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Category / Hope and Social Blog / Make Art / MakingTheAlbum / See Everyone Next Tuesday

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  • S.E.N.T. – Week 6

    What the hell is S.E.N.T.? If you’ve no idea what we’re talking about you can catch up with previous weeks over on the S.E.N.T. page. Foreword Lordy lordy, here we are, the final week. What a rollercoaster. It’s all becoming very emotional as we drag these tired, battle worn musical ideas over the finish line.…

    August 26, 2020

  • S.E.N.T. – Week 5

    What the hell is S.E.N.T.? If you’ve no idea what we’re talking about you can catch up with previous weeks over on the S.E.N.T. page. Week 5 – Flowering IDEA #5 – SI Open up this week’s project. First listen…it’s not bad…got some groove, some sort of pop/indie thing. Another listen…oh no, hang on, maybe…

    August 19, 2020

  • S.E.N.T. – Week 4

    What the hell is S.E.N.T.? If you’ve no idea what we’re talking about you can catch up with previous weeks over on the S.E.N.T. page. Foreword After last weeks telling off you’d think we would have ironed out all our technical difficulties. Not so. It turns out somebody has been uploading the wrong weeks audio,…

    August 12, 2020

  • S.E.N.T. – Week 3

    What the hell is S.E.N.T.? If you’ve no idea what we’re talking about you can catch up with previous weeks over on the S.E.N.T. page. Foreword Before we get into the quick witted literary delights below I wanted to add a small preamble about discipline. Discipline is something that is entirely non-existent in this band.…

    August 5, 2020

  • S.E.N.T. – Week 2 – Germination?

    What the hell is S.E.N.T.? If you’ve no idea what we’re talking about you can catch up with previous weeks over on the S.E.N.T. page. Week 2 – Germination IDEA #5 – HUX Bless Ed. You may have read his self deprecating words in last week’s blog, “I’m not very good at writing music by…

    July 29, 2020

  • S.E.N.T. – Week 1 – The Seeds

    Making music together….apart… Two weeks ago we were due to pick up where we left off with writing and recording the next album. Unfortunately due to the current world situation we were unable to all be in the same room and make music the way we most enjoy.  With the novelty of Joe Wicks wearing…

    July 22, 2020

  • “Do It All Again” on The Radio

    Awesome news everybody! Wowser. Thank you all for an amazing first week of our new album “Happy Bread (& Cruel Hangovers)“. Lots has been happening but first up, a heads up. We’re overjoyed to be able to announce that our lead track Do It All Again will get it’s international radio debut on National Treasure…

    October 4, 2019

  • New Album “Happy Bread (& Cruel Hangovers)” OUT NOW!

    That’s right, Hope and Social’s brand new album “Happy Bread (& Cruel Hangovers)” is out now. We’ve lots to tell you about… downloads, streaming, where to get it on CD and all about the pre-order for vinyl, posters, tee shirts… but more on that in a minute… why not press play, then read on..? Happy…

    September 30, 2019

  • Happier Breads (and Apple Turnovers)

    Gary writes all about the food it takes to make a really great record.

    September 17, 2019

  • Album Drop – 30/09/19

    “Happy Bread (and Cruel Hangovers)” Hope and Social to release their 6th studio album on the 30th September SAVE THE DATE! Yep, you heard it here first. The 6th eagerly (meagrely?!) awaited album by Hope and Social is in the can. Recorded, mixed, mastered & sent to the pressing plant. “What’s it all about then?”…

    September 13, 2019

  • A Change Of Scenery

    They say a change is as good as a rest. Find out what happens when H&S take their album writing shenanigans to the inimitable Harewood House.

    September 6, 2019

  • Yorkshire Electric

    New year, new music, new tour, new van! With Santa and his reindeers safely back in Lapland, this years surviving turkeys breathing a sigh of relief… not only that they’ll see another few months before the Bernard Matthews gang get their hands on ’em, but also that if they traipse north of Watford Gap they’ll…

    January 5, 2018

  • FEEL – a song a week #4: Dig Hard

    Dig Hard The Song Si: In our original set of demos for this album there was a song which we all agreed had a lovely melody, but not necessarily one we’d want on one of our albums. It was a little too MOR, even for us. It was certainly a strong melody but it just wasn’t…

    November 16, 2016

  • Album and Single Launch

    Three new releases coming your way, courtesy of your ever loyal Hope & Social. It’s nearly here. At long last and after two years of work, our fifth studio album “FEEL” is finished. Done, signed off, gone to print, gone to press… [gulps] complete! So complete in fact, that we have release dates! “Sunrise Laughing”…

