Match Made for Success

Over the past year, Gypsy Kids has gone from a garage band to venue entertainment, and in February, they released their first professionally produced single.

The Gypsy Kids, a band consisting of Jack Lambert (guitar), Carson Petocz (lead singer), Elik Jazdzewski (bass) and Jordan O’Connell (drums), formed in the fall of 2018. Lambert and Petocz were introduced by a mutual friend at a musical audition. After Lambert was interviewed by Petocz and his bandmate, Jazdzewski, the connection was immediate, according to Lambert. The three eventually met O’Connell through an advertisement the band posted saying that they were looking for a drummer.

“Everything just kind of fell in place as time went on,” Lambert said. “I met Carson and we started talking about music and he showed me his song ‘Serenity’ on Soundcloud, and I was like ‘dang I need to work with this dude.’ ”

As the band continued its journey at the time, their song “Match Made in Custody” was in its infancy. The song was written by Petocz and began as a riff, which he added the lyrics to later. After Petocz introduced the song to the band, everyone then added their own touches to it, according to Lambert. 

“I was in my car after playing the riff to it all day,” Petocz said. “This girl had texted me and I was just so done with it, so I started singing about how I felt trapped. I drove for two hours and had it done. I never wrote it down until later when we went to the studio, but I just knew it and played it.”

Since the song’s introduction to the public, the band has been playing at local coffee shops and planning future events to continue its journey. Because of the workload that goes into making sure the band is successful, Lambert said that they had the opportunity to spend a lot of time with each other.

“It’s kinda cliché, but I’d say we’re a family,” Lambert said. “There’s a lot of creative freedom in our band, and that leaves a lot of things up for discussion – it’s not just Carson running the show, we’re all cogs in one big machine. Because of this, we can get into arguments sometimes, but at the end of the day, we’re still family.”

The band, who has upcoming concerts planned in the Austin area, is ready to play at more venues “like crazy,” according to their website.

Aside from playing more gigs, Lambert said that the band plans on continuing to make music that makes people feel different emotions.

“Our goal for Gypsy Kids is simply to make a living doing what we love, to get sponsored by Altoids, and to make good music,” Lambert said. “I’d say my personal goal for the band is to make music that makes people feel things. I want people to be able to relate to the music, for the song to really mean something, to strike a chord. For people to find solace, happiness and energy in our music. Music helped me get through some pretty tough times in my life, so I’m going to make music that helps people the same way those songs have helped me.”

Their next performance is on May 18 at Black Sugar Caffé from 6:30-8:30 p.m. Their upcoming performances are free and can be found on the Gypsy Kids’ website.