Today on Monday Live: Mathew Rudd and Alex Searle!

Today on Monday Live, we had two local musicians perform for a full hour on the Morning Cruise. Their style is best described as a fusion of African soul, folk, rock, and more. To them, genre boundaries are restricting, and cannot affect them. They performed a myriad of songs for us, utilizing a couple of different styles and instruments. We talked to the musicians about their inspirations and origins. They had a very unusual origin story: When Mathew moved to Cape Town, he was all alone, so he began looking for a band to join. While searching on Gumtree, he found Alex! That is how they met and began making music together.

About the Musicians

Matthew Rudd is a Cape Town based Singer, Song-writer and Session Guitarist. Performing live since the age of 17, he is no stranger to the world of music and entertainment. Matthew began playing the guitar at the age of 9 and hasn't stopped yet. Thanks to some talent, and a fair amount of luck, the guitar gifted Matthew the privilege of performing alongside a few of South Africa's finest musicians, namely: Jethro Butow, Francois Van Coke, Aston Creed and Vusi Mahlasela. Matthew is currently recording his first album and manages the booking of artists for events held around Cape Town under the Matt Rudd Music banner.

Alex Searle is a songwriter, singer, bass player, filmmaker, business owner, father and occasional human being based in Cape Town, South Africa. He was born to musician parents who took him around the world in their travels, living in the Middle East and Spain for a big part of his childhood. After finishing school, he played in the family band in Abu Dhabi for 8 months before starting a degree in English and Journalism at UCT. He met Matthew Rudd along the way and they've been playing together for the last 3 years. In 2015 he shot a Youtube-style solo documentary film on the culture of music in Vietnam, called South by South East. It also chronicled the journey of becoming a father during his travels with his future wife, Tiffany. It was his first film and has since been screened in both Cape Town and Hanoi, Vietnam. It is currently in the running for a number of festivals internationally. Since then, Alex has started writing music for films, become a father to a gorgeous boy named Lake and launched a video production company. He and Matthew are currently writing some new material for their debut album. VIDEO TO COME