Hiya GOLDICAT thanks for joining us in the virtual RGM lounge today, grab a brew and take a seat.What made you decide that music is a thing for you?
“Decide” is a really interesting word that I’ve been reflecting on a lot lately. I think many of us, especially in the English-speaking world, tend to view decisions as an active motion towards something specific. But when you break down the word—‘de,’ meaning ‘off,’ and ‘cision,’ like in ‘incision,’ it’s actually about cutting off.
It’s about sculpting. So, for me, choosing music was a gradual process of carving out the right space for it in my life; of cutting off other ways of spending time. Then, at a certain point, you look around and realize you’re totally immersed in something. My approach to music is often subtractive too. I like to throw everything at the wall and then see what I can find in the interstices—the spaces in between—see what’s worth keeping!
Introduce us to you all and your musical history.
Music has always been there in the background for me. When I was a kid we had a little electric organ and a few guitars lying around, but I have a brother who’s five years old, and (as a rather sullen and competitive child) I was infuriated by the gap in our abilities and embarrassed to play. Haha it sounds ridiculous now, but when you’re seven, your world is so small.
I dabbled with the piano again as a teenager, but relentless perfectionism made it impossible to really enjoy or engage or improve. I learned a few fairly advanced pieces on the piano through sheer rote memorization—doing drills of Chopin before I even knew what a scale was. I was trying to prove something to myself.
In my mid-twenties I started getting involved with psychedelics, and that’s when music really took hold – when (over the space of a couple of years) I managed to unlearn all the hang ups I had around making mistakes and get out of my own way. It was an astonishing liberation. Then I started writing my own songs because I didn’t understand how to use my voice and I was convinced that my vocal range was too narrow to sing anyone else’s!
A few thousand Logic hours later – here we are! Por fin!
What’s the live music scene like in Sayulita right now? Anyone we should be looking out for (Bar you of course)
So we live in a little town called Sayulita, on the Pacific coast of Mexico. Two-thirds of the year it’s a popular tourist destination, so there’s this tension between the demand for cover bands and the yearning for original music. Most of the people who live here full time are a little mad, so it’s a really creative atmosphere, and there are lots of artists and bands doing cool original stuff – shout out to JC Gatsby, Akuaman, Zadok, Holy Hannah, Pugband, Gaby Swan, Rob Cavazzini, Azul Dario, Jacqueline Rae, Hologram Sound, who are all pushing boundaries in their own ways!
I’ve seen a lot of people struggling for support recently online. What’s your view on the industry?
It does seem like it’s a difficult time, but then again, hasn’t it always been, but in different ways? Maybe it’s more that the contours of that difficulty keep shifting.
The pace of the evolution of technology and algorithms is daunting, and how we interact with media is changing all the time.
I have to admit, there is something that troubles me about the ever-increasing premium that’s placed on ‘likes’, ‘shares’ and engagement. People, whether consciously or not, know how much power the micromovement in their thumb now holds, and I think we’ve all become a bit miserly about the things we ‘like’.
When I see my friends doing something on social media, I interact with them. But I’ve also caught myself forgetting, and it makes me think about how I’d feel if my friends blanked me on the street.
I used to feel really negatively about social media, but now I’m developing an affection for it. ‘Content’ has almost become a dirty word, but at its core, it’s just about telling a story within some very strict boundaries. It’s like a 21st-century haiku.
Where do you feel you currently sit within the music industry?
A loose thread right now, but we’re determined to contribute some new patterns to the tapestry.
Tell us Two truths and a lie about you.
I ran into the same couple in four different cities during a 6 week trip around Japan.
I was in a hot air balloon crash.
I’m a tremendous cook.
Do you ever worry about people taking things the wrong way or cancel culture? Discuss….
Personally, I can’t imagine saying anything so controversial that it would lead to being cancelled – but I’m sure many of the people who’ve been cancelled also felt that way! I think we are what we consume, and if we’re constantly absorbing polarized media, it’s going to seep into our values whether we like it or not—it normalizes it. We have to stay grounded and consider everything in context and be prepared to imagine ourselves in different circumstances.
Do you sign up to any conspiracy theories? If not why not?
I don’t subscribe to conspiracy theories, largely because I try to be cautious of certainty in any form.
