Bad Peter @ St Francis Brewery

ABOUT

BAD PETER is a folk rock duo made up of PG Badenhorst and Alwyn Bekker.

Both members picked up guitars for the first time in high school and like so many others started jamming riffs by Metallica, Blink etc. but this soon developed into a preference for acoustic guitar playing. To start off with, the motivation was purely to have fun, they never thought about making music for a living! PG says:

“Alwyn is quite the genius, playing drums and violin in high school but when he got to guitar; that was it! PG picked up a few chords and started entertaining friends every once in a while…”

The two first met at a performing arts company, and even though their musical partnership didn’t start immediately, it wasn’t long before BAD PETER was born. Alwyn first went to work in Thailand for 9 months, playing shows weekly with PG doing the exact same thing in South Africa. Upon Alwyn’s return the two realised that together they could create something special. 

They say: “We really wanted to pick a name that has a meaning for the both of us.” So they played around with various combinations of song lyrics, where they’d lived and their names and surnames… They eventually stumbled upon Bad Peter by using PG's surname which is (Bad)enhorst and Alwyn's middle name, Petrus(Peter). 

From playing mostly covers to gradually building a repertoire of original music together and gigging more and more, BAD PETER was soon travelling the country and winning fans on a daily basis. They were never going to go unnoticed for long, so when they signed a worldwide record and publishing deal with The David Gresham Record Company in November 2014, they were the only ones who were surprised.

BAD PETER released their highly anticipated debut single ‘Month of May’ in April 2015 and within 24 hours secured themselves a Top 30 single on the iTunes Chart in South Africa. Their 5-track EP, LET GO, was released in November 2015 and reached the Top 20 on the iTunes chart in South Africa. The duo found inspiration for their debut offering in day-to-day struggles and experiences and the influences of Country, Folk and Blues are evident in tracks like ‘Month of May’ and ‘On This River’ other tracks like ‘Brother’ explores African guitar sounds combined with melodic rapping and a theme of living together in this beautiful diverse country of ours. Their third single ‘Faithful Lover’ is a song about a one night stand, disguised as a love song! As a live act they quickly became in demand and gigged relentlessly, playing at major festivals in South Africa.

“We don't like to limit ourselves to a specific genre. Being singer-songwriters gives us that freedom” says PG. “You'll hear country, Latin, blues, African, pop and reggae sounds in our songs. We prefer writing songs that can make people dance, groove and feel good!”

BAD PETER is an energetic band that really has a passion for jamming, performing and making music live! They often tell one another if neither one of their guitars break during this performance they're not giving it their all. This might sound like a strange thing to hear from guys playing acoustic but they love putting all their energy into performing, and that’s what makes them such a joy to watch.

According to the band, “It's been the raddest, funnest 2 years of our lives and we couldn't be happier. A thought that really blows our minds is that we've just started and we have no idea and can't wait to see what

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