Mason & Julez just released their newest single “Passion,” and we can’t stop listening!
Hailing from Melbourne, Australia, the brother duo pride themselves in being musicians, encompassing everything from singing to songwriting to producing.
With Mason being 17 years old and Julez being 15 years old, the two conjoin forces to create the most heartfelt music possible, as they continue to gain fans on the daily.
With Mason handling more of the vocals, and Julez being more of the wordplay expert, the duo are excited as ever to be living in sunny Los Angeles. First exploding onto the scene from posting covers on Youtube to doing pop-up performances at their high school, both teenagers prove they’re far more than just TikTokers, they’re recording artists in their own right.
“Passion” serves as one of the singles from the boys’ forthcoming album titled Going on 21, in which they wrote and produced each record.
AllHipHop: Being from Melbourne, Australia, what was that like growing up?
Mason: Very different to the US. Very different from LA.
Julez: Very different, it’s cool.
Mason: We drive on the different side of the road. It has a lot of differences. LA’s very big compared to what we’re used to.
AllHipHop: You guys came to LA for music. How long have you been here?
Mason: Couple of years now, probably 2.5 maybe. We were going back and forth before that, but start of the pandemic officially.
AllHipHop: Talk about who your biggest influences were. What made you guys fall in love with music?
Mason: We’re always listening to a different variety of music. I like people from Kanye to Jay-Z and Lil Wayne. I like Musiq Soulchild. I like John Mayer and Ed Sheeran, people like that too. It’s a bunch of different people.
Julez: I like Lil Wayne, Drake, Jay Z, and Eminem.
AllHipHop: When did you realize you could do music for a living?
Mason: My brother had played the guitar. We were in Australia and he taught me when I was young, when I was only 10. He taught me to play the guitar and I started to sing a little bit more. It was nothing serious, I was just singing for fun for the family, because we’re the two youngest of 5 kids.
Julez: We were always dancing around. We always wanted to be the center of attention so we were always putting on a show: singing, dancing around, doing whatever. It just became a thing that we’d do every so often. I started doing videos and singing covers of people’s songs. We’d post them to show our family and friends, then a couple of them started going off. We’re like “Alright, let’s keep doing this.” Eventually, it just progressed.
AllHipHop: What was the first cover that went viral?
Mason: There was one that I did ages ago, a song called “18” by Ed Sheeran. Actually, one time we were busking. We went around Europe. We went to Ireland and were asking around the streets with one of our friends Allie Sherlock. We didn’t even realize, but someone filmed it from the crowd and must’ve sent it in. It ended up getting on this page, a vocal page, for 11, 12 million views. That was our first big hit on there. We’re like “Oh my God, how the hell is that…?” [laughs]
Julez: I didn’t even know who took the video.
AllHipHop: What’d you guys do after that?
Mason: Well in the meantime, we were writing songs and just learning more. But after that, we were so motivated like let’s keep going. Let’s write more music, let’s work with different people. That’s what really kicked us off to be like alright, let’s do this for real.
AllHipHop: You guys are only 15 and 17. Are you guys still in school?
Both: Yeah.
Julez: We’re just doing it online.
Mason: After Covid and all that, we’re doing it online. Before that, we were in high school. I did a little bit over here just before, but it was cool. I like school.
AllHipHop: Talk about your presence on TikTok. How did that happen?
Mason: Good question. [laughs] I have no idea. I just posted a bunch of random videos and I’d put in some singing videos, a couple of them randomly popped off. I’d do random stuff and had fun posting the videos.One of them ended up getting 30 million views, another one of them got almost 40. Really random and weird.
Julez: Yeah. [laughs]
Mason: It’s hard to track down.
AllHipHop: Musically, what do each of you bring to the table?
Mason: I’m the better one, the pretty one. [laughs] I sing, he raps. I’m more the heartfelt one probably, and he’s more the player I’d say. When we’re creating music in the creative process, I’m more of the music man and he’s the word man. We do a bit of both.
Julez: We produced and wrote the whole album too.
Mason: Yeah, but it’s a bit of both for everything.
AllHipHop: “Passion” is your newest single, what inspired this record?
Mason: “Passion” came out a couple weeks ago for Valentine’s Day, it’s been great. We made that song about 6 months before that, so a little while. Usually when you play songs, you get used to it. After a while, you’re like “alright, I’m sick of hearing this song.” But it still feels fresh everytime I play it, so it’s a cool vibe.
Julez: It puts you in a cool vibe, a cool mood type thing. It’s relaxing. It was officially the Valentine’s Day single, so it’s a love song.
Mason: It’s a love song, love story kind of thing. Just setting the scene. I like the vibe of what’s going on in the moment and what’s going on around you.
AllHipHop: Did a certain female inspire it?
Mason: Yeah. I’m not gonna say who, [laughs] but yeah. It did come from experience. It was setting the scene and describing what it was feeling in that moment. Because sometimes when you write a song, people tend to jump straight to what’s happening, who you are, things like that. But no one discusses what’s happening right in that moment.
