UNIVERSITY CHALLENGED

UNIVERSITY CHALLENGED are Ajay Saggar (“Bhajan Bhoy”), Oli Heffernan (“Ivan The Tolerable”) and Kohhei Matsuda (“Bo Ningen”). The trio began in 2019, playing shows in Holland, where they gained a reputation for delivering highly dynamic sense-rattling shows, ranging from gentle melodic orchestral spinouts to epic power jams. They released a majestic 8 track double album “Oh Temple!” in January 2021 on the UK label Hive Mind Records, which garnered international praise and sold out in no time. It also led to Le Guess Who? festival inviting the group to come and play at their prestigious festival in November. The band will play this exclusive Amsterdam show in the run-up to Le Guess Who? festival. Not to be missed!

"This is my favourite album of the year. Epic". (Thurston Moore)

"The late great Andrew Weatherall would have been all over this on his legendary "Music Is Not For Everyone" shows on NTS Radio and you don't get a bigger compliment than that" (Truth & Lies) 

"Wonderfully tense, cerebral stuff" (Electronic Sound) 

"top quality and depth all the way; expect to see this opus reach the choice end-of-year features" (Monolith Cocktail) 

There's a commonality in the artists' approach to music and they take inspiration from a wide variety of styles and genres - kosmische musik, electronic experimentation, modern classical, pastoral guitar soli, and more. If specific reference points were needed then you could do worse than mentioning Amon Düül, Popol Vuh, John Martyn, Aerial M, Thirteenth Floor Elevators, Haruomi Hosoni and The Incredible String Band. But beyond the comparisons, UNIVERSITY CHALLENGED have created and settled into a musical space all of their own.