Local musical act The Joy has spilled all the details on how they ended up performing with Doja Cat at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival.

The American rapper and singer, who is the estranged daughter of SA actor Dumisani Dlamini, is one of the headliners this year with No Doubt, Lana Del Rey and Tyler, the Creator.

In a surprise appearance, the five-piece Mzansi band joined Doja Cat on stage for a special rendition of her two track Acknowledge Me and Shutcho – with a Zulu twist. The group comprises of Pastor (Ntokozo Bright Magcaba), Duzie (Melokuhle Mkhungo), Guduza (Sphelele Hlophe), Sthombe (Phelelani Sithole) and Marcus (Sanele Ngcobo).

In an exclusive interview with Sowetan after the moment, lead vocalist Duzie shared that they were handpicked.

“Doja’s management team connected with our manager Sevi from Black Major. They told us this is something she had been wanting to do since she started following us on our social media platforms a couple of years ago,” Duzie said.

“We love Doja and literally screamed when we heard she wanted us to share the stage of the biggest festival in the world.”

The group, who are all from the small township of Hammarsdale in Mpumalanga, recently released their single, You Complete Me, and are two months away from dropping their self-titled debut album. 

“We recorded vocals for the two opening songs and sent them from SA. Then spent a week of rehearsals in Las Vegas. The team has some incredibly talented people in it. Everyone was wonderful and made us feel at home,” he said. 

“The stage moment itself went very quickly but imagine being in front of 100, 000 people – we truly loved every minute of it.”

Doja Cat isn’t the only international artist who is a fan of The Joy, American award-winning singers Alicia Keys and Jennifer Hudson are also fans. Hudson loved the group so much that she invited them on her talk show in 2022.

“Hopefully more good things are ahead for us from this moment,” he said.

“We will be releasing our album on June 21 and we’d like to request everyone who has watched this performance tonight to stream our album when it drops. We believe we will have one of the biggest albums of the year.”