Few releases have left such an immediate and indelible mark on me as Mould’s abrasive new album ‘Hope as a Coping Mechanism’. As a fan of the band’s previous projects – most notably post-hardcore outfit Milo’s Planes – I was excited to see how the three-piece deeply rooted in Bristol’s post-punk scene could grow their sound.
Across 13 tracks Mould waves their way through jangly talk-rock, muscular punk choruses and a notably heftier take on jagged post-punk rhythms. Skirting the line between nihilism and desperate optimism, the hope on ‘Hope’ is an unconventional one, masked by internal turmoil. Tracks like Float and Lucid are particular stand outs.
We caught up with Mould’s trident of Joe Sherrin (vocals & guitar), Kane Eagle (bass) and James Luxton (drums) to discuss their writing process, keeping up with the Bristol music scene as you get older and the importance of staying hopeful.
Mould’s new album Hoping as a Coping Mechanism is out now. They play Bristol’s Thekla on 29th of October.
Hoping as a coping mechanism came out recently. What is the album about and what inspired it?
James: We sort of got burned during the making of our first EP. It hurt, because after years of playing music with some great artists and working bad jobs to allow the morsel of music, we put full welly into our own project, and at the very first hurdle the pain came. Hoping became a big feature in our lives as it was our escapism! Daydreaming while delivering the 100th parcel or pouring the 1000th pint, the fear that so many of our age get where it’s the feeling of, is this the last chance? Obviously it’s not, but once the brain machine gets rolling – hoping is the best option!
Joe: From a lyrics perspective I wasn’t writing the album with a set theme in mind, they’re more thematically linked by being written during the same time period. A lot of it’s about mental health, toxic masculinity & despairing of our current world.
How do you write your music, does music come first or lyrics? How collaborative is your process?
Joe: Music almost always comes first, though the process is a bit of a mixed bag. Sometimes I’ll have a musical idea or most of a song and bring it in to work on and complete it together in the room. Sometimes we start out with nothing and just see what happens and build songs out of these ideas. I like to demo the song really early on so I can walk around listening to it to find the vocal melody/lyrics. Being a postie is the ideal job for this process.
Kane: I like that we’ve never really had a set formula for our writing process – a lot of the time it comes from an already half-fleshed out idea which we come together and imprint our own playing and ideas into it. On the other side, we’ll be in the studio and someone will get stuck in some repetitive chord sequence or riff and we’ll all be magnetised to it and it will just evolve there and then. I think those moments feel special because we all know when something has potential, we’re all tickled by the same aural fingers – even if we can’t put our finger on why we like it, we’re in the same boat from the get-go. Mould is a boat.
As part of Bristol’s music scene, how much does the city influence your music?
Joe: Historically it has massively. I started playing gigs with bands involved in Howling Owl Records and then Breakfast Records. DIY labels putting out awesome music, bonkers shows and building communities out of music – it’s where 90% of my friendships come from. Some of the bands on those labels are my favourites ever and were enormously influential on me – Velcro Hooks, Oliver Wilde, Langkamer, Jasmine.4.T.
Kane: I always wanted to make music and be in bands. Bristol from an early age showed me actually how achievable that was. Breakfast Records being the pinnacle in those days, mooching around in multiple bands with mates and starting new bedroom projects willy nilly. That excitement of being within a supportive community and just having fun was super important to our formative years. Bristol still has a lot of that going on, with the success of Getdown Services and a bunch of other local bands popping up, you can still feel that musical buzz in the city. Shout out ‘Wild Kindness’ events.
How much do you feel part of the scene, are there any influences you want to shout out
Joe: I think less so than we used to be. Probably just cos we’re all a bit older and life gets busy so we’re not out all the time anymore! But we all met and started playing together through Bristol music scenes, for a while it felt like every weekend there was a big Breakfast Records event and we’d be playing all the time (as SLONK) with our pals’ bands.
In terms of local influences, the three best albums of the year are all by Bristol artists — Gimic, Getdown Services and Tara Clarkin Trio.
James: Yeah I definitely miss feeling properly part of a scene, but I also didn’t know Banarama were from Bristol and that probably says something.
//Words: Jonathan Morris//