Exclusive: Futureheads' Barry Hyde Talks New Album

"A few people might be surprised by what they might hear," proclaimed Hyde about the follow-up to the Futureheads' widely-acclaimed 2004 self-titled debut. "I think it's many leaps beyond what we've been doing...it's quite a brave statement of an album."

Hyde also expounded on the quartet's unique, architecturally-conscious recording approach, in which the varied environs of a Scarborough-area farm doubled as a studio: "every room has its own sound and its own personality in any building." The farm has "some very bright-sounding rooms, some dull-sounding rooms for contrast. We used the greenhouse for some guitar parts...we put microphones around the courtyard, we recorded the drums in a cowshed and backing vocals in the stables, we recorded percussion parts in the cellar. [We] used as many spaces as we could."

Working with producer Ben Hillier (Blur, Depeche Mode, Doves) proved especially fruitful, claimed Hyde. Hillier "was very good at putting microphones within rooms...we got on well and worked quickly. He was not too intrusive with ideas in terms of arrangement; he left most of that up to us."

Hyde mused further: "[Hillier's] belief behind recording music is, in my opinion, the only way to approach it: the sounds should sound good immediately, as soon as they're recorded, and not have to be tampered with later on. Get the sounds right in the first place." Post-production studio witchery be damned, man.

Recording's all wrapped up and Hyde is hopeful mixing will see completion in three weeks time. He also happily disclosed several more of the new album's track titles. In addition to the previously reported "Worry", "Thursday", "Yes/No", "Cope", "Fallout", and "The Return of the Beserker", LP2 will feature "Faith", "Knife In The Water", "Back To The Sea", "Skip To The End", and "Munich" (a working title, and most assuredly not an Editors cover).

Fans can expect eleven or twelve original tunes on record number two, culled from a total of 14 recorded tracks--and no off-beat cover to follow-up "Hounds of Love". "We don't play any more covers apart from that one, so we're not going to really bother...although we'll probably do covers again someday," Mr. Hyde revealed.

Ardent perfectionists, the Futureheads are prepping their wares for some springtime touring in the UK, and yes, eventually America. "We like to be able to play [a] song really well the first time, rather than the sixth time [we] play it live...if we try a new song and we don't get it perfectly right the first time, we never play it again." Hyde surmised that at least three songs from The Futureheads have taken years to reach he and the boys' expectations and that as far as live fare goes, the band are, predictably, always looking toward the future. "A couple of the songs are older than this band to me; it's certainly time to say goodbye."

As for that brave statement? "Tempo is the most concrete difference, I suppose," between albums one and two. "There's fewer things on it, a lot more space ... you can dance to it a bit more, but it's not just poppy. It's got really nice, kinda slow-moving grooves, to use a horrible term," Hyde decided, swift to add: "I think when people talk about grooves it makes it sound like they're writing for a guitar magazine."

The Futureheads: http://www.thefutureheads.com/
679: http://www.679recordings.com/
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