NEARLY two decades after the release of one of Australia’s most recognised hip hop anthems The Festival Song, the story of Pez and 360 still feels equal parts unlikely and inevitable.
Long before platinum records, festival stages and chart success, Perry Chapman and Matthew Colwell were simply two teenagers from Melbourne chasing the same dream on the basketball court.
Music, at first, was just something they bonded over between training sessions and road trips.
Back then, both believed their futures would be in professional sport. But injuries changed everything.
The pair threw themselves into music completely, writing constantly and spending endless hours refining verses and developing their craft.
“Everyone thought we were crazy,” Pez said.
“We were telling people we were going to be rappers. It wasn’t really a thing you could do here back then.”
Then came The Festival Song.
Originally written by Chapman as a laid-back track with little expectation attached to it, the song quickly found an audience.
When 360 added his now-iconic verse, the song exploded beyond anything either of them anticipated.
The Festival Song became more than a hit, it became an anthem for a generation and a defining moment in Australian hip hop.
Success continued, with tracks including Boys Like You, Price of Fame, Live It Up and later Weekend, cementing both artists as key figures in the evolution of the local music scene.
For Chapman, success coincided with a diagnosis of Graves’ disease.
“It was a shock,” he said. “You’re experiencing the biggest highs of your life, but at the same time dealing with something genuinely scary.
“It probably saved me in a way because I would’ve kept going down that path otherwise.”
For Colwell, the demands of touring and recording fed a growing reliance on substances, something he said became tied to both creativity and escape.
“I was in the studio every day, but I was depending on it to feel creative. It just became a cycle,” he said.
“My life had been this rollercoaster – addiction, mental health struggles, all of it.”
Over time, both artists stepped away, recalibrated and slowly rebuilt their lives away from the spotlight.
Despite the highs, lows and long periods apart creatively, one thing has remained unchanged: their friendship.
“It’s just genuine friendship,” Pez said. “There’s no agenda.
As the pair prepare to reunite on stage for their Back N Forth Tour, there is a sense of symmetry in where life has brought them.
Two friends who began chasing one dream together, found success in another, lost themselves along the way, and ultimately returned with a clearer understanding of what matters most.
“We’ve both gone through our own journeys,” Colwell said.
“It’s not about proving anything anymore.
“It’s about connection – with the music, with the crowd, with each other.”
360 and Pez’s Back N Forth Tour will play the Racehorse Hotel on Thursday, June 4, with tickets available through Oztix.
