‘The Institute‘. Known for their their upbeat, fun and psychedelic output, the songs in the album are no exception.
Hitswave‘s team had the chance to have a chat with them for the occasion – to discuss the album, their sound, plans and more… Enjoy!
Hey! So who are the guys behind Goodvibes Sound?
[Alex]: Hey, I’m Alex
[Angus]: And I’m Angus! We produce, write songs, and play everything together which means that we both sing and play guitar, bass and keyboards. We met at university and we’ve been playing together for about three years now.
You’ve just released your first album ‘The Institute’ – Congrats! How did you come up with the idea of a journey to find the Goodvibes Institute? Is it based on personal experience?
[Angus]: That’s right. When we started jamming together before we formed the band, we enjoyed making each other laugh by making up this imaginary “goodvibes” world that was kind of a cross between a mindfulness retreat and a research centre. But we pretty quickly realised that we shared a lot of experiences in our own lives that we were subconsciously connecting on.
[Alex]: Yeah, the concept of a being on a journey that takes you through ups and downs, with the aim of finding yourself and finding peace is very real, we just use the world we’ve created to express it.
The world is loosely inspired by this place I read about which was set up in the 60s to explore conscious, but now it’s a place where business leaders go to find enlightenment. In a way, that article really provided a lot of the foundation around which we coloured in.
How would you describe your music to someone who has never heard of you?
[Alex]: For us, we love making music that we people can put on at a party, or chill with friends to. We’ve had people call us “psychedelic disco”. For some people it’s more like pop music, for some people it’s more chill. Guess it depends on your own vibe!
Do you have any advice for wannabe musicians?
[Angus]: Enjoy playing your instrument! For me that means playing with other people as much as possible. And if that seems intimidating then just try working up to it by jamming along to YouTube videos. Learning how to play songs that you actually love listening to is also really important. Don’t feel bound to follow whatever course or textbook you’re using to learn. It should be fun, so make sure you’re doing it in a fun way.
So what’s next? Any plans for the coming months?
[Alex]: Yeah, we’ve got an animated version of the album cover we’re excited to upload to YouTube in the next few days. We’ve got a few gigs coming up and we’re looking forward to going on tour next year. Finishing the album over the last few months has meant that we haven’t worked on new material for a while as well, so we’re super excited to do that again!