AllHipHop: What inspired the video? Where was that shot?
Both: That was shot in LA.
Mason: Me and Julez wrote the treatment for it. It’s on the reverse vibe, everything’s reversed in the video.
Julez: It’s a love story in reverse kind of.
Mason: It’s that theme because when I produced the song, I reversed a lot of the stuff. When you hear it, it has that vibe. Everything’s going backwards and it’s very spacy, so I wanted the video to reflect the same way. It’s a love story that’s in reverse, going backwards. You can see me driving the car in reverse, all things like that. I think it’s really cool. It came out really cool, overall a fun experience.
AllHipHop: What was the best memory?
Julez: The car was pretty fun, Mason was driving.
Mason: The car was really fun. I was driving, Julez was in the passenger seat. What was it? A Ford Mustang 1965. It was really cool.
Julez: It was just us two. Mason was pressing the gas and it was going fast. It was cool.
AllHipHop: You mentioned your forthcoming album, Going on 21. What’s the meaning in the title?
Mason: You can expect a lot of different things.
Julez: Different vibes of music.
Mason: This is our first time putting out a full body of work. It’s 13 songs, it’s almost like a playlist full of different vibes, songs, and different memories. It’s like a playlist and a journal in the same way. I don’t know if that makes sense or not, but that’s reflective on the writing and the music of it. Going on 21 is the way we are, we’re 15 and 17 out here in LA. It’s a pretty crazy life to live out in LA at such a young age. People are all around you and all these people are in music. You see celebrities walk by and all these other things. The way we do music and all the people around us, it’s almost we’re going on 21.
Julez: It was written in 2021 too, so it’s a bit of both.
AllHipHop: Talk about your new single coming called “Playlist.”
Mason: Yes. Before the album, we have a single called “Playlist” coming out on March 18th
Julez: Next Friday with the music video
Mason: With the music video we just shot last week, so we’ve got a lot of stuff cooking.
AllHipHop: What can we expect from the video?
Julez: A lot of good vibes, dancing. Infectious dancing.
Mason: [laughs] You’re going to start dancing if you hear it. It’s a cool vibe. We had a lot of fun making it, especially the video too. We had a lot of friends in it, so it was really cool.
AllHipHop: Writing and producing the project during the pandemic, Did that encourage you guys to lock in?
Both: Yeah!
Mason: That honestly was the best for us, making that album during that process it gave us a lot of time to lock it in and no distractions, things like that. We learned a lot through that too, then from other people we learned from them too. It’s a very different album to other things, especially cause it’s not all on one theme. It’s a bit in every kind of lane they have.
AllHipHop: 3 things you need in the studio to record at all times?
Mason: Food. [laughs] Maybe some nice lights, it’s a good atmosphere setting.
Yeah, some nice lights to give good vibes. Some of these were written not in the studio. It was one of them on the album that we wrote in the car, then when we got home we recorded the whole thing. Just put it down as soon as we could.
Julez: It doesn’t really matter where you are, as long as… we need the right vibe
Mason: You need energy, and you need food and water. That’s about it.
Julez: Your surroundings, good people around you, and that. I mean, you could do a song in a really fancy studio and it might not turn out as good as the one you did in the car. It’s all about the vibe and that.
AllHipHop: What do you guys like to do when you’re not doing music?
Julez: Music. [laughs] Basketball, go to the beach.
Mason: I like to play basketball, surf a little bit. See friends, family.
Julez: Footy, play some footy. That’s about it, then make music.
Mason: We do a lot of music. We do music every single day, make 2 to 3 songs a day. Especially over the last couple of years, I’ve looked on my computer and we’ve had 3 songs to last every single day for the last year.
Julez: Yeah, two years at least.
Mason: I didn’t realize it, it just happens.
AllHipHop: What artists do you listen to the most?
Mason: I love Musiq Soulchild, John Mayer, and Ed Sheeran. I have a bunch.
Julez: Lil Wayne, Beyonce, Jay Z, Rihanna.
Mason: Yeah Beyonce, I love Beyonce. A bunch of different singers.
Julez: A bunch of different varieties of different music. We listen to everything: Chainsmokers, DJs
Mason: Avicii. Just a bunch of different things really.
AllHipHop: Any goals for yourself at this point in your career?
Mason: I want to get a lot more music out, which especially helps with the album coming out. Go touring.
Julez: Go touring, yeah. Do some shows on the road. My ultimate goal is to sell out Madison Square Garden.
AllHipHop: Anything else you want to let the people know?
Julez: Stay ready for a lot more music!
Mason: Stay ready for a lot of music, yeah. The whole album’s coming out on April…
Julez: April 29thh, then “Playlist” next Friday and the music video. I also want to say thanks to all our fans, for the love on our recent single “Passion” and the video too. I’m excited!