Life as a musician: Edgy V and GG Carma
Regan Kelly
Being a musician has never been easy; it takes an unrivalled sense of dedication, passion, and often tenacity to see the fruit of your labour pay off.
It is sometimes a thankless and brutal task to try to get all your ducks in a row when it comes to promoting and getting your music out there.
Undeniably, it is now easier than ever to get your music heard. We have a plethora of apps and software at our fingertips that can help edit music and get it heard.
Picture this: it's 1995, you had to find a way to fund and record your own demo, possibly on an 8-track tape and send it to a record company or similar, just to be in with a chance.
Nowadays, one can just produce and edit a song or album at home; before you know it, your music can be on apps like Spotify.
This comes with its own challenges, though. We now compete against many others who can do this, while having to tackle all the tedious administrative tasks that musicians have to deal with.
Self-promotion, booking gigs, registering your music, and creating music videos. The list is endless.
It takes a special kind of dedication to remain passionate and creative while dealing with these extra stressors.
We spoke to two people who possess these traits in droves, twin duo Edgy V and GG Carma.
Both ladies moved to Ireland from Lithuania when they were 11, spending their teenage years in the Meath town of Athboy.
This was a huge move for the ladies, and though it was hard, they have fond memories of living there.
“We were so young at the time, and learning the English language was difficult.
“Our mom was a general nurse, and our dad was a lorry driver. So, that meant we couldn't get dropped to classes or extracurricular activities, and the music took a bit of a back seat for a while.
“During our teenage years, we started really connecting with music, sending songs between our friends back when you had to hold the phones together.”
Edgy continued: “It was different back then in regards to music, we used to burn CDs and be at parties where we would find out what everyone was listening to.
“As well as that time, we would go to junior discos, which would then transition into raves, and that was a huge explosion of understanding music and connection.”
They were keen entertainers from an early age, showing signs of being performers, singing on their karaoke machine and dancing on camera.
Edgy said: “Myself and GG were always kind of vibrant, energetic children; we always had a high energy about us, and our mom wanted to find a way to get this energy out.
“We started going to after-school classes, like dance or drama and we just loved it.
“We were like, this is our world, we are in our element, from then on we knew we were going to do something within entertainment.”
Their father sadly passed away 16 years ago, when they were just teenagers, but they have fond memories of their father nurturing their early talents in music.
“Our father was a lorry driver, and he would be gone for long journeys, but would come home for a couple of days, and he had a camera.
“He would tell us to sing a song and do a little dance, and when we look back on the footage, you can see other kids were shy in front of the camera, but we would be fighting for the microphone.”
When their father died, they really got serious about their careers in music, and both women say that their emotions regarding his death helped spur them on.
GG said, “When I look back and reflect, I think we really threw ourselves into music.
“It took a different turn, and we wanted to really express our emotions. There was a lot of grief coming up to the surface.”
Edgy added, “If you look back, when you are a teenager, you have a lot of big emotions, but you don't really know how to self-regulate properly, and I think for us music was always part of our lives.
“It was a tool to help us process our emotions, to help tap into what we were feeling and experiencing.
“Upon reflection, with how much time has gone by, I feel like this was our way of still staying connected to our dad, because we associate him with the filming, singing and dancing that he used to ask us to do.”
Edgy V and GG Carma have had a vibrant career so far, releasing multiple EPs and recording music videos.
They do all of this themselves, promoting their music and organising gigs, which they regularly perform.
This is no easy feat. On this, GG said: “When you get older, you have so many other responsibilities falling on top of you, but we always see music as something that brings us positive feelings in our lives.
“When we go on stage, there is so much positive energy within us, and when we get off stage, people in the audience tell us how excited they are to hear our music and cheer us on.
“That feeling lasts for weeks and weeks, and this helps us hone in on inspiration and keep us motivated.”
On the difficulties, Edgy said: “It does come with its own challenges, the promotional aspect and having a strategy in place.
“Both myself and GG have our own strengths and weaknesses to offer and bring to the table, so we kind of work for eachother, by saying, can you do this, etc.
“So we divide up the workload and have a plan in place, because if you have these things in place, it's more likely that we can keep going instead of procrastinating.”
GG added, “I think that administrative skills are one of the most valuable things to have as a musician.
“I know that a lot of musicians don't like to do it, and we don't like it either because we just want to focus on our creativity.
“A lot of people go into it with this notion that you just want to make music day in and day out.
“Unfortunately, that's not the reality, especially if you are independent. You just have to do the paperwork, and you just have to do the emails.”
Artists like Edgy and GG spend a significant part of their lives creating, putting their blood, sweat and tears into their art.
Like most creatives, the rise of AI art and artists stepping into the scene brings with it a sense of discomfort.
Edgy said, “The market is becoming very saturated, and we often have to think of how to stand out with all of the noise coming through.
“We really believe that people will still prefer to connect with the human essence, because at the end of the day, we are the ones living a day-to-day life and sharing our experiences.
“So hopefully people will still want to go to live shows and see real people performing and listening to their music and purchasing it, because that's how you support independent artists.
“The only reason AI is any good at making music is that it is taking inspiration from real artists who have created the art, it's not because it came up with it on its own.”
Edgy V and GG Carma are a shining example of the dedication it takes to be an independent artist in 2026. Their lives have been centred around performing, and they will continue to do so into the future, letting nothing stand in their way.