By Yasmin Brown
Oct 4, 2020 14:56
It's come a little later than hoped, but The Hunna have finally released their third album, ‘I’d Rather Die Than Let You In’, a wonderfully experimental progression in the band’s career, and a testament to their unwillingness to stand still. The band have taken their fierce foundations and built on them to create a brand new yet still recognisable sound, trusting their fans to follow them on this journey of growth, and they’re “very, very excited” about it finally being out in the world.
While no one wants the current global pandemic to be a focal point when releasing new music, it’s hard to avoid when it’s having such an impact on the music industry. For The Hunna, it’s meant that by the time of its release, the album has been recorded for nearly a year, and certain ideas they had for music videos that accompany some of the tracks have had to be scrapped in favour of something entirely new. Whether that was filming from a distance, or reusing live footage, The Hunna had to find ways around the restrictions and have pulled it off expertly, not letting anything stand in their way.
“We had to really keep our distance and literally created all the music videos ourselves. We also had to do one where we used lots of old live footage, from our tour we did last year from like Europe, the US and UK, and kind of mash up loads of different footage. And then we had a track called ‘If This Is Love’, featuring Phem, and she’s based in LA and had to record stuff from her apartment, and we had to record stuff from our apartment and then we sent it across to do lots of editing. So I guess we have been more creative, yeah, in trying to make things happen – it’s just pretty crazy but I’m glad we definitely got it done which is brilliant.”
While much of their music comes from a place of anger and frustration, what’s clear is that the band members are actually a self professed “bunch of hippies”, and as such they manage to find the positive in every negative. While Covid has changed most things for the worse, it’s important to acknowledge the things that will have changed for the better, and Dan is convinced that moving forwards, musical collaborations will be easier now that we’ve discovered ways to do things from across oceans.
“I actually genuinely believe that after [Covid] we’re gonna start working this way. It’s way more productive and it’s quicker. We’ve even had writing sessions again with some of our friends in LA and we’re gonna write over Zoom which is pretty crazy, and we’ve had all our meetings with our record label over Zoom.”
It’s opened up a whole new world of collaboration for musicians, and to be able to not just write music but also film and edit an entire music video from across the world shows just how much more opportunity this international disaster has also been able to open up.
And it’s not just ways of working that have the potential to improve. Dan notes other aspects of life that benefit from this newly discovered virtual collaboration, not least the environment, acknowledging that if more musicians were to take this approach, not only would writing music be more efficient, but the reduction in travel would have a direct impact on pollution levels, too. While it’s possible (probable, even) that pixelated faces and bad internet connections could prevent things from running as smoothly as we would like (and nothing really beats that face to face back and forth), what’s been proven is that we can push through anything and continue to make art that resonates.
And that’s always been the most important thing for The Hunna: that the music resonates with the fans. Everything they do is with them in mind, as they’re all too aware of the part these people play in the band’s success and their ability to live their dream.
“Without them we wouldn’t be where we are today. There’s this mutual respect of being really appreciative of having fans and people who listen to our music.”
To be able to reach even more of their fans, then, is a huge bonus for The Hunna. Where before, listening parties might have been limited to major cities, excluding a huge portion of their fan base, the current circumstances have allowed them to reach out to even more people, and not just through a like or a retweet, but actually through spoken conversation using these newly embraced online tools.
“We’ve even had fan parties where we’ve released some singles and it’s really cool ‘cause we get to really interact with them and talk with them over Zoom and have listening parties and stuff like that. In a way I actually think it’s created a really cool thing for the music industry and the people within it, you know?
“We want to try and reach and connect with as many people around the world as possible. So I guess this kind of situation, it’s given us that platform and idea to do it.”