Gallo Records new rising star with debut hits "Go Under" and "Fall Again." 

It was during his formative teenage years that London based singer songwriter Josh Wantie [pronounced ‘Von-Tee’], real name (Joshua Wantenaar) tapped into his love of guitar playing and lyric writing, fuelling his passion for making his own music. However it was only later in life, after discovering that he was unfulfilled in his chosen career path of fitness that Josh set his sights on music as a livelihood.

 

Josh’s ever-evolving live set-up is simplistic but profound as he swaps between bass, synth and guitar while blending in electronic elements and vocal loops. Influenced by several types of genre, Sia, Lorde, Ben Howard, James Blake and Flume are all among the artists that he draws inspiration from, lending a mellower, broodier sound to his work than that of stereotypical pop.

 

Signing to Gallo in 2015, Josh finally achieved a professional milestone he’d been chasing for so long with his blend of indie, electro and synth-rooted melodies. With the backing of his label, he was afforded the opportunity to travel to Cape Town to record at Heritage Sound Studio under the trusted ear Brendyn 'Rusti' Rossouw and alongside fellow Durbanites Brad and Josh Klynsmith from Gangs Of Ballet.

 

“I want to be successful enough to feed my family one day but I won’t measure my success as an artist by how much money I make, but rather that I wrote songs I believe in and were true to who I am,” he confesses and it’s this struggle of realization, which lends a deeply personal air to his craft, that makes him universally relatable.

Stuart Baylis is following