Reflecting on music and life with minimalistic RnB duo Oh Wonder

Writing and releasing one song per month for a year straight, the songwriting duo of Josephine Vander Gucht and Anthony West, Oh Wonder, had unintentionally penned together a hit record by mid 2015. With over thirteen million streams on Soundcloud before even performing live, the duo has been greeted with nothing but sold out gigs since making their live debut to a crowd of 800 strong in London last September. Continuing to pick up steam as they go, the brits have been delivering their minimalistic RnB laced pop tales via a mind-melting live show to packed rooms across the globe.

Intro by Andy Gorel
Interview and pics by Lauren Engel

Anthony, you were born and raised in Isle of Man. And Josephine lived in London. How has that reflected on the music you’ve made?
Anthony: I moved to England when I started playing music, so when I was 11/12. I was on the outskirts of London. I don’t think the music we make is formed by where we lived.
Josephine: We both listened to the same artists growing up. We wanted to make the same type of music. But coming from London, obviously London is the music capital of the world and all of my friends went to gigs every night so that has some sort of influence on you. Loads of my friends are in bands. There was a sense that you had your little scene and community. Anthony had to come into London for shows and stuff. I’m a bit biased but I have that anything is possible view. Because anything in London is possible. You can do anything and be anyone.

You both had very different backgrounds, Anthony was raised near the sea and you in the city. How do you think that has made you the person you are now.
Anthony: I moved around a lot when I was a kid. I went to nine different schools and had to make friends all the time. I knew what it’s like to let your friends go and make new ones which is really strange to do as a kid but for me it was actually pretty good and made the person I am now.
Josephine: Anthony can just go into any situation and is fine. Touring for Anthony is like chilling because he’s like cool! I grew up in the same place for all my life. One house, one school, one city in London and I’m like oh my gosh – new cities and new faces. It’s so anxiety inducing. I love structured ways of doing things. Which is why it’s such a good balance when releasing art because we’re so different. I’m like no, no, no it has to be all regimented and planned and we got to get it done this way. Anthony’s just like it’s cool, whatever, we’ll go with it.

“These new songs are quite personal in comparison to the first record. But you have this distance. No one knows who I really am.”

Anthony, growing up you were really inspired by your uncle, right? Would you say he’s your mentor?
Ya he was a blue grass musician and came over from America and toured around Europe. He used to always stay at my parents house and write some songs. I was like wow! How are you making something out of nothing?! It was this magic of songwriting. The way he’s done things was very independent and taught me that I don’t need to rely on anyone to make music. Just need to start producing my own music. He taught me that actually you should be self sufficient if you can.

Josephine, did you have someone in your family who does music and that you looked up to?
Nobody in my family was creative for a living. That was not a thing. “Josephine will be a lawyer or a teacher or work in journalism. Something normal.” Because nobody in my family was creative. I had my piano teacher growing up whose told me I am really good and that I should go to music college. He was really encouraging and then I had a musical godfather, I suppose, at university. I was studying English literature and met this guy called Piers who was in his sixties and he was just so cool. He said you’ve got something, you should do something with it. He used to invite me around to his house and make songs and music. He was like, I’m telling you, you should go and do music for a living. When I finished university I listened to him and just went for it.

How were you able to convince your parents to do music full-time?
Josephine: My parents were so supportive but I can imagine it must be really daunting as a parent when you have no prior experience of anything. Say if my kid wanted to be a tattoo artist and I had no idea of the industry, if that was feasible and if you could make a good living, and if you could be happy. You would just be like NO! Don’t do that. They were just a bit scared of the industry. Musicians have that reputation of living this excessive lifestyle and being really unhappy, taking advantage of you, wanting the slice of the pie. Only 0.1% of people make it. If you add up the stats it’s the worst industry to go into (laughs). But at the end my parents have always been supportive and said to follow my dreams, do what I want.

“I just like the idea of being the soundtrack of someone’s life.”

What kind of careers were your parents in?
Anthony: My mom’s a nurse and my dad’s a marine biologist. Half my family is “sciency” and the other half is really artistic.

Did you have that academic phase growing up?
Anthony: My sisters did that for me. They’re both scientists now. My brother writes and I write. My granddad wrote. That side of the family was creative. I left the academic stuff to my sisters. I couldn’t really care about biology and chemistry as much as writing songs.

