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HeartSongs - 20171106

  • Published in Columns

Welcome to HeartSongs, our regularly scheduled (probably) look at songs and the people who write them. We spoke to Cornwall’s Hypophora about their recent single ‘Headlines’.

“The theme of the song is about friendships falling apart. It’s not a nice thing to go through, especially when it’s not handled well. It felt like it would be a good thing to write about as a kind of release, hopefully listeners can empathise and appreciate what the lyrics are about. It was written with one person and one situation in mind but reading the lyrics back made us realise how it can apply to so many moments in life.

Lewis Pilcher (bass) actually came to practice one day with this absolutely stonkin’ dissonant riff that he’d been working on. We were all a big fan of said riff and that’s where ‘Headlines’ started. Karum had been experimenting with a bunch of open seventh chords for a while so it was a great excuse to sling them in  over the top of a grooving bassline for the verse part and a slightly similar chord sound (though drenched in distortion) for the chorus and thus ‘Headlines’ was born.

One of our fondest early memories of road testing the song was supporting LTNT and The Hyena Kill in Plymouth in July last year. We sound checked with ‘Headlines’ (which at the time we nicknamed ‘Stab’ because of the choppy rhythms) and we got a bunch of positive feedback from the LTNT/Hyena Kill dudes - they thought the opening riff was absolutely brill, which filled us with a lot of confidence!

We had so much fun recording ‘Headlines’. We recorded at Momentum Studios in Devon with the ever talented Josiah Manning. The song was recorded alongside ‘Behave!’ and ‘Hipster Blood’ - both of which are set for release early next year.

We were lucky enough to have Josiah feature on his beautiful Fender Rhodes during the second verse and the middle eight - this added an entirely new and super interesting musical layer/texture that we haven’t really experienced on a Hypophora tune before (we had a small amount of MIDI keyboard on ‘Caught’ but that doesn’t count). That really makes the tune to be honest.

Also the ratty guitar tone in the run up to the “breakdown” section was recorded by placing a microphone inside a broken snare drum on the other side of the live room from the guitar amp. So pointless but fun nonetheless.

We stayed in the studio for three nights in a row, drank wine, ate Nando’s, and made music from about 9am - 9pm for three or four days. We went a little stir crazy towards the end of the session but we had such a laugh. We actually documented the whole thing on our YouTube channel through a series of vlogs.

We’ve had a lot of comments about how different this vibe is from our last release ‘Youth/Caught’ - there’s a lot more interesting/experimental chords and overall a much darker feeling to the song.

We think people seem to really enjoy the tune and most people have been pretty positive about the (slight) change in musical direction, but it’s really not that different is it? It’s nice to finally be able to look at our songs available online and see more than just two songs, we’re gradually building up our discography, which is about time! It’s making us so excited for a full album to be released - we’ve been sitting on material that’s been unreleased for ages so it’s going to be so nice to let the world hear it!”

Lyrics:

Without intention, I lost my taste for you,

And now nobody's mentioned the latest piece of news,

Lacking attention, you quit the thing you love,

It's the pretension you need to let go of

 

Now and again I question if it's just because I'm here

You make a great impression to everyone that's near

Their backs are turned so you're talking, no one needs to know

Now and again I question if it's just because I'm here

 

Without intention, I lost my faith in you

And now no one's remembered to see the whole thing through

Lacking attention, you quit the thing you love

It's the pretension you need to let go of

 

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Hypophora Rock Plymouth Tonight with Sløtface

  • Published in News

South West post hardcore quartet Hypophora are pleased to reveal their brand new single 'Headlines' that is released this week via Easy Action/Zen Ten Records. Creating hard hitting, catchy and anthemic material, Hypophora bring intricate guitar music back to the mainstream. 'Headlines' is a much darker sound, both musically and lyrically, than the bands previous material, featuring one of the jazziest, yet chilled out middle eights that they’ve ever written.

In the past twelve months the band have supported the likes of He Is Legend, Kurt Travis (ex Dance Gavin Dance) and Allusondrugs at various locations in the UK. In the summer they played slots at UK Tech Metal Fest and Boardmasters Festival and this winter they hit the road again on a headline run to promote their new material.

"'Headlines' is about the realisation that a friend might only be your friend for convenience and circumstance rather than true connection or respect. Upon learning that fact, the song touches on how you’d be forced to then question your entire friendship history, whether or not it was entirely real at all and whether to continue putting effort into keeping it going." explains the band, when talking about the story behind the new single.

Live dates:

October

19th - The Underground, Plymouth (Supporting Sløtface)

21st - Cavern Club, Exeter (Supporting VANT)

28th - Bar Socio, Newquay (Halloween local show)

November

11th - Embers, Carlisle

12th - The Crowndale, Camden

16th - MONO, Falmouth (TBC)

17th - The Underground, Plymouth

19th - Crofter’s Rights, Bristol

26th - New Cross Inn, London (UK Tech Fest: Techabilitation All Dayer)

 

 

 

 

 

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