Just a couple of days before starting their Europe and UK tour, HotWax agreed to chat with me about their new album, Hot Shock. Interview.
Unis Son: Well done on Hot Shock! With it, you’ve managed to translate your energy on stage to the studio. Can you tell me more about the recording process? Why and how did you choose to translate that energy?
Tallulah: I think so many times we play shows and people would come up to us afterwards and be like “Wow, I really like your music! But then seeing you guys live… It had like such an impact on me! You had so much energy!” and “as a three-piece, you come across really well and it sounds really full and exciting.” I think to do a record that did sound more raw and did sound more like a three-piece as we are is something we’ve always really, really wanted to do.
It’s just almost a case of finding the right producers who really got it. And we got to work with Catherine Marks and Steph Marziano together. They collaborated for the first time. It was really cool working with them because they kind of got the best of both worlds. Steph has more like a pop mind in a way, and then Catherine is quite the opposite in the studio. So to have those both come together, that made us do most of the album live and made it come together really perfectly.
US: Speaking of live, whose live acts have you been most inspired by?
Tallulah: I don’t know about most inspired, and we don’t sound anything like them, but Opus King. That band live… Their stage presence is just incredible to me! They’re so talented as musicians. The frontman… you kind of almost feel quite terrified of him, in a really exciting way. I think they’re amazing and their live act is incredible. I’ve seen them a few times. The first time was in Tunbridge Wells, this small, small kind of place in the UK, and there wasn’t really anyone there. I was like, oh, my God, who is this guy? Like, it’s kind of mad!
Lola: A lot of bands we’ve been on tour with have been really, really good performers. Like Frank Carter is really, really good. I feel like he puts everything into his performance, his singing and his crowd interaction as well. And connecting to your fans, I think, is important. Yeah, he was really good. Queens of Stone Age are always good live. They just sound so tight. When a band has played together so many times, you can tell and it really comes across. I think that’s important as well.
Alfie: Growing up in Brighton, it’s… being inspired by watching everything that your friends are doing and getting little tips and tricks. Just learning by watching loads of people. You’re feeling a little bit of a competition, but also not, you know? Yeah, it’s nice to be inspired by your friends.
Now Playing: Wanna Be A Doll
US: Where else do you find inspiration? Do find some in other media? What would you think fuels your writing?
Tallulah: Yeah, 100 percent. I’m going to say art, but then I don’t really have artists I particularly love, or I’m not very knowledgeable about art. I think it’s more just settings in life, certain rooms and the way something might be placed on a table next to something else. That could spark inspiration for a song. Or just aesthetics of things, I find it inspirational.
The way seasons change, if you’re going with spring, which should feel quite exciting, the change makes everyone feel emotionally sort of on edge and anxious, even if it is in a good way… I also find it inspirational. I definitely want to start reading more books. And I did start reading a book yesterday. I need to do that to expand my vocabulary because then I could explain this much better if I had the words.
US: And in terms of musical inspirations, when you guys are coming together in your sessions, how does it work? How is your music created?
Lola: We’re always trying to find the best way for us to write music. It’s different with each song we write, but we’re doing a lot of it on the computer at my house. Normally, I’ll come up with a riff, or Tallulah will come up with a riff, and we’ll bring it to the other one and see what they think. Then, they’ll come up with another part. We’ll record a bit of it, get that down, and we’ll take it to rehearsal with Alfie. Then, we’ll play it all together and get a couple of phone recordings and just try and get the structure the best it can be. Go home, listen to it and come back to it.
Tallulah: We’ve been able to make this work. Come up with a small riff or chord progression, and then be like, “Oh, I want this song to sound like this Radiohead album”. I think, sometimes, I can lose confidence in a song. Then, Lola, I think she just does it to trick me, but she’ll be like, “Oh no, that guitar bit sounds like St Vincent, it’s really cool!”. And then I’ll be like, “Okay, cool!”. We’ll roll a bit like that, and not copy the ideas, but think “Okay, this song we want it to be kind of slinky and sound this way, like this song from this album” and that will sort of inspire us.
US: I’ve read that you were working with an all-female team on that album. Was this a conscious decision? a happy accident? How did you go with that?