“There’s a sense of I’m young and I need to do it now! But patience is a virtue. I don’t think that there’s any need to rush.”

Since you guys have been in the music industry for a few years, what would you tell your younger self?
Josephine: Patience is a virtue. I don’t think that there’s any need to rush. There’s a sense of I’m young and I need to do it now! But actually I think wisdom is a very powerful thing and being settled within yourself and knowing what you want.
Anthony: Yeah and not to rush things. Everything’s already mapped out, your time will come. Just whether it’s now or in a few years. Maybe when you’re sixty. Look at Van Gogh, he didn’t make it until he died.
Josephine: Wow

Where did you get that idea of putting out music once a month?
Anthony: That kind of just fell out of the sky. In soundcloud where it said write something about yourself, we wrote umm we will do this every month? That was it. In hindsight it was a great idea. It was like a marketing concept. It was pretty strong and helped us grow our fanbase.
Josephine: It was just this really super organic and natural idea that we had. We didn’t really think about it and now it’s like genius. At the time we were just like, cool let’s just do that.

How do you think the initial music you made reflects you as a person and do you think it has changed compared to the music you make now?
The new idea has totally different energy to the rest. The first record feels insular.
Josephine: Insular but also, maybe this is just me looking back now, I feel like those first few songs were so naive. We were so vulnerable because no one was listening to us really. So we were like let’s just make some songs. There was never a sense that anybody else would hear it. Maybe that’s it. So you’re making songs just for yourself. That’s why they feel so insular because they were for us. Now it’s like oh crap people are listening to it (laughs). There’s a heightened awareness of what you’re making I guess.
Anthony: Ya but you constantly have to remind yourself you are making music for yourself.

“In order to make new music it’s really important to live in a vacuum for a bit otherwise I think you just get so overworked with that sense of like somebody is pinning all their hopes and dreams on this record.”

What has changed now that you know so many people are listening to your music?
Anthony: When we were doing the second album we had to go into the headspace of the first album as we had just been on tour for two years, playing on stage all the time. It throws you into this other dimension.
Josephine: Yeah exactly. So after that we just hung out at home in London for a few months and we didn’t really listen to any other music and we didn’t really do anything else. We just sat at home and made songs for our album. It’s really important though, you have to live in a vacuum for a bit otherwise I think you just get so overworked with that sense of like somebody is pinning all their hopes and dreams on this record and getting them through the next year of their university and you’re just like ahh! You can’t think of it like that.

Are you scared of being too vulnerable now that people are listening?
Josephine: I think it’s the other way. I feel really free because you’re in control. Maybe that’s just a personal thing. I feel like I’m in control of who I am. I feel like we can be quite honest in our songs. These new songs are quite personal in comparison to the first record. But you have this distance. No one knows who I really am.

Since you have pretty similar personalities and get along really well, would you say you are soulmates?
Anthony: I would say that our personalities are very different. Our outlooks are very similar. We both want very similar things out of life.
Josephine: Yeah. I think we are musical soulmates. Because we’ve both been making music independently for seven/eight/nine years before we started Oh Wonder so there was that sense that something wasn’t quite sticking or something wasn’t quite right until we collided. There was a sense that when Oh Wonder started this makes sense because you’re bringing something to the table that I can’t do and I’m bringing something to the table that you can’t do so our holes were kind of filled in. It’s lucky that we are so different because if I was alone on the tour bus I would go mental. You’re so chilled so it’s fine.

What do you want to be remembered for?
Josephine: Awh so many things.
Anthony: I just like the idea of being the soundtrack of someone’s life. It’s pretty powerful. A lot of people have said that. Even 25 year olds are like you got me through my university or whatever it is. It’s pretty amazing when they tell you their stories.
Josephine: I would like to be remembered for someone squeezing everything out of every opportunity and every moment. Touring especially makes you realize how lucky we are to be traveling around the world singing songs. That’s SO insane as a whole concept. Like we are in Hong Kong now and a bunch of people here have saved up their money and come to listen to us sing. That’s the biggest privilege ever. Also being somebody that really valued and appreciated everything that she was thrust into and you know, you got to do your best!