Balu Brigada release first studio album ‘Portal’
Interview by Emma Ehrhard
Saturated in recent successes, virality on social media and the anticipation of the drop of their very first album Portal, Auckland, New Zealand-based band Balu Brigada is on an uphill journey to stardom. The band, consisting of brothers Henry and Pierre Beasely, create euphoria through their music, bending genres to create an eclectic blend of funk, groove and indie rock that is reminiscent of bands like Gorillaz or The Strokes.
It’s clear that the brothers in Balu Brigada are close, and even though they take their work seriously, they know how to have fun with both themselves and their music. The boys sat down with Pleaser for an exclusive interview to discuss the album, the excitement of touring and the growth that they’ve made as artists. Lighthearted and witty, Balu Brigada is a novelty within the world of indie rock.
Before their viral song “So Cold” blew up, the boys had a pretty good gut feeling that this track was going to be a hit. The track has a whopping 41 million listens on Spotify, and was the first “accidental” viral moment for The Band.
“For me personally, I feel like I always know what ones are going to do good and what ones are going to do ok, but this was the best feeling I had ever had before we released the song. I thought it was quite special and I really hoped it would do good, and it did do that,” Pierre told Pleaser. “There was this one post that we made that I was showcasing the baseline and I wore a cool red jacket so it popped. I wrote a silly caption that said, ‘Is this the hottest baseline of 2026?’, which is ridiculous because it was in 2024, so it made people think, ‘He doesn’t know what year it is’...then they watch the reel for longer, engagement, blah blah blah…”
Other than “So Cold,” Balu Brigada has released a couple of other singles from Portals such as “Sideways”, “Politix” and fan-favorite track “Backseat.” When deciding what songs they wanted to release as singles, the boys took time with their selections, and they only trusted a couple of people to help them select.
“It’s a lot of seeing how they feel. We only have a very select few people who we trust. One of them being each other, the other our manager. We sit with the songs, between us, see how they feel. We keep pretty light on our feet. For instance, we thought the single order would be really different a few months ago, but you want to ride the wave and push things back or forward if things are rolling out different than you expect.’Backseat,’ which we released a couple of months ago, was getting a lot of good responses, so we decided to change the order and put out a song that was kind of like a sister song to ‘Backseat.’ We were really proud of all of the songs, so it’s not that much of a mind f*ck to change the order since they are all songs we want to release anyways,” Henry said.
“Backseat” is a sonically awe-inspiring six minute track that takes listeners through an elongated journey of synthetic sounds, electronic hypnosis and funk-driven guitar riffs. The song reminds me of sitting in the backseat of a car on the way to another party after the first one ends with people you barely know– full of adrenaline and the anticipation of regret. The song, written after the band’s European tour opening for Twenty One Pilots, is visually stimulating through the imagery of experiences that Henry and Pierre had after that tour.
“We had just finished the European tour with Twenty One Pilots and finished the mixing of the album– it was this chaotic two weeks. During all of this we were trying to brainstorm ideas for what the visualizer for ‘Backseat’ could be. We remembered we had a festival in Napa Valley [California]. Weeks prior we were like, ‘It would be cool if we could do this thing in the desert…but it’s not like we’re going to America anytime soon enough.’
When we realized we were going there, we were like, why don’t we fly to LA, drive to the desert, hire a red truck, and drive around for half the day and get our friends to film. That’s what we did, so exhausted and delirious but fun to look back on. Driving in the desert, it’s pretty surreal being in Joshua Tree,” Pierre said.
“Yeah, it was very intense and last minute and we were so tired, but those are all of the moods of the song itself so it just worked because of that,” Henry jumped in to say. “It was kind of a happy accident. It was genuine to the mood of the song, which goes between frustrated and jaded to euphoric and cathartic.”
With Portal being Balu Brigada’s first album, recording location was pretty important to the band. Taking influence from artists such as LCD Soundsystem and The Strokes, Balu Brigada’s sound is heavily influenced by the alternative rock scene in New York. When it came to where the boys wanted to record, NYC seemed like the obvious choice.
“We’ve always been pretty fascinated with New York. We got the first opportunity to go there in 2018 and fell in love with it. So when we got a call from Atlantic Records in New York, it was essentially an excuse to go back there and make the most of a new relationship with a label,” Henry explained. “I feel like it's less obvious to go because it’s very expensive and not conducive to spaces like studios because it’s so condensed. But it’s also very inspiring for all the obvious reasons of it being such an intense melting pot, as you know. We’re quite satisfied with how that’s influenced the album. It’s leaned into that aggression and pace of [New York] artists we look up to like The Strokes and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.”
With the release of Portal, Balu Brigada is stoked to bring their new album to life on stage with their headlining tour set to accompany the release. Fans should be foreseeing a wildly rocking good time at Balu Brigada’s set. The band is preparing to amp up their production on this tour, and all in all, they just want to have fun with their fans to celebrate the release of their very first album.
