Honheehonhee Guide Us Through “Shouts”

Honheehonhee are great, and although their debut album “Shouts” has only been out a matter of weeks its already one of my favourite records released this year. With this in mind, we asked the band if they’s like to write something about it for the site and they’ve done just that. If you fancy listening while you read you can stream and buy the album through the widget below. Without further ado then, here is Greg, Matt and Stefan from Honheehonhee’s track-by-track guide to “Shouts”.

We Only Go:

We Only Go was originally going to be the 7th track on the record (right before silo). Right after we recorded the bed tracks we all knew the energy was great, possibly the best of the album (it was the 7th song we recorded) and magic man Greg Smith, who was never convinced of our original track order, mentioned that maybe we should start the record with this song. It was only after weeks and weeks of listening to the finished tracks that I actually considered Greg’s suggestion (I’m pretty stubborn with this kind of stuff) but it was the right choice. (Thanks Greg!) - Greg

Rumours In The New Morgue:

Rumours In The New Morgue came from the Poe story “Murders In The Rue Morgue”. We like to joke about the end of the chorus (“primate sit tight and behave”), how the melody sounds a lot like the “Sell off va-ca-tions dot com” jingle, although it was totally unintentional. This is the oldest song on the album. At the point of writing the lyrics I had “never broken a single bone in my life”. I have since had a hairline fracture in my foot. Does that really count, though? No cast. - Matt

A. Is For Animal:

A. Is For Animal was only fully finished (if there is such a thing for a song) the day we recorded it. This was the case with three of the songs on the album but Animal was only conceived about 3 weeks before we went into the studio (procrastinating is my favourite) so it was definitely the newest song on the record. I think the freshness comes through in the recording and I think that’s what we like about it. It’s always a toss up when recording such a new song because you aren’t going to be as comfortable with your parts (I was reading (and rewriting) lyrics while recording it) and certain things might not be as finely tuned as a song you’ve taken on the road and chiseled into your bones; the hidden treasures of the song might not have revealed themselves yet. As a result the A. Is For Animal we play on stage now has grown up a bit from the newborn on the record but all the parts were in the right place and the energy was there and the freshness added an excitement that we could never recreate if we tried to record the song today. - Greg

B. Rooftop Archipelagos:

B. Rooftop Archipelagos was one of the three songs we wrote in the condensed writing weeks leading up to the recording session. It started with the “ooh’s” chorus part and was built from there. The drum beat on the verses was one of the last elements to be written, and at first we were playing the whole song at a much slower tempo, but eventually it kept speeding up to what it is on the recording. This is our hardest title to say out loud. I love picturing city rooftops as groups of islands in the sea, remote but visible from one another. - Matt

Intro: My Lips, Your Voice:

Although it begins a cappella, Intro: My Lips, Your Voice is the only instrumental on the album. Typically, we try to incorporate a lot of vocal parts in our songs, which makes it difficult to get away from our mics when playing live. This song kind of allows us to tune into our own instruments a bit more and gives us the collective freedom to explore the stage. It also enables us to practice our acrobatics. If something is being climbed up onto during our set, it usually happens in this song. - Stefan

Jumpstart My Heart:

Jumpstart My Heart is one of our oldest songs and is probably the creative inspiration behind Shouts. We wrote it altogether, which was a ton of fun and we were all happy with the result. This way of writing was new to us and felt really natural. We ended up adopting this collaborative writing approach to every song since. At the beginning of Jumpstart you can hear what sounds like a marching drum fade into the mix amidst the R2-D2-like chirps. These drum hits were actually generated by a few different snares and a floor tom placed strategically at various ends of the studio space around a single room mic. The idea was to start the hits off using one of the snares furthest away from the mic and have the rest of drums join in one by one until the full band comes in. Just this intro bit proved to be the most complicated setup of the entire recording and might have been the most time consuming indulgence. In retrospect, it probably wasn’t worth all the trouble but it was something we needed to try and we definitely had a blast doing it. - Stefan

We Never Sleep:

We Never Sleep has my favourite moment on the record. It’s a hard song to get right. It has a lot of different parts and we still struggle with it. But on the record, towards the end of the song in the last 5/4, we nailed it. It’s not that everything is played perfectly (actually if you listen closely before the last vocals come in, you can hear what sounds like a guitar flub; it’s my string breaking) but the tempo and the energy come together in such a way that sets a mood. Every time I listen to it, the mood is there. I like that. - Greg

To The Silo:

To The Silo was probably the least prepared song heading into the studio. We knew the general structure and we knew that we wanted to end in chaos. We had tried recording a few different versions of the song but nothing seemed to really come together the way we hoped until Greg Smith suggested we make a few minor adjustments to the arrangement. Following his advice, we laid down the track that appears on the album on the next take and haven’t played it the same way since. - Stefan

Buy the excellent Honheehonhee album here.