EXPLORING MINDSUITE: TARIQ’S DANCE-DRIVEN VISION OF CULTURAL FUSION
In a time when music often feels polished to perfection, MINDSUITE offers something different: movement over theory, feeling over form. At the helm is Tariq, a Leeds-based artist whose approach to music is as expansive as his worldview — shaped by travel, rooted in rhythm, and driven by a desire to bring people together.
From Avocado Farms to Drum Grooves
Tariq’s path to music didn’t begin in a studio. It started somewhere between an avocado farm in Australia and a yoga retreat in Greece — the kinds of places where spontaneity thrives and strangers become collaborators. His early years were shaped by watching his older brother explore the world, sparking his own hunger for cultural immersion and connection.
When he eventually landed at university in the UK, it wasn’t just for a degree — it was a chance to ground his creativity. There, he found drums. Not just as an instrument, but as a language — one that let him channel the energy, playfulness, and cultural collisions of his travels into something tangible.
MINDSUITE: Music Without Borders
Born from this journey is MINDSUITE — not just a band or a project, but a creative ecosystem built on cultural fusion. Its sound pulls from a range of genres: the urgency of Drum and Bass, the pulse of Techno, the warmth of House. But at its core, MINDSUITE isn’t about genre — it’s about groove. It’s about music that moves you, literally.
And it’s also about recreating a feeling. Tariq talks often about the jam sessions he witnessed abroad — music erupting around campfires, on beaches, in hostels. No formal training, no polished production — just people picking up lids, pans, shakers, and playing. That sense of joy, of unfiltered expression, became the heartbeat of MINDSUITE. His goal? To bring that same energy into spaces that often forget it.
The Trap of Overthinking — and the Joy of Letting Go
When Tariq began building MINDSUITE at uni, he noticed a pattern. Musicians were technically skilled, but stiff — caught up in getting every note right, in chasing complexity. The spontaneity he’d seen abroad was missing. So he set out to undo that.
MINDSUITE became a space where dance was the measure of success. If people moved, the music worked. As more collaborators joined — each with different backgrounds and skill levels — the project grew into a kind of communal letting-go. Musicians dropped their egos, loosened their grip on structure, and started trusting feeling over form.
The result? A sound that’s both tight and free, unified and unpredictable. A celebration of music not as performance, but as shared experience.
More Than a Name
The name “MINDSUITE” reflects the project’s layered ethos — music as something that lives both in the body and the mind. The project aims to break free from genre constraints, focusing on music’s raw ability to resonate with people on a primal level and tune in: to themselves, to others, to rhythm as a way of making sense of the world.
And while the sound is global, the roots are personal. Tariq’s experience moving between cultures has shaped a belief in music’s capacity to transcend language, to carry memory, to connect strangers. In an era of overstimulation, MINDSUITE offers a space to simply feel — together.
Looking Ahead: Building a Movement
MINDSUITE isn’t just a studio project; it’s a live, immersive experience. The shows are interactive, blurring the lines between performer and audience, creating a shared musical journey that transcends the stage. Tariq believes in the healing power of music and community, offering a reprieve from technology-driven isolation. Looking forward, he envisions MINDSUITE as a global movement promoting music as a tool for self-expression and unity in a hyper-disconnected world, inspiring intimate and authentic connections.
At its core, MINDSUITE is a reminder of what music can do when it’s stripped of ego and built on intention — invite movement, spark connection, and bring people into the same moment, together.