    September 3, 2016
  • Pre-Order "FEEL" on Blue Vinyl - hopeandsocial.bandcamp.com/album/feel

    The Vinyl Countdown

    A Way To Blue. . . 12″ Vinyl Wheels are in motion, cogs are whirring and spreadsheets are being filled in here at H&S HQ, readying ourselves to drop our brand spanking new album ‘FEEL‘ on your laps on Monday the 10th of October. It’s all recorded, we’re just at the stage of signing off…

    August 15, 2016

  • 9 Videos for 9 Songs

    We need YOU to make our next music video It is with great excitement that we’re putting a call out for film makers for our new album. We’ve poured heart and soul into our new record. It’s taken 3 years to get it to completion, we’ve lost and gained band members, we’ve talked and talked…

    June 16, 2016

  • “Difficult Tenth Album” Syndrome

    Whoa there Horsie! ————- The good ship H&S has recently returned from a month having THE best fun at 11 shows at Grassington Festival, Oakwell Festival, Durham Brass, Scarborough Seafest and Underneath The Stars. Prior to that, I started this blog-post, to reflect on where we’re at in the making of this next Hope and…

    July 31, 2015

  • Feel…

    Well, it’s June, and that means we’re starting a new album. It’s been a long time coming this one. What with so many and varied Hope and Social projects this past year, Si and his many theatre things, and Goff being totally immersed in art in Berlin, we just haven’t been able to get a…

    June 1, 2015

  • Crypt Covers: Vol. 1

    2 years on from our first ever Crypt Covers session, we’re releasing the first album’s worth of Crypt Covers. For the uninitiated, Crypt Covers is our one day challenge to record and video a fan-chosen cover version, with another artist, in one day. It’s been a challenging, interesting and worthwhile experience throughout. We wanted to…

    April 1, 2014

  • 8 Steps to Making an Album in 30 Days

    … or Less An Update from the House of the Gimli Bear [UPDATE: We need YOUR voices to sing on our album. in Leeds on the 20th October!] We’re roughly half way through the writing and recording our 4th album. Every year it seems like we get less time for actual making of new music…

    October 12, 2012

  • Cotton Wool and Knotted Wood – RELEASED!

    Hope and Social are delighted to present our new acoustic album “Cotton Wool and Knotted Wood”. Cotton Wool and Knotted Wood by Hope and Social Last year was amazing for us… so many big gigs, so much big noise, so much fun was had. We loved it but by the end of the year we…

    March 23, 2012

  • Crypt Covers 1: Ellen and The Escapades

    [UPDATE: 23/3/12] Here’s the finished song with video by the awesome Shot by Sodium crew. Robert Palmer – Addicted To Love, with Ellen and The Escapades, suggested by @ScottishPenguin, all completed in one busy busy busy fun fun day! You can also see a load of photos from the Shot by Sodium guys on their…

    March 18, 2012

  • Sleep Sound track a day blog: The Road Never Lies

    The Road Never Lies by Hope and Social First off I think we need to give Ed a massive pat on the back for this one. He took many many tracks of “stuff”…strings, brass, keys, guitar, vocal, 2 pianos which just went on and on and on….and sculptured them into something beautiful. Ed and I…

    June 2, 2011

  • Sleep Sound track a day blog: Swaddled in Dark Clouds

    Swaddled in Dark Clouds by Hope and Social The verse to Swaddled came from a fragment of an idea I had and recorded into my phone months ago, and it was originally intended to be a hymn. It was really really simple and was literally the melody and those first four lines. I’d just sing…

    May 31, 2011

  • Sleep Sound track a day blog: Them Rolling Boys

    Them Rolling Boys by Hope and Social This track was written so quickly at first. Literally banged out in an afternoon all from the opening riff which Rich plucked out of the air. In every writing session we always seem to write quite a lot of big guitar stuff – most of which doesn’t get…

    May 24, 2011

  • Sleep Sound track a day blog: Cotton Wool

    Cotton Wool by Hope and Social [Si] This started life for me as a tiny nothing of a tune I played very late one night in my kitchen and recorded into my laptop. (original demo here – I had to be quiet because everyone was in bed!) It was an irrelevance really – just one…

    May 23, 2011

  • Sleep Sound track a day blog: Rolling Sideways

    Rolling Sideways Rolling Sideways by Hope and Social Rolling Sideways is made of 100% jamming around. It’s a bit hazy but I seem to remember that it all came pretty easy in terms of the music at first – sections and parts just slotted into place and the feel of it was coloured by the…

