Not constantly at the forefront of my consciousness though, thankfully, but always near and available. For hours, days, weeks and sometimes months. Over and over, sometimes with an instrument, but often as a rumination. Once I’ve had that initial breakthrough of having absolutely nothing to having absolutely something I find it difficult not to become obsessed. It’s helpful now for me to ‘make a date’ with myself and gently build up some anticipation and excitement. I suppose it’s very common for songwriters to need to be alone to work but as I get older I have less time to indulge in the creative process. I once wrote a song on a very quiet shift while working on the checkout of a supermarket. I’m sure this is entirely common with writers but worth mentioning! It seems these days I only ever get to have that creative loneliness late at night downstairs with an unplugged electric guitar, once my family are asleep. I have added to those ideas in the rehearsal room in band collaboration or whilst teaching or playing guitar with friends, but the incredible excitement of those first euphoric moments happen to me only when I am alone. I have never had the initial inspirations or you could say the ‘germs’ of a song appear when I have been in any meaningful company. Here, guitarist/vocalist, and self-professed muso, Barry Hyde lifts the lid on his songwriting world… Singles Good Night Out and Jekyll bristle with tension and killer riffs and are instant reminders of why we all fell in love with the band 15 years ago. Having had their difficulties, the band now return with new album Powers. Box office: 01642 674 115.Barry Hyde of The Futureheads’ Songwriting Survival Kit in our Summer 2019 issue The Sunderland post-punk band’s guitarist and vocalist, and self-professed muso, lifts the lid on the ingredients of his songwriting worldįrom the frantic post-punk delights of their eponymous 2004 debut album to the a capella stylings of 2012’s Rant (offering re-workings of the group’s own songs as well as a number of cleverly chosen covers), Sunderland’s The Futureheads were a welcome voice on the UK’s music scene as inventive as they were hair-raising. At Georgian theatre, Stockton-on-Tees, 19 August.Taking in dark showtune Sugar – about “psychic vampirism” – a drunken cabaret cover of Tom Waits’ Lonely intended to “make you feel sick”, and the climactic, stirring pop of Thunder Song, Hyde delivers a brave and powerful confessional akin to Daniel Johnston or Nick Drake. Lyrically, it’s eviscerating: “My friends say I’m insane, I’m not insane,” laments Theme “Who am I tonight, what am I tomorrow?” demands the desperate Monster Again. The opening Malody Suite puts you inside a disorder whereby “half the person disappears for a while” and with a concert pianist’s dexterity, he swerves from sombre introspection to tempestuous outbursts of passion, violence and melodic euphoria. Cue Malody, the piano-led solo album exploring his illness, premiered tonight with chamber ensemble backing and a virtual Vonnegut of dark humour.ĭescribing overdose ballad While We Were Sleeping as “the most morose song ever written in Sunderland”, begging for a record deal and donning Cutler’s trademark hat and glasses for the tribute EP, Hyde leavens a haunting, disturbing and deeply moving hour. Fans of the spasmodic output of indie group the Futureheads might have suspected there was an off-kilter creativity involved, but it took singer Hyde numerous manic episodes, a period of believing he’d died in a cycling accident and three spells in a psychiatric hospital to be diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
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