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Cape Town – When hearing the names Andrew Davenport, Fred Den Hartog and Sheldon Yoko, I immediately think AKING and Die Heuwels Fantasties – Andrew plays for AKING, while Fred and Sheldon play for Heuwels.
But a few years ago they formed a band called THIEVE. And after many years of releasing new material sporadically due to their busy schedules, they feel like they have now grown into the best version of themselves as a band and are releasing their second full length album, Extra Ordinary, on 17 March.
Sitting down with frontman Andrew to chat everything THIEVE, I just have to ask: "Where did you steal the name from?"
Andrew chuckles. "Fred and I both love production and we’ve got loads of influences, that’s where the name THIEVE sort of came from, we just love taking little bits from different sounds," he explains.
"So how would you describe the sound of the new album?" I ask.
"We were talking about this yesterday, I’m quite nervous actually for people to hear it ... because it’s taken a while and we’ve sporadically written the songs, the songs differ quite a lot. There are maybe two or three songs that sound slightly the same so you can put them under one bracket sort of, but then there’s like other stuff that sound completely different. Like the other day someone came into the studio and asked ‘Whose playing, Gloria Estefan?’ Then there will be one song that’s very punky, so it’s really hard to describe the sound as a whole. I would say it’s an eclectic representation of wide variety of influences," explains Andrew.
The band recorded a big part of the album in a make-shift beach studio in Vleesbaai which they documented in their first music video for their single Wild Western Cape.
"It looks like you guys had lots of fun while recording. What was the experience like and can you take us through a typical day?" I ask.
"If you’re talking about what you can see in the video, that was a jol! We would wake up, eat some leftover braai food, pull out a guitar and start playing, take a swim... That was like total fun, but I mean we had a job we had to do, but we did it in the funnest possible way," says Andrew.
Having lived together for five years, making music together and basically seeing each other every day, Andrew and Fred have developed quite the bromance. "Do you guys ever fight and how do you deal with it?" I ask.
"Fred and I, we’re like brothers you know, there’s no awkwardness when we fight, and we do fight. It doesn’t last very long, it usually escalates very quickly and then defuses just as quickly. We usually end up arguing about me never thinking it’s good enough, and he’s like, let’s just go with it it’s amazing, and he thinks I’m like super negative about stuff. I’m very worried about quality and like message and that it’s fresh and new, where Fred’s like, let’s just finish the fucking song you know. It does get heated sometimes though, but he knows that I’m stronger than him," Andrew says laughingly.
"So who writes the songs and what do you write about?" I ask.
"Fred and I, we both write the songs together and we both play for other bands as well, so it took us quite a while you know, we’ve been putting some loose stuff together over the last three years, little pieces and bits here and there. And we’ve both been too busy to find the time to be serious about it. And then Fred and I went on holiday to Barcelona, we went to this massive festival there and we watched some of our favourite bands there which really inspired us and that’s when we decided to give it a good go," Andrew explains. "The album has sort of picked up a theme, where we talk about the fear of getting old, and this natural want for like a more ordinary life after touring for a lot of years, but then sort of feeling like you’re letting go of dreams, that kind of stuff. And so trying to find the extra-ordinary within the ordinary," adds Andrew.
We also played a little game with Andrew, it's called Never Have I Ever...
1) Ghosted a girl...
2) Watched a full episode of Keeping Up With The Kardashians...
3) Forgotten a girl’s name that I hooked up with...
4) Stalked someone on Facebook...
5) Googled myself...
6) Taken a nude selfie...
7) Done it in a car...