    May 19, 2011

  • Sleep Sound track a day blog: Family Man

    Family Man by Hope and Social This track had been kicking around my guitar for a while and I’d put it down on a couple of Garageband demos just with me and an acoustic guitar (have a listen here if you’re interested) I’d thought it wasn’t really appropriate for this album after all we’d discussed…

    May 18, 2011

  • Sleep Sound track a day blog: Sleep Sound

    Sleep Sound has now been out a few days and we thought we’d do a track by track blog like we did for April last year. Loads of people commented on how much they’d enjoyed reading about each song, and to be honest it was a great way to put a full stop on the…

    May 16, 2011

  • A little bit about Sleep Sound…

    … the Album So here it is… Sleep Sound. The third Hope and Social album in as many years (actually, it’s less than two calendar years since we released “Architect…“). We’re very proud of it indeed… Over the next couple of weeks we’re going to do blog posts for each song like we did for…

    May 10, 2011

  • Plague, Album Progress, Tour, T-Shirt, Swing, Other

    Plague The plague has hit the Crypt. A daubed red cross adorns the door and a trough has been placed outside to wash the monies used to pay for incoming pasties. No man shall leave and no man shall enter. We have written and signed our pledge to contain the disease within these walls and…

    April 15, 2011

  • April, Track 10, Eurospin

    Eurospin by Hope and Social This was truely one of the most heartwarming things we’ve done…  Yet another of the the magical, wonderful, impossible, crazy things that are only possible because of the wonderful friends and fans around us. For those who don’t know we turned our crypt studio into a French restaurant for the…

    May 17, 2010

  • April, Track 9, Marching on Through

    Marching on Through by Hope and Social This track started out as a really really simple jam in the studio – sort of a warm up really as we were preparing to do something else. We have a pump organ in the Crypt which Ed bought for a bottle of wine about a year ago.…

    April 30, 2010

  • April, Track 8, A Darkness Now is Coming

    A Darkness Now is Coming by Hope and Social So we’ve had this song kicking around for ages – but it was in a sort of sub-Aqualung piano pop style until we headed into these sessions. All that really remains from previous versions is the first melody line – “Hear me out / Sound for…

    April 29, 2010

  • April, Track 7, Ripples Rock My Boat

    Ripples Rock My Boat by Hope and Social This is a song with a long history and it comes from a demo I (Si here!) did back at the start of 2008. I had a period of about a year where I did a load of recording just using GarageBand and the inbuilt mic on…

    April 27, 2010

  • April, Track 6, James

    James by Hope and Social Right. Well I think all we need to do to explain the origins of this track is to say that the working title was FunmasterJazz. Yes. Indeed. This track came entirely from a jam whilst we were in the writing phase and, until a week before the final mix only…

    April 26, 2010

  • April, Track 5, Follow You Into

    Follow You Into by Hope and Social This song happened just about as naturally as any song can. We’d been writing all day and feeling pretty beaten, I sat down on the sofa in the studio and just started playing the arpeggio guitar part and singing some random lines over the top. Ed joined in…

    April 23, 2010

  • April, Track 4, Let’s Go out Tonight

    Let’s Go Out Tonight by Hope and Social Lovely lovely big brass band… One of my favourites from the album and in some ways the easiest to record (in others not). Came from one of the original demos and we originally recorded it as a very simple song. Si described as a song about the…

    April 22, 2010

  • April, Track 3, Caught in the Wake

    Caught in the Wake by Hope and Social Now this is a curious beast, and despite seeming like an easy win at first it probably gave us more trouble than any other song. It was the first track we started (apart from the drums on Ripples Rock My Boat) and, as Ed kept pointing out…

    April 21, 2010

  • April, Track 2, “Pitching Far Too High”

    Right…let us continue… track 2, Pitching Far Too High Pitching Far Too High by Hope and Social We’ve been kicking this around for a little while and Ed, Rich and I had done a 12 minute demo which just looped round and round the “All that I know now” and the end choral section. It…

    April 20, 2010

  • April, Track 1, “April”

    Morning all. Today we release our second full album, April and we thought we’d try and write a few words about each track over the next week or 10 days… I’ll start the ball rolling but I’m hoping the others might chip in along the way… So without further ado… April is our second full…

    April 19, 2010

  • GO GO GO! April released today!

    OK calm down, calm down, stop pushing, stop pushing…one at a time, one at a time, there’s plenty for everyone. Ladies and Gentlemen, boys and girls… NEW ALBUM APRIL OUT NOW! Yes, your eyes don’t lie, the truth stands buzzing before you like an overweight bee. Our new album April is now available as simple download…

    April 19, 2010