Entertainment Editor Stacy Walsh
Hailing from Bristol, Hanging Tree are a dark
and sexy, grungy blues four piece band. The
band just released a video for their beautifully
grungy track “Hanging Tree”. Their music is
raw and loud – an exciting act to emerge from
the UK.
Read our Q&A to learn more about Hanging
Tree – a band you should definitely be
checking out!
Tell me a bit about Hanging Tree? How did
the band come together? What's the band's
line-up?
Tom and Fred were in a band together before
and when that fell apart Fred called Jack, who
he knew from school, and Tom met Dan in a
gin bar.
You describe yourselves as "a dark & sexy,
grungy blues four piece" what bands/artists
have influenced your sound?
We all like very different things so we all end
up influencing each other with our influences.
But at the core of it we try and keep that dark
delta blues feel to the songs.
So your video for the self titled track
"Hanging Tree" just premiered on Vevo, I
believe you directed the video yourselves
how was that? Who else was involved? Any
more you can tell me about the video?
We thought we'd have a crack at one ourselves
and Dan (the star of the video) is an incredibly
talented magician but also happens to be our
close friend. It's a fairly simple concept but we
think the performance is really amazing and it
was the first take. Job done.
Your EP Roots is available to stream on
Soundcloud, where did you record the
tracks? When is the next release? Is the
track "Hanging Tree" off an upcoming EP
or album?
We recorded the whole thing in two days at
Highbury Studios in Birmingham. We love it
there, it's all reel-to-reel and the guys there,
Rob Peters and John Mostyn are just great. We
actually recorded it ages ago it has just taken
us a while to get it all out. “Hanging Tree” is
the last of those songs. In the mean time we've
recorded another whole album we are in the
process of mixing.
Do you have any other releases online that
our readers can check out?
Apart from the “Hanging Tree” video, all the
other songs out are on Soundcloud and they
are all available for free download.
Are you looking forward to the gigs coming
up in March? Any crazy stories from any of
your previous shows?
Yes we're always looking forward to the
upcoming shows, March should be no
exception, some cracking ones booked in. No
especially crazy stories, our shows just seem
to go well.
What do you guys do outside of Hanging
Tree?
We all work in restaurants, pizza-based ones.
What are Hanging Tree's 2015 plans?
Play a bunch of shows, get this next album out,
get better haircuts and get some more videos
out there.
How did you come up with the band name?
The thing we try and do most with the
music is try and show some hope and light
coming out of darkness. You've got to have the
dark to have the light kind of thing. We
thought you can read "Hanging Tree" as both
dark and light. Is this a thing you go to die on?
Hang your hopes and dreams on? Or both? It's
a bit of a metaphor for life in general.
Could you give me some insight into your
songwriting process?
To this point Fred's been writing the songs in
a very "bare-bones" format, teach Tom the
lyrics and outline of a melody and then just
start playing it as a whole band and not stop
till we like how it sounds. It's all pretty quick.
Often the first thing we do with a song is how
it stays.
Any festival appearances planned for the
summer?
We're doing the festival booking at the
moment, very arduous process but hopefully
worth it for our first festival season.
What music are you listening to lately? Any
new music catching your attention?
We all listen to different stuff but at the
moment it’s hard to ignore The Fat White
Family, The Wytches and Slaves. They're all
doing things right by us. We went to see Yak
the other night and they were an absolute
force, everyone needs to see them.
Check out the brand new video for self titled
track “Hanging Tree” at
http://www.hangingtree.co.uk/
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