Rise of The Iridium Experiment

Iridium is a rare and brittle metal that has elements of tenderness. Similarly to the silvery-white metal, South African group The Iridium Experiment has found their niche on their terms in the hard rock and alternative metal genre.

What started as a five-track project between Kenneth Hugh and Ewan Botha would be the foundation on which the band was formed as other artists showed interest in the recordings. The duo was soon joined by Merrick Kyle on bass guitar, Damian Coldfield on guitar, and Caleb Smith on drums. Although Ewan eventually moved on, the remaining members became The Iridium Experiment.

The members have been interested in music for many years with some coming from musical families. “By the age of 14, I went to the States with brass bands,” Damian aka DC began. “By the age of 16, I had Springbok colours. The first time somebody put a bass in my hands and said ‘Do you hear that? That’s what you are holding in your hands right now’, it just sparked something. For me, it’s been 26 years in the industry.”

Venturing into hard rock and alternative metal was a no-brainer because it is what they grew up on. Kenneth revealed that every member is capable of playing multiple genres of music. “We just figured with this one we would do what we want to do. We didn’t want to put those constraints on ourselves. It’s the kind of sound that the audience will listen to and they’ll be able to move to.” DC interjected, “We want to be able to have fun playing on stage. Do we want to write music just to have what everybody else listens to, or do we want to do stuff that we enjoy playing and performing?”

The reality of the pandemic has pushed many artists to create and perform differently and even expand themselves in roles they did not perform before. ”We started asking ourselves ‘if we can’t perform, what can we do?’ A lot of the writing has been remote. I would send ideas to the guys via the internet and they would sit at home and work out their ideas. We were able to stagger who was coming to the studio so a lot of people are not here all at once. It was done very carefully but it was also leveraging because the technology we have now is great,” Kenneth said.

Their upcoming EP titled Buried No More is expected to drop on September 6, and was recorded and mixed at the Rabid Dog recording studios in Strubens Valley. They already have 11 radio stations internationally looking to pick up songs from the EP, and have done 127 submissions to local and international radio stations ahead of the release date. They said their upcoming music conjured up a lot of hope and acknowledgment. It will take listeners on a journey of feeling despair to triumphing towards resolution and getting up again. “The message is that you are not the sum of your despair,” they concluded.