Good Kid formed in 2015 after meeting at the University of Toronto. Jacob, alongside David Wood (guitar) – who's also chatting with Dork today – met Nick Frosst (vocals), Michael Kozakov (bass), and Jon Kereliuk (drums), after bonding over their shared love of computers, video games, and of course, music. Soon after forming, they released their debut single 'Nomu'. In the 10-plus years since they've released a series of EPs (the Good Kid series), with each delving into the indie influences that initially bonded them.

But what sets Good Kid apart is how they refuse to be anything but themselves. They unabashedly embrace everything from their J-rock influences, anime, indie and technology, all coalescing to make something downright striking.

Getting to being this ambitiously charged hasn't been easy, especially when entering an industry that is adverse to the modern way of doing things. "Even when we were having success, at one point we had 100,000 listeners on Spotify, and no one was giving us the time of day. We couldn't even get a booking agent to look at us," Jacob says. Such is the Good Kid way, they eventually found a booking agent for podcasters and YouTubers who was up for it.

"It's been a bit of a fight," David admits. "We weren't the 'hit the road' kind of band. We had to carve our own path, and every step of the way, we kept being told by people who are really deep in the industry, that's just not how it works, it's not gonna amount to anything.

"It's not that we thought they were wrong," he adds. "It was out of necessity. We couldn't do those things, so it's our own narrative."

Good Kid instead leaned into what they knew. Quickly starting up a Discord, this became the de facto home for their burgeoning fanbase. "The thing for us is the irony. Now, every band has a Discord, but no one had one when we started out," Jacob laughs.

"And the same thing with streaming. We stream as a band, and that's led to a lot of really cool opportunities, and now I'm seeing more and more artists do it, and I think it's great. But these are the things that we did because we had to find other ways of engaging with our communities."

The next logical step wasn't touring more, or chasing a label – it was a doubling down to see how far they could take Good Kid.

'Can We Hang Out Sometime?' is the result of ten years of graft and building a foundation that makes them ripe to take that coveted top spot, but the idea of even doing an album was one they chewed on. Good Kid weren't even sure if they wanted to enter the fray of being an album's band.

"We all have favourite albums that we listen to obsessively, but we were at a crossroads. We were thinking, do we just keep doing EPs and singles and whatever we want, whenever we want?" explains Jacob. "Or do we try to do a more ambitious thing? And what it really came down to is we were looking to expand our sound and to grow as musicians."

They recorded their debut in LA while the wildfires of 2025 tore through the city. It was also the first time they shelled out for proper studio time, and suddenly, time meant money. This, alongside the brutal reality outside, created a sense of fraughtness amongst the post-00s indie buoyancy. "It created an unintentional thesis, if that makes sense; it tied it all together," David says.

The other, more intentional supposition relates to the title: it's an invitation to the people they miss hanging out with. We've all become victims of life barrelling on as people get busier and busier, and reminiscing back to those days before things became so busy is what 'Can We Hang Out Sometime?' is all about.

"I like to frame it as we try to capture that nostalgic feeling of when times were simpler, and you were hanging out with your friends all the time," Jacob explains. "As you get older, that becomes less and less of a reality for people. But I think when you're younger, and you're in that mindset, you go through this range of emotions constantly, you're getting into fights with your friends, and then you're making up literally the next day – it's all over the place. But those are the times I think so many people cherish."

If 'Can We Hang Out Sometime?' wrestles with change, that's because Good Kid do too. "Our singer Nick hates change," Jacob laughs. "He's a guy who goes to the same pub every Sunday, plays music and hangs with the same people, has band practice every Tuesday and Thursday."

As for the rest of the band: "Jacob is the punches I roll with," David laughs.

"I was about to say that I grew up in a very chaotic environment, but we kind of all did," Jacob chimes in. "It's funny, different people take those experiences and react to them. I think the lesson I took from those things was that everything's gonna fall apart at any given time, and you have to learn how to roll with it. I used to have a band in high school called Rolling With The Punches, actually!"

"A part of being in this band is that usually when you let people roll with their ideas, a good thing will happen," David adds. "Nine times out of ten, things end up going great. Even though in the moment, if you feel uncomfortable or you're not sure how something's going to play out."

In particular, David recalls a time when Jacob said he was going to go on stage dressed as Vocaloid software mascot, Hatsune Miku. "You're like, I don't know, maybe that'll work, maybe it won't, and then it totally works. You just have to accept that other people's ideas are good."

It's hard to argue that whatever alchemy exists between the five of them isn't working. Each new undertaking carries them further towards that goal of theirs. Recently, an idea turned reality was the launch of the single, 'East Side'. A performance live-streamed from a boxing ring to reflect the aggressive nature of the track, "That was great, and it led to us getting on the front page of Twitch, which was amazing." Jacob says. "I saw just today that there were 200,000 people who watched that, and all that came again organically from us. We weren't sitting there being like, 'Okay, how do we get on the front page of Twitch?' It was us following our artistic and creative ideas."

While their debut has only just managed to surface, they're more than ready to seize the future now. And it's all based around the same DIY, knuckling down approach they've had since 2015. "I'm a firm believer that if you are consistent, you work hard, and you don't hold yourself back, good things will happen," Jacob says. "That's my motto these days, and I think in general, it's been working out pretty good." They could well be the next stadium-filling indie band, and as David acknowledges, "It's scary to think what it takes to get there, because it's a lot of work, it's a lot of skill. It's a lot of time, but I don't see why it couldn't be us."

Good Kid's album 'Can We Hang Out Sometime?' is out 3rd April.