Goofy Geese on stage at Trondheim Calling on January 31, 2026. (Photo: Thea Arnesdotter Lien)
Indie-pop-bossa duo Goofy Geese delivered a phenomenal concert at Trondheim Calling, and in June they will release a new album. We had a chat that included the flute sounds of the mellotron, Roland Space Echo, artificial intelligence, and soft alternatives to dominant chords.
/ 11/02/2026 / Willy Martinsen(You can find the music of Goofy Geese on all services, for example Qobuz, Apple Music og Tidal. We still link to their songs on Spotify, as it is the most used service as of 2026.)
Indie-pop-bossa duo Goofy Geese were one of many highlights at the music industry festival Trondheim Calling in January. In front of a packed Byscenen, surrounded by a bunch of talented musicians, Kaja Malena Håvik and Mats Jøger (TONO members since 2018) offered soft, funky and organic tones, and a large portion of musical charm.
– Who and what is Goofy Geese?
Kaja: Mats and I met at the music therapy study in Bergen in 2020 and quickly realized that we had to create music together, especially after we discovered our shared love for bossa nova.
Mats: At the time, Goofy Geese was a solo project where I had released a few bedroom pop songs on my own. That changed when Kaja showed me her bossa song Yellow Flower, and we decided to produce it together. The one song quickly turned into several, and what was first intended as a small collaboration developed into a permanent project. Kaja became part of Goofy Geese, and the project took on a new lease of life as a duo. Since then, we have gathered top-notch people and formed a band consisting of good friends who love playing together. Goofy Geese is currently a happy mix of Bergen residents, Oslo residents and one real Siddi.
– Goofy Geese appears as a solid musical concept. You must have been aware of this, because such things rarely happen by themselves?
Mats: It's nice to hear that it's experienced that way! For us, it feels quite intuitive. We try to follow what comes naturally to us in the moment, both in songwriting and production. Sometimes it can feel a little fragmented along the way, but we notice that we share a love for a certain mood and expression, which possibly gives the music a direction. At the same time, we have to give a lot of credit to our producer, Vetle Junker, who has a unique ability to make things connect and highlight the wholeness of the project.
– What kind of music inspires you?
Mats: We draw inspiration from many places. I'm probably an indie guy at heart, and I'm particularly inspired by artists like Loving, Sam Evian, Kate Bollinger, Pokey LaFarge and Mathieu Boogaerts. At the same time, newer instrumental music means a lot to our expression, with artists like The Sweet Enoughs and Molly Lewis. And then of course there's a whole ocean of inspiration in bossa nova and other older music, which has shaped a lot of how we think about melody, rhythm and mood.
Kaja: I listen almost exclusively to two artists at the moment, Bala Desejo and Zé Ibarra. Timeless and authentic Brazilian music. Otherwise I really like MICHELLE, Jessica Pratt, Papooz and Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass (haha) to name a few I draw inspiration from. Good mix!
Both: It's also important to mention all the friends and musicians around us in Norway. There's an incredible amount of great stuff happening on the Norwegian music scene, and that's often where we find the most immediate inspiration.
– What is the path from the first idea for a new song until it is finally recorded?
Mats: Sometimes one of us comes up with an almost finished song, other times it starts with a small idea, a chord progression, a lyric line or a melody, which we develop further together. The end result is always a mix of both of us. We often do a lot of the production ourselves at the beginning, so we can explore and shape the song ourselves. When we feel something starting to fall into place, we take it to Vetle Junker, who elevates the music with cleverness and magic.
Kaja: We each have our own strengths that help a lot in our collaboration. We play well off each other.
– Which of your own songs are you most proud of, or which song is most typical of what you want to be musically?
Kaja: Station REM, maybe? Production-wise, it is one of the strongest.
Mats: It's incredibly hard to say. When we've been working on a song, recorded it and it's all finished and released, we tend to be pretty tired of it. Our ears need to rest a bit, at least for a while. So right now we're probably most proud of some of the songs that will be on the new album in June.
Watch Goofy Geese perform Bam Bam from the NRK stage here (The story continues below the video):
– Do you have a favorite instrument, favorite microphone or anything else that helps shape the Goofy Geese sound?
Kaja: Mats is the gear nerd here.
Mats: Again, a very difficult question. What is an instrument without a friend? But considering the "Goofy" sound, there is a lot of the classic flute sound on it. Mellotron which is used to fill the substrate. The Space Echo to Vetle is also frequently used.
Favorite chord, or favorite chord progression – and why?
Kaja: I don't know if it's a favorite chord or not, but we have a recurring chord that we just call the Goofy chord now, haha.
Mats: Well. I really like major chords, maybe major or sixth, with the second in bass. It works like a dominant, without being too dominant, it's softer in a way. It also has the fun feature that it fits almost no matter "where and when" you play it. But maybe we need to take a little break from overusing it too? We'll see.
– We in the editorial team believe that there can never be enough of these chords. If you could choose any artist in the world to cover one of your songs, which song and who?
Kaja: Can I say anyone? Bee Gees. I can hear Barry Gibb's iconic falsetto on one of the upcoming singles, which is called Zoe. Or if I'm going to think about current events; maybe Sabrina Carpenter could cover Picking Petals?
Mats: The first thing that comes to mind is to choose Mother, and it would have been a great honor to hear Konradsen interpret it. There's something about their very close and honest expression that always captures me. Jenny Marie Sabel has an absolutely beautiful, motherly voice that I think could have given the song a beautiful dimension. I think they could have brought out another vulnerability in the song, which it could have dressed.
– What has been the highlight of Goofy Geese so far? And is there anything you are specifically looking forward to now?
Both: The preliminary highlight is probably that we got to perform on the NRK stage, which was released in January 2025. Next on the list is the release of our second album, which we are very excited to get out into the world. We develop a little bit with each project, and this album has a slightly wider genre range than our previous projects. We are looking forward to showing that we can do more than just bossa nova.
– Last but not least, the hot potato: Attitude towards artificial intelligence. Do you use it in any way, or do you steer clear of it completely?
Kaja: We're a little dizzy from the whole AI hysteria. It's scary how big a place it has already taken in the music world. Creating music takes an extremely large amount of time, energy and money, compared to AI music that is generated in the blink of an eye for almost free. It feels like an easy and cheap way out, often with great gains, which is simply incredibly unfair to musicians who work their asses off.
Mats: That said, there are quite a few plugins in the production world that are powered by some type of artificial intelligence, so in that sense we use AI as a tool in a way.
Kaja: The scary thing is that it's almost impossible to escape AI too? Hopefully, AI-generated music is a passing trend, but it looks dark for now. We hope people start to yearn for the human-made and genuine again. We consider ourselves steady enough songwriters and musicians not to have to resort to AI in our music.