I remember sitting next to a flat earther on a transatlantic flight once – at that height you can even see the curvature of the horizon. He was having none of it. He insisted it was the shape of the window. I kept thinking about this Robert Anton Wilson quote: ‘Belief is the death of intelligence’. And Aldous Huxley: “Give us this day our daily Faith, but deliver us, Dear God, from Belief.” Uncertainty abound!
That said, conspiracy theories, even when they’re implausible—like the alligators in the New York sewers—often carry metaphorical weight. They reveal how people feel about the world around them, eg. the sense that unseen, predatory forces are out there, beyond our control. I suspect this just echoes people’s fears of late-stage capitalism or whatever other systemic powers shape their lives in ways they don’t fully understand. So, while I don’t buy into most of these theories, I do recognize that they tell us something deeper about how people are experiencing the world.
What was your best experience on stage?
One of the most interesting things about live shows is that anything can go wrong—and usually does. That potential increases exponentially when you’re working with electronic gear like laptops and sequencers in a tropical climate! It can be frustrating, but it’s so inevitable that these challenges have become part of the fun. There’s a point where you stop stressing about everything going perfectly and start enjoying the creative workarounds that arise when things don’t go as planned.
What was your worst experience on stage?
The first show I ever played was a complete disaster. I wasn’t ready, and I knew I wasn’t, but I also knew I’d never feel ready, so I decided to just do it. I figured it would be a learning opportunity, and I wasn’t wrong. Every single thing that could go wrong, went wrong. None of my controllers worked, I didn’t know how to fix them, and halfway through, there was a power cut.
One of the speakers even blew out. The set itself was something I’d thrown together in about seven days, so it was shambolic at best. To top it off, it was the middle of a super sticky summer in Mexico and I was wearing these new shorts. Right before the set I went to the loo and I couldn’t get them back up again – I spend about an 8 minute eternity panicking and struggling before they finally yielded!
I don’t regret it though. It was a turbulent start and I wanted to cry afterwards, but that experience taught me more than any amount of preparation could have.
Tell us something about you / each member that you think people would be surprised about.
One thing that surprises some people is that everything we create is from scratch—every beat, every loop, every melody. You’d think that wouldn’t be surprising, but the amount of people who have asked me ‘which website do you use for your beats?’
What are the next steps you plan to take as a band to reach the next level?
So I’ve been looking at which parrot breeds are the most musical – if I could find one that can sing, dance and do some basic divination I think that would really level us up?
(Not really – christ can you imagine living in your home studio with a parrot?!)
We’ve been invited to do some shows over in Tulum this winter, and we have some collaborations in progress too!
I hear you have a new music, what can you tell us about it.
‘Another Way’ is our latest release. The song began back in January when I was housebound for a few days, recovering from a mildly necrotic spider bite. I wrote maybe half of it and tried to move onto other creations, but, for the next month or so, I just kept inadvertently rewriting the same song over and over! (Maybe in a different key or a different bpm…but it was unmistakably the same song!) It insisted on being finished!
It all came to a head when we were prepping for a gig and I just wasn’t feeling good. You know those days when your own mind just drives you insane? I was in that sort of subterranean style of psyche and had been all day. I knew I’d feel 100x better if I finished writing a song, so I resigned myself to staying up until it was done – even if the other parts ended up being placeholders.
It was a long night but at some point it occurred to me to pretend to be Tim Curry singing “Sweet Transvestite” and it galvanised me back into functionality. It sounds cheesy but the whole process was very empowering. The song is really about that – how we can transform our inner narrative, but what we have to do to feel okay is different for everyone. (I mean, staying awake all night on your laptop isn’t normally deemed an exemplar of self-care, but it was exactly what I needed to do!)
What was the recording process like?
Fragmented and frustrated and glorious!
What was the biggest learning curve in writing the new tunes?
Recording my own vocals.
Would you change anything now it’s finished?
Not a thing! I think Roberto – the other half of GOLDICAT – still feels torn on the barmy vocal fx, but for me they totally encapsulate the jangling context from which the song arose!
Is there anything else you would like to share with the world?
Don’t let ‘perfect’ get in the way of ‘done’.
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