Early last year, three close mates Chris, Kate and Jess gathered together to mess around with a few little ditties about body odour and perspiration. Soon after that a fourth party was introduced into the equation in the form of their producer friend Miami Horror, and the cult hit Sweaty Wet/Dirty Damp was born. Ladies and gentlemen, we give you Gameboy/Gamegirl.
Snapped up by Ajax for his new record label Sweat It Out, the Melbourne four-piece and current darlings of the blogosphere are gearing up to hit the road for their first ever national headline tour. The tour coincides with the release of their debut Golden Ghetto Sex EP, which has their afore mentioned hit included on it along with another four new tracks. Past winners of the Triple J Unearthed, they’ve also supported some of the coolest kids in indie/electro including Robyn, Muscles and the Bang Gang DJs, as well as appearing at festivals like Parklife, Big Day Out, Good Vibrations. Get along to one of their shows if you’re the type who likes to bitch and brag about how you saw the next big thing ‘before they sold out’. Here, ITM talks to Jess from Gameboy/Gamegirl.
Firstly, how did you guys meet?
Katy and I went to school together. We were often told off for talking to each other in high-pitched kids voices during class. Tranter was a geeky kid that we took a while to warm to but when we did we became inseperable, and watched an abundance of cartoons and listened to a heap of music together. We decided to make a song one day and Miami came in and rescued us with the offer of production. We’re now the weirdest bunch of self-conscious and well-dressed nerds anyone knows.
What do you guys do for a living when you aren’t tearing up dance floors around Australia?
Jess: I work in shoes. Not really a surprise there. Katy works for a music retailer, which means she gets kids buying mixes with her on them, wondering if she’s on this why does she work here. Tranter DJs all around Melbourne and Ben DJs, remixes and produces his own stuff.
Fashion seems to be a vital part of your performance, where do you find your outfits?
Mainly Savers and eBay. I had a wardrobe full of costume choices. I’ve always dressed pretty outrageously. Now I have more of an excuse to do so. Katy and I mix and match each others stuff too. We also have an amazing clothing sponsor George Terrific. They hook us all up with crazy leggings oversized tees and everything we need to look fly. Yes, I just said fly. The boys are a little less risky with their outfits. Miami has some tricks up his sleeve though and Tranter has got into just taking his off.
I saw your Adelaide show and it was the coolest thing ever. How would you describe your ‘full clubbing experience’ to someone that has never seen it before?
It’s like being let into our bedrooms. We’re in crazy outfits and we’re dancing like we just don’t care and you know you wanna dance and join in but sometimes you’re just a little scared of the entire situation.
How did the ‘full clubbing experience’ come about? Like how did you decide to rap over popular dance tracks? For example I think I remember you guys did sweaty wet/dirty damp with Daft Punk’s Aerodynamic playing in the background.
We knew we weren’t going to do anything amazingly original, but we wanted to do something fun and totally danceable. We use a lot of samples and hip hop references to get the crowd going, they’re more likely to start dancing to something familiar then keep dancing to our less familiar stuff. Plus it just turns the irony level way up. Why not give literal shout outs to our influences. It’s better than trying to cover it up.
Do you feel like you are part of any sort of international ‘mashup’ scene, along with Spank Rrock, Girl Talk or 2ManyDJs?
Well our live show definitely is, but our tracks have less of that feel. We definitely mash a few genres. So much so that Tranter labelled us ‘Coochie Club’ so it’s us in a nutshell. It’s got the sass and aggression of dirty rap, and the beats and sound of good fun dance music.
How do you feel about mp3 music blogs? They seem to currently love you!
Honestly they have totally got us out there in a way we couldn’t have managed ourselves. They are the reason we’re going overseas in June. We have such a worldwide fan base because of these blogs that it will allow us to party everywhere. They really give the underdogs a chance to get heard.
Your music seems to have a tongue in cheek approach to hip hop. Are you trying to be making fun of it or just reinterpreting it?
Not making fun at all, we love it! We’re totally giving shout outs. When we reference any of the hip hop stuff it’s in a totally admiring way. We are so in awe of all the amazing stuff out there we’re just glad to be able to be doing something and we’re cruising along the path that they made. Gameboy/Gamegirl is a direct reference from Spank Rock’s Bump. We aren’t afraid to let our influences be known.
How do you come up with your hilarious lyrics? What is the inspiration for them?
Honestly we’ll sit for hours thinking of nothing, then one of us will come up with an entire song while at work or on the tram. We put hype words in a hat and pull them out of a hat, play hip hop scatergories, all we know is we’re never going to be writing about anything serious so the writing process has to be fun as well.
How do you think having an electro DJ rather than a more conventional hip hop orientated DJ has on you sound?
We’ve used both before. When Ben hasn’t been around we’ve used CWD and OOH-EE who are both amazing DJs more on the hip hop side. They just do more scratching and really get into making the set have a different feel. Ben obviously is our main man though and I think by having a DJ who people know so well and love dancing to means he can start with some tracks and keep going to that whole experience is like a club show. For our album which will come out later in the year we are going to have more hip hop sounding track but still keep to our sound.
Finally what are your favourite fruits?
I love passionfruit and Raspberries. Full stop the best fruits out there. Sweet and tangy.
Gameboy/Gamegirl will be launching their EP at the following shows, and you can check them out in full flight in an ITM-TV promo clip HERE…
29 Mar – Miss Libertine, Melbourne
11 Apr – Candy’s Apartment, Sydney
12 Apr – Bourgeois Bogan, Perth
18 Apr – Lick It, Brisbane
19 Apr – Streetkid, Gold Coast
24 Apr – Rocket Bar, Adelaide
bobmoog says...
oh dear...