“We think music is getting a lot rawer and more meaningful”.
Having released their debut single ‘Eclipse’ last year to much fanfare and critical acclaim, they have been set on the path of giving listeners and society the honesty and imperfection it craves.
Their latest release ‘Celestial’ which places Joseph’s soulful vocals at its centre, once again, serves up this exact honesty and powerful rawness with ease. Speaking of the message behind the track, Joseph reveals, “The song is about watching someone you love from afar knowing you can’t be with them, whether that’s for your own sake or the other persons. When I was writing the lyrics, I thought it was like watching a full moon, and despite being so far away, you can still appreciate its beauty.”
The simplicity of appreciating the beauty around them seems to form the foundation of the duo’s music. “There are a lot of nature and worldly references in our songs. We write songs based on our own experiences or from observing the world around us”.
From the way they make music and speak in adoration of their craft, it’s clear as day that this is much more than a job to the twosome. This sentiment is only made more apparent by the message they want to leave their listeners with. They say, “ Music is art and art is about honesty. So we’d love our music to show that you don’t need to choose between being commercial or artistic/creditable.”
To show that making ‘commercial’ music isn’t the only way to be successful, the duo has found their sound evolving to become freer and far more creative. They explain, “Over time we’ve become a lot less genre-specific and write whatever we think is honest to the song.”
While pushing each other to reinvent their sound, they simultaneously draw inspiration from Kendrick Lamar. Explaining how the successful American rapper influences them, they say, “He puts music before business, popularity or what people expect from him. All of his
songs have purpose and character.”
Another person on their list of inspirations is André 3000. They both refer to the musician as “one of the all-time greats “, Joseph reveals that they’ve always talked about having him on a song, believing that the Andre -who was included in Billboard’s ’10 Greatest Rappers Of All Time’ in 2015 – has a unique style that would fit perfectly with the duo’s music.
Moving on from dream collaborations to their very own dream album, they talk about the passion project they’ve been working towards in the past four years. They say, “ We’re currently in the final stages of putting our album together. We’ve written over 300 songs in the span of four years as we’ve worked for this, so it means so much to us that we are at this point now.”
Disproving the myth that artists cannot be successful if they make “left-field music”, Joseph Lawrence & The Garden are steadily on the rise as they give listeners everything they need from music and more.
