Banji would like to be a little more carefree. They’re working on it.
The Utrecht four-piece weave indie, funk, hip-hop and R&B into soulful grooves, fresh production and a pop sensibility that holds it all together. Still playful and colourful, but now with a little more life experience and a tendency to go over everything one more time.
Their debut ‘Freshcakes’ took Banji onto the airwaves, into sold-out headline shows and to festivals like Down The Rabbit Hole and Into The Great Wide Open. UK club tours, shows with Son Mieux and DI-RECT, and a European tour with De Staat followed. Plenty to think about on the road, but fewer answers than they’d hoped for. About success. About direction. About when you’re allowed to feel satisfied.
And then things went quiet.
Not because Banji were done, but because there was plenty to work through.
For three years, songs disappeared into project files, ideas changed shape, and something new slowly took form between deadlines, dishes, bills, bad nights, crowded trains and half-empty coffee cups.
That became CAREFREE: a record produced entirely by the band, bringing Banji closer to who they are. It moves between organic indie, funk and alternative pop, with hip-hop, R&B and soul woven through. Mixed by Thijs van der Klugt, whose work includes Son Mieux, Sef and Sue the Night, it sounds more direct and organic than ever.
CAREFREE unfolds in three chapters. It starts with feeling stuck, doubt and the urge to move forward; moves through a reckoning with old patterns and expectations; and ends with slowly letting go of the need to understand everything.
Because maybe you don’t always have to know where you’re headed.
Banji are back. A little more grown-up, a little wiser, and maybe even a little CAREFREE.