The Lounge Society released their debut album Tired of Liberty via Speedy Wunderground and produced by Dan Carey in 2022. A run of singles, their own headline tour, festival appearances including SXSW and Lytham Festival alongside Fontaines D.C. and The Strokes, dates in Japan and remixes (A Certain Ratio‘s mix of ‘Cain’s Heresy’ remains a highlight), all followed. I caught up with guitarists Hani Paskin-Hussain and Herbie May in their spiritual home, The Golden Lion in Todmorden, keen to learn just why things have been so quiet for the band since. It transpires they have a second album all ready to go, but such is the brutal nature of the music industry they have no support to release it. The Lounge Society is completed by Cameron Davey (vocals, bass) and Archie Dewis (drums).
I read an interview that you did a few months ago, which seemed to infer that things just came to a halt for The Lounge Society.
Herbie: Yeah I mean we hit a brick wall pretty hard actually after the release of the album. Certainly the business side of things didn’t go where we thought after having an album that had that kind of impact. So that was a bit difficult. I think all of us in our personal lives were exhausted, to be honest. The stress of trying to make the album the best it could be, to write another one, to tour, to still live a normal life, and burning the candle at both ends, if you know what I mean. I think things came to a head, and then you find yourself with a blank calendar, and not so linked into the industry, not as much security as you thought you had. So what do you do in that situation? We just picked up guitars. We went upstairs (here at The Golden Lion) and we wrote another record, and now we’re, I think, totally different people, with a totally new set of things to say and no way of saying it, no way of getting it out there. That’s the honest thing. But we have an album finished. It’s very different to the first and, it’s been a total reinvention from the bottom to the top.
Herbie: There