Tallulah: It was a complete accident. We first worked with Stella from Warpaint on the first couple of songs we recorded, which are the two acoustic ones. That came about because she and Courtney came to the first gig we did in the US, actually. We met up with them, and they liked the show. The next time we went over to the US, we went to her house. We didn’t know these songs would be on the album, we were just kind of trying it out.
Lola: We only had about two or three days there.
Tallulah: When we got home from there, we started to write with Steph. We’ve been very stubborn with writing with other people, but she fit in and felt like another member for a bit. We wanted to do the album with her, but we were also talking to Catherine. We had this meeting with Catherine, and she was like, “Why don’t I get on the phone with Steph tonight and see if she wants to do it all together?”
It ended up happening naturally. We weren’t like, “We want to just use females.” They were just the best for the job. I don’t think we’d ever choose to go with a certain gender or whatever, but it’s cool. It felt really, really empowering. I’m very happy it turned out that way.
Lola: Yeah, if all those people happened to be males, we still would have gone with them. Exactly, the same. They’re just really good. And they’ve all worked on albums that are influential to us. Obviously, Stella as well. We love Warpaint!
Now Playing: One More Reason
US: Shows the industry changes. And about that, is there anything you’d like to make happen or to see change? What are your thoughts on the current mood it has?
Tallulah: I think it’s just insanely expensive to do anything in the music industry. And, you know, unless you’re signed to a label, you can’t afford to tour because you can’t even afford to rent a van. You can’t afford anything. It’s so hard for artists to be able to record, tour and live. Then you end up working so much… So many artists are so overworked!
But I guess it’s the same in so many industries. It’s just a lack of money and funding. I mean, even big artists are like, “We have to cancel our tour because it’s way too expensive,” which is just insane! I don’t know how it’s really going to be possible for bands to keep going…
US: True… but, despite all that, what’s next for HotWax? What’s coming up?
Lola: We’ve got a tour in Europe and the UK. It starts the day after tomorrow, which is really exciting! It’s going to be really good! We’re quite nervous. It’s like our first proper… well, we just did the in-store tour obviously, but that was in record shops. This is our first proper headline tour. We’re going to be playing that album. We’ve got a band called The Pill coming on tour with us, which is really nice. We met them the other day. And yeah, we haven’t been back to Europe since last year, so that’s really, really fun.
US: Cool! Anywhere exciting you’d like to visit whilst you’re touring as well if you can?
Alfie: We’re playing some new cities, which is nice, in Europe especially. Oh, and Hull.
Lola: Hull, Stockton-On-Tees…
Alfie: Well, yeah, we’ve got some smaller towns in the UK that we’re playing that is exciting to do, but also we’re playing some places like Antwerp.
Lola: Berlin, we’ve only been to Berlin once.
Alfie: Yeah, we’ve only been to Berlin once, we’ve only played Cologne once. And yeah, especially being a headline tour, doing headline shows in Europe is quite a step up, you know. It’s exciting! But I’m excited to go back to Germany. I like Germany.
US: Well, we’re now reaching the last question. What’s your earliest musical memory?
Tallulah: I had a similar question asked the other day. It made me think… my dad used to sing me this song. I think it’s the Elvis version of that I Love You Because song. He used to play it on guitar, like a few chords, when I was younger, putting me into bed. I remember that. When I hear that song, it gives me a flashback!
Lola: I remember going round my grandparents’ house and my uncles were rehearsing. I used to wait outside the door and just listen for ages and then hope that I’d get to go and have a go on the drums. When I was about four. That was my memory.
Alfie: My dad only had a little minidisc player in his car. I always remember the order of the songs or getting excited for a specific minidisc, those weird plastic case things in his car. I remember putting them in the little insert into the car. But then, once I got a little bit older, I was really into choosing all the music and going, “No, I want this song, I want this song.” But it was really weird, weird music. I would only get to listen to it whilst we were driving to swimming lessons as well.
US: Anything else you’d like to say to our readers?
Alfie: Go buy the album!
Lola: Yeah! Thank you for reading!
Thank you to HotWax for your time and for answering my questions! And thank you to Camille for helping set up the interview. Their album, Hot Shock is available on Bandcamp!
