Foreign Architects are a Perth based duo featuring singer/songwriter Matt Burke and percussionist Andrew Barnett. The duo will play Beerfest Asia 2015 (together with Singaporean and other Aussie bands) on Sunday 28th June. This is part of the musical exchange between Singapore & Western Australian music scenes which has been ongoing for the last couple of years. Thanks to Timbre Music (Beerfest organisers), we got in touch with Matt Burke/Foreign Architects for a short interview.

Why is it important for you to play in Singapore?

This is an important opportunity for us to gain international exposure and start to build a fan-base outside our home city. Singapore is a country we have always wanted to travel to and getting to bring our music to Singapore is a dream come true for us.

What do you hope to take away from the experience?

We feel we take so much from this experience both professionally and personally. As a band we are excited to share our music with a new audience and hopefully setup relationships with the Singapore music industry, which could see us return and build on those relationships in the future. We haven’t toured before so we feel we will gain a lot of knowledge about playing internationally and the logistics of what goes into it. On a personal level, neither of us have traveled out of Australia before, so we are really excited at the possibility of experiencing a different culture, and we have heard nothing but good things about Singapore, so we are glad this going to be our first international destination!

What is the band about? How did you form? What is your musical philosophy?

I have been a solo artist for years, predominantly performing my music in a solo/acoustic setting. A couple of years ago I started the process of releasing an EP and enlisted the help of my cousin and drummer Andrew Barnett to collaborate, and we haven’t looked back since. We now play shows in an electric format, with a bit of guitar trickery which allows us to have a huge sound without a bass player – Andrew and I communicate a lot when we perform, we feel our songs our the strength as well as our performance and the freedom and honesty which our current lineup allows is perfect for us to communicate the message and energy of each song.

Why should Singaporeans be interested in your music?

We feel we are quite unique in what we do, the music we write and how we perform it live. Our songs have catchy melodies, musical depth while sticking to the point, and we hit above our weight for the sound we produce from the two of us. We’ve lost count of the amount of times we’ve played and been told by people after the show that before they saw us they heard us playing and were expecting to see many more people on stage. There is nothing pre-recorded in our live show, but we use technology to our advantage to deliver the best show we can. For example on our latest single, ‘Clover’ we have a solo section which we re-produce live using a loop pedal.

Connect with Foreign Architects at their Facebook page.

SWAM Schedule at Beerfest Asia – 28th June 2015

The China Blue Experiment 3.45pm – 4.15pm

Stopgap 4.30pm – 5pm

Foreign Architects 5.15pm – 5.45pm

LEW 6pm – 6.30pm

Jake and the Cowboys 6.45pm – 7.15pm

Beerfest 2015 Official Website