Basson Laubscher and The Violent Free Peace 'blues-rock' the stage.

Basson Laubscher and The Violent Free Peace ‘blues-rock’ the stage. Image: Supplied

The vinyl frontier: Basson Laubscher to break blues barriers with ‘Testify’

The South African chatted to ‘that guy with the mad guitar skills’ Basson Laubscher ahead of the long-awaited vinyl launch of his debut album, ‘Testify’.

Basson Laubscher and The Violent Free Peace 'blues-rock' the stage.

Basson Laubscher and The Violent Free Peace ‘blues-rock’ the stage. Image: Supplied

Stellenbosch-based musician Basson Laubscher and The Violent Free Peace promise to stand and deliver on an “extravaganza” of foot-stomping blues-rock boogie when they hit the stage again at the Hillcrest Quarry on Sunday 8 November.

Laubscher released a limited-edition vinyl of his 2018 debut album, Testify, in March this year, but due to the current pandemic he not only had to cut their maiden European tour short, but also had to delay the launch of the vinyl.

Lockdown blues brings new perspective

“The lockdown has definitely given us all a case of the blues, but the inspiration has been to stay positive and to try move forward by truly connecting with the passion that made me pick up a guitar in the first place,” said Laubscher, who is often referred to as “that guy with the mad guitar skills”.

“Lockdown has in a way, re-ignited the flame and let out the teenager (who played air guitar in his bedroom) in me by looking at music with a new perspective.”

basson Laubscher

Basson Laubscher takes ‘the byte’ out of blues and goes vinyl

And there is of course nothing like vinyl when it comes to high-quality sound for the ultimate blues-rock experience, said Basson about the motivation for vinyl.

“When it comes to music and your favourite musicians, you obviously want to listen to it at home, but you also want it to sound just as good as it would live. Which is why we made these limited-edition vinyls for the ‘Testify’ album.

“There are so many intricacies on the Testify album that can only really be heard and appreciated on vinyl, as a record is such high quality and no audio data is lost. So when making these vinyls we really didn’t hold back and we went for the highest quality that Roasting Records had to offer,” Basson said.

Raw blues-rock power and passion

Laubscher entered the local music scene as a member of the popular band Zinkplaat and he has also played alongside Valiant Swart, Ann Jangle and the Blues Broers.

He released his debut EP, Shakedown, in 2014, followed by Testify in 2018. And the raw power and passion of his brand of blues-rock has been met with all-round rave reviews.

Basson Laubscher and The Violent Free Peace has given a new lick of paint to dirty rock ‘n roll and brought sexy back with their new album, ‘Testify’. By using darkly ornate, literary-minded, self-consciously verbose blues rock ‘n roll they have exceeded expectations with this bad boy.

They released their debut EP, Shakedown, in March 2014, and it was an incredible release. I would compare their music to that moment when I first added a Mentos to a two-litre Coke: Mind-blowing.

Melanie Holder (The Flow)

Go and ‘Testify’

Laubscher’s big-band backup for the evening consists of Mr Fingers (keyboard), Riaan Nieuwenhuis (Delta Blue) and Mr Smooth on the second guitar, CJ Bergh (The Bakers, Scare Quotes) with the veteran angelic backup voices of Lise Swart (Anton Goosen) and Mabet van Wyk (Cut Glass).

 Doors open at 15:30 at the Hillcrest Quarry, in Durbanville, and tickets are available at Quicket