Cape Town’s Goldfish return to Egg LDN and talk original loves Mr Scruff, St Germain, Fatboy Slim and…

Cape Town’s Goldfish return to Egg LDN and talk original loves Hailing from Cape Town, Dominic Peters and David Poole’s Goldfish project had humble beginnings – starting out mainly as a platform for impromptu jams at their tiny local club on the beach. They have now put out five acclaimed albums, won countless international awards and play on an endless tour of the world. They bring a special fusion of live instruments, electronics and anthemic vocals, and return to EGG London on July 13th. Before that, we catch up with the pair, ask about their ever evolving style and more besides. 

How are you, what’s going on for Goldfish right now?

Doing good thanks! Greetings from San Diego..we’re just getting ready to head to Brazil for two shows in Sao Paulo and Rio. It’s a perfect day here…as it almost always is in Southern California. 

Summer is here – is it a season you enjoy, does it influence the music you make and play? Do you get more warm and sunny in your sounds and selections?

I guess growing up in Cape Town was a huge influence on our summery sound. We’ve naturally gravitated to living in warm places so Cape Town, Ibiza, and now San Diego have all had their part to play in our subconscious sound I guess. Plus Dave and I are naturally positive guys so that always tends to influence what we gravitate towards musically.

What initially turned you on to dance music, what labels, artists, parties, DJs – is it the same things you love now?

So Dave and I grew up heavily steeped in music tradition. Our parents were super into music, and really supportive of us. We were both playing multiple instruments and performing in bands professionally before we left school.

We met studying Jazz degrees in Music at the University of Cape Town, Jazz was the obvious choice when the only other options were Opera or Classical(laughs).

Having that serious tertiary training has turned out invaluable though, even though we now make an arguably less complex style of music. All that jazz training was great vocab to draw on when we started getting into Dance and Electronic Music.

When it came to that, we loved the stuff that combined that old school, warm analogue sound from Jazz and Blues with dance beats, so our original loves were artists like Mr Scruff, St Germain, Kruder & Dorfmeister, Fatboy Slim, Moby stuff like that. We started making tracks and suddenly found ourselves playing the main floor of Pacha Ibiza. It was a baptism of fire but an amazing experience.

And what of your own style do you bring, what inspires or influences you, what are your aims in the studio?

Just trying to make stuff that we like. It’s harder to do that than make music other people like! But we are the guys who have to play this stuff over and over again so it has to resonate. We’re actually branching out a lot these days. Being based in the States has exposed us to a whole lot of music we didn’t really brush up against on festivals in Europe so it’s been liberating making some more slower tempo stuff that isn’t 4/4 based, and we can’t wait to release some of that this year. Alongside that, we’re enjoying a lot of deeper, driving stuff in the deep house and techno realm too. 

What are your favourite bits of gear in the studio – what do you reach for when you need an idea?

We love our Focal Monitors, Our Moog, as well as our instruments like Dave’s 1964 Selmer Sax which is made of melted down WWII shell casings. More often than not when songwriting we like to step away from the laptop and jam on guitar or piano for that stage of things. If it works like that it will work in any style.

How do these processes in the studio translate to your live shows?

That is always the challenge. As what translates live with dance music isn’t neccesarily what reaches your listener while they’re on the tube, or in the park, or making supper at home. It’s always been our challenge of how to make our music in a sound that lasts and has a timelessness, within the requirements of Dance Music…Which can be quite fashion and trend based. It’s a constant process for sure.

Talk us through your live set up, what are each of your roles?

Cape Town’s Goldfish return to Egg LDN and talk original loves Whew. There’s a lot going on. Between us we have two laptops running Softsynths, Ableton for the tracks which Dave controls along with playing two Saxophones and a Flute. I’m on two Keyboards, one more piano and keyboards stuff and the other analogue synth bass as well an Electric Double Bass. We run this into two DJM 900 mixers and mix it all altogether live.  

You have released a lot of music on Armada Music, tell us about your relationship with the label.

We have had a long relationship with Armada as their head of A&R was actually our original main man who signed us at EMI before they were disolved. Those relationships and friendships last longer than the companies oftentimes, especially in the music industry. Armada is a great label to be working with and they understand what we are trying to achieve with our music. 

What is the most important lesson you have learnt so far in your career?

Apart from being unique – It’s not survival of the fittest, it’s survival of the fastest. How do you stay nimble, relevant and flexible to the disruptive economy which is the new normal for us all, whatever career you’re in. If you’re complaining about algorithms, short attention spans and the good old days you’re just gonna be edged out quicker. Stay true to your sound and use the tools at your disposal.

And you will be playing at Egg London on July 13, what can we expect from your set?

Like we mentioned we’re enjoying a lot of deeper, driving stuff in the deep house and techno realm and that’s what we’re bringing to the Egg on the 13th. DeepFish is a brand new project debuting at the Egg that we have been working on for a while, and we’re super excited to share this side of our musical personalities. The Egg is just the perfect place to do this and we have a killer lineup too.

And who else are you looking forward to seeing at the event?

Watermat and Tom Frankel! They are both absolute monsters in the booth and we’ve played so many shows around the world together. Can’t wait for the combo of all three of us, it’s gonna be a massive Friday night!

Tickets available at http://www.egglondon.co.uk/