Following the release of their highly-praised debut album ‘Goodbye, Blue Monday’ last year, with the singles going on to receive airplay on BBC Radio 1 and BBC Radio London, named as Jack Saunders’ New Wave, and receiving tastemaker support from the likes of The Line Of Best Fit, CLASH, GIGWISE, Indie Shuffle, Wonderland, Fault Magazine, The Most Radicalist, Atwood Magazine and Record of the Day, indie-psych heroes Hi Frisco today release a new collection of stripped-back renditions lifted from their initial full-length.
Dubbed the ‘Living Room Versions’, the new four-track EP features reworked and lo-fi examples of some of the record’s standout offerings. Led up by the new version of ‘Drift’, the pair looks to create a more cosy and laid-back approach to their sound, creating a more intimate atmosphere throughout and adding a new layer to their dexterous sound.
Speaking about the new release, the band said, “These versions happened whilst making other plans… We wanted to do a live stream with our rhythm section as company, but due to lockdown we didn’t feel comfortable doing so. Instead, we stripped the songs back from their many many layers, playing them as the two of us + our beloved miniPops drum machine… We liked the way they sounded in this form, but they were perhaps a little too exposed for us… To find a happy balance, we limited ourselves to 6 tracks per song, mimicking our live stage set up in an ideal world, just with 3x ourselves instead of other musicians.”
Goodbye, Blue Monday (Living Room Versions) tracklisting:
- Drift (Living Room Version)
- The War (Living Room Version)
- Headspin (Living Room Version)
- Goodbye, Blue Monday (Living Room Version)
Hi Frisco are also planning to make a return to the stage later this year, with a short UK headline tour planned for November 2021. Full details and dates will be announced in the coming months.
The pair, originally hailing from Blackpool (Henry) and Yorkshire (Felix), create in their studio, Calmer Than You Are (one of the many Big Lebowski references surrounding the studio) based in a block of creative spaces in East London. They built the studio with another friend, kitting it out to be cosy enough for them to virtually live out of while promoting creativity. It’s the kind of place to lose days in, though you’d be safe in the knowledge that anything put down in this space would no doubt come out sounding special. What they create is the perfect middle ground between experimentation and smart pop writing.
Named after a greeting from the novel, Atlas Shrugged – Henry has been writing and performing as a session musician and guitarist for several years, with work alongside Say Lou Lou, Chlöe Howell, Sunset Sons and Sparkadia. Felix, meanwhile, takes on more of a producer role in the two. He’s worked as a studio engineer with some of the biggest names in the game and has also produced songs for some of Britain’s most exciting new bands like YAK, Crows, Babeheaven and more.
“Around the end of 2017 I’d written a load of demos and no idea what the fuck I wanted to do,” Henry says about their origins. The pair started running in the same circles in London towards the end of 2017, and when Henry took them to Felix in a casual capacity, the two hit it off creatively immediately. They bonded over bands like Love, The Beatles, Kinks as well as current bands like Metronomy, Unknown Mortal Orchestra and Caribou and this lead to the conception of Hi Frisco.
Hi Frisco are: Henry Eastham and Felix Rashman
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