The Duo, LIINKS, Premiere Their Brand New Video for “This Feeling” And They Discuss The Band’s Formation, Their Biggest Inspirations And More!

Photo Credit- Liz Rosa

LIINKS was first formed in April 2014 and were immediately chosen as Bell Media’s AC/Hot AC “Future Star” for April and May. Prior to making it official and becoming LIINKS, Georgia and Dwhiz had co-written a #1 hit song in South Korea (which was actually stolen by Korea’s most popular artist at the time and reached #1 for 3 weeks until the scandal went public).

Their first single “The Break” was the most added track to Canadian radio and peaked at #35 on CHR Billboard and #18 on the Emerging Artist Billboard chart. Soon after they were chosen to be on CBC’s nationally televised reality show Cover Me Canada and Georgia performed at California’s first WE DAY event in San Francisco. Georgia also played herself as a lounge singer on the ABC hit show Boston Legal alongside Candice Bergen and has also sung the anthems for numerous NHL and NBA teams including the NY Knicks and the NY Rangers.

The duo has collaborated with internationally renowned dubstep producer  Datsik  (“Hold It Down”), electronic artist Mord Fustang (“Pop”), and electro duo Ephwurd (“Just Us”). They’ve also been tapped for a feature on producer/DJ Datsik‘s new EP’s title track “Darkstar,”  showcasing Georgia’s gorgeous vocals and Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker’s insane skills.

LIINKS recently signed to Universal Music Publishing Group and are currently working with/ mentored by legendary producer Bob Ezrin (Pink Floyd, Kiss, Hollywood Vampires).

All Access is proud today to premiere their brand new sultry video for “This Feeling”:

Learn more about LIINKS in the following All Access interview:

Thanks for your time today! So, how’s 2016 been treating you two so far?

You’re so welcome and thank you. 2016 so far has been emotional but great. We moved to LA so that was a big change. Creatively it’s been awesome. Lots of writing and recording and getting used to our new surroundings. 

Can you talk about LIINKS was first formed? Where do you two meet? How did you come up with your band name? What other names were you considering?

We met at Lucky Bar – our favourite live music venue in our home town of Victoria, BC and we formed LIINKS in mid 2014 – just over 2 years ago. We were on the top of Mt Stevens glacier which is located just off of northern Vancouver Island. We were looking out over the Broughton Archipelago (the little islands that make up the mainland) and decided we should start a duo. We’d already worked together on different projects but wanted to commit to something unified and personal so we could express ourselves equally. 

And about our name, LIINKS was the only name that we considered and the only name that made any sense. It represents the strength of our partnership. Side note: DWhiz designed our logo and has also done all our single artwork. 

Let’s talk about your newest single, “This Feeling.” Where did the inspiration for it come from?

The inspiration came from trying to hold on to the highs of our lives which are so up and down. For us, those highs can come from writing, performing, intimacy or smoking weed….traveling or coming home and it’s just about never wanting to come down from those moments. 

Can you talk about working on Datsik’s new EP’s title track, “Darkstar”? What was it like working him and Travis Barker?

Doing the song with Datsik and Travis Barker was really rad. We love how heavy and intense Datsik’s production is but it’s mixed with these soft, beautiful moments that gave us a place to fit into on the track. DWhiz produced my vocals and we both co wrote my lyrics and we were happy that Datsik and Travis liked our addition to the song and ended up making it the title track on Datsik’s ep. 

What exactly happened with your song that a Korean artist stole and turned into a huge hit over there?

Haha – crazy right? We had a demo of a song we wrote that we had uploaded to an online streaming service but had never officially released. A few months later we got a random email from a Korean lawyer saying our song had been plagiarized and was currently #1 in South Korea. There was a link to a music video that already had a million plays and it was our exact song – only in Korean. You could actually play the two songs over top of each other they were so identical.

The song had been put out by Hyori Lee – who at the time was like the Madonna of K Pop and it had already been #1 for 3 weeks. Once the story got out – they pulled the song (not our decision – we wanted them to keep pushing it) and we actually ended up settling out of court. It was truly crazy but also kind of awesome. And their version was actually pretty deadly! They just should have run it by us first.

How do you think you’ve both grown as musicians since forming in 2014? What’s been the biggest surprise about being in this duo?

So much has changed since we started LIINKS. Our first single “The Break” ended up getting a lot of radio play in Canada which got us a publishing deal with Universal in LA. We’ve now been down here for a while writing and recording and have had access to incredible studios and met so many outstanding writers and musicians and it makes us really strive to up our game. Living in LA can be overwhelming at times but we’re just soaking in all the creativity and its humbling to be exposed to so much talent.

What artists have continued to inspire you both? Who else would you love to work with in the future?

So many great artists….damn. Portishead has been massively influential on both of us – Dummy is probably our #1 most played album. We both come from a hip hop background and came up on Tribe, The Roots, Outkast, Wu Tang, Jurassic 5, Pharcyde..to name a few. We’re both big Kanye and Sia fans and I’m particularly influenced by Amy Winehouse, Lauryn Hill, Eva Cassidy… also Pearl Jam (first tape I ever got was Vs. from my older brother) and Alanis Morissette. When DWhiz was a kid he was a hip hop head and DJ but also really into Metallica and Slayer. Production wise he sites Danger Mouse and RZA as his biggest influences….there are so many wicked artists that have had a major impact on our lives and creativity – I could go on and on. 

Where are some of your upcoming gigs? What have been a few of your favorite shows in the past? What really makes a perfect performance?

Right now we’re focusing on finishing writing and recording our album and we’ll be back to playing shows once the music is good to go. We’ve played a couple private gigs in LA since we’ve been here – one actually for Eric Garcetti, the mayor – he told us he’s a jazz musician and writes his own tunes – he was really nice. We recently played Rifflandia Festival in Victoria and had custom visuals by Emp Interactions projected onto three layers of super thin, see-through material that created 3D holograph images that surrounded us on stage. It was so rad and the response was so positive. We’re excited to develop that concept further and bring it to our new show.

Georgia, you’ve done a little acting in the past. Would you like to do more?

(Laughter) Well, it was more singing/acting….I’m definitely all about the music. It would be fun to get more into acting but it’s just not a focus for me creatively right now. 

At the end of the day, what do you hope is the message of your music? What do you hope listeners take away from your songs?

We try to take a balanced approach to our music and our message. One song might have a lighter subject matter while another might contain darker content. All in all we want to uplift and connect with people through our music. We have strong ideas and values and we inject that into our music and always try to make art that is a true representation of our lives and experiences. Some songs are like rays of hope and others are more like cautionary tales. Ultimately we’re trying to be ourselves and have fun.  

Is there anything else that you would like to share with our readers about yourselves or your music?

We shot, edited and direct the video for “This Feeling” ourselves. It’s the first video we’ve ever made and it was just the two of us organically filming at our studio in Victoria and at the Santa Monica Pier. The inspiration for the video came when we found an old vintage projector in the crawl space at DWhiz’s parents place. Along with the projector (that used to be DWhiz’s grandma’s) were some old slides from the 60’s and they felt very nostalgic. We thought the vibe really suited “This Feeling” so we started filming all the slide shots and you can’t see it in the video but our french bulldog Artie was ripping around the room underneath me the whole time. Anyways, it was cool how it all came together and we’re excited for people to see it. 

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