New Hope Club fans! The wait is finally over! After being a band for a good few years, the boys have finally dropped their long awaited album. The 13 track record sees some absolute bangers. From fan favourites; Permission, Medicine and Let Me Down Slow, to brand new bops; Why Oh Why and Serious. This album will get you tapping your feet and destroying the replay button.
We recently sat down with Reece, Blake and George to talk about all things music and answering some questions from their devoted fans:
You have an album coming out on Friday! Do you want to start by telling us a little bit about it?
B: Yeah! So the album has basically been 3 and a half years in the making. Since we’ve met we’ve been writing songs. That was obviously one of the things that made us connected was our love of music. We just started writing songs and there was never any pressure to make an album. So we just started writing songs and going on trips to LA. Some of the songs from the album are from our first trips to LA. And then some of the songs like from when we started going on tour for the first time and experiencing some distance from family and all that. And then also songs from like the past 6 months that we’ve written recently. So, we wanted it to be a collection of the songs so far, the 3 and a half year journey we’ve been on. And it’s the first album, the first thing we’re giving the world as a collection of songs. We wanted it to contain songs old and new.
It’s definitely been a long time coming! You’re releasing a bundle as well which has your own individual versions. What gave you the idea to do that?
R: We always like the idea of going back to our original roots. We started off basically meeting on weekends, writing at whoever’s house was free – whoever’s mums or dads would have us! So we would just be in George’s front room watching TV, writing songs together. We kind of wanted to take it back to that because it’s our first album and it’s self-titled – we wanted to take it back to our roots and really show who New Hope Club is. So we basically got together at Blake’s house, Blake has a little bedroom studio. And we just sat in his room, writing songs with Blake producing them and it was just a lot of fun! Now there’s 6 extra songs all written by us and produced by Blake that we’re really proud of. And it’s a nice little stamp I think and these are very personal. I think it’s quite nice you only get it with the pre-order because you know, it’s quite exclusive.
You’ve got a couple of collaborations on this album including your most recent ‘Let Me Down Slow’ single which features R3HAB. How did that collaboration come about?
B: We always knew that song had that energetic, electronic kind of sound to it. So we thought we would be so cool to get an amazing DJ on the song that seemed like it fitted. We sent it out to R3HAB and he loved it and we were on tour whilst he was on tour, and he was just sending us demos of what he had done and how he’d changed the song and how he produced it. So, every week we were getting a new changed version that he had been working on and stuff. It was a slow process but so cool to see how he turned a song we play live and always went down the best, to this DJ version. The song is actually an emotional song. The lyrics in the song is about being in a relationship that’s coming to an end and your asking your partner to let you down slow. So it’s like a sad song and originally, before we even played it live, it was a slow sounding song compared to how it is now. It’s such a transformation.
Whilst we’re on the topic of collaborations, who would your dream collaboration be? This can be anyone ever.
G: I mean, obviously we would love to collaborate with Paul McCartney. They’re like our favourite band The Beatles. That would be wicked. But to just write with anyone like Ed Sheeran would be incredible.
What song are you most looking forward to playing on tour? Because you’re doing a UK tour in April. What are you most looking forward to playing live that you haven’t performed before?
R: I think there’s a couple off the new album. I think it’s going to be fun. I think ‘You And I’ will be really cool to get like a drum on stage.
G: Yeah the ones you can play standing up!
B: Yeah ‘You And I’ is probably the song on the album that no-one’s heard but I think it represents us live pretty well. It’s kind of got that energetic bounce and our shows are pretty wild. I don’t think many people realise that are shows are actually quite rocky. That song kind of represents that quite well.
You’ve spent the past few years supporting The Vamps. Now you’re headlining your own shows, are their any upcoming artists that you would like to see supporting you?
B: We’ve literally just been on a UK tour in October, and we got these 3 lads called “The Tyne” and they’re really talented. We’ve started to help them and started writing with them and stuff and they’re just really nice lads and they’re really in to music. So, we’re working with them and we’d like to get them back on tour.
Your fans are pretty dedicated. What would you say is your most craziest fan experience?
G: The conga line during ‘Permission’ on tour was always happening. I kept thinking like “aw should I get in it”. And I told everyone like ‘nah nah I’m not going to do it”. And then I was just like in the spur of the moment I was just like “screw it”. I gave my guitar to our tour manager and just jumped in to the crowd and just got in to the conga line and I went round with people. And I had my hands on the back of this girl and she turned around and she was just like “what?” It was so good.
I can imagine that you’re doing quite a lot of interviews this week. You must be getting bored of having to keep repeating yourself. What is the one question that you wish someone would ask you in an interview but nobody ever does?
B: That’s quite a good one.
G: That is a good question.
R: We don’t really get like bored whilst talking about our album. We’ve been so excited to get it out so. Honestly these are the first interviews we’ve done so maybe ask us that after the albums out. But yeah we’re just excited to get it out, we’re not bored of those.
I tweeted out asking if there were any fan questions people wanted to ask and I got an overwhelming response! So I’m just going to ask you some of those now:
So this question is from @audiotristan. She wants to know what is your favourite lyric that you’ve ever written?
B: Our song ‘Permission’ there’s a line that’s like “they make these rules, they break them too”. It kind of sums the song up pretty well because it’s all about not needing permission any more to do certain things. Your parents are saying “you can’t do this” but then they go and do it so I kind of like that one.
G: I quite like the lyric in the ‘You and I’ song like “I need nothing but you and I.” That’s quite a nice sentiment.
R: I like in ‘Serious’ there are a couple of good lines in that “when the leaves start falling, I’ll come crawling.”
G: Yeah I quite like that one.
@rjbcrazy wants to know if you had a boat, what would you name it and why?
G: What was it they call it in ‘Step Brothers’?
B: The Titanic 2.
R: That’s quite dodgy knowing what happened to the first one! Um…I’d call it “The HMS Bibmeister”.
G: HMS is like a war boat.
@lovestrucknhc asks if you could chose any song ever, what would be the theme song for your life?
B: Starts singing ‘Life is a Highway’ by Rascal Flatts.
G: haha that’s good! Uh…Eminem “Lose Yourself”.
So @DanixRx wants to know what was the easiest and hardest song to write on the album?
B: Most of the songs on the album were always kind of easy to write. The best songs are always easy to write.
R: I think the easiest song to write was probably ‘Serious’. We had fun that day.
G: Yeah it was written in like half an hour. We went to In-n-Out burger like half an hour after the session.
B: The hardest song was..
G: Probably ‘Why Oh Why’.
Big thanks to the New Hope Club boys for taking time out of their extremely busy week to chat with us! Their album is now available to stream through Spotify and tickets to their tour are on sale here – tickets are selling quick so be sure to get yours before you miss out! Also keep up to date with their Facebook, Twitter and Instagram for more band related news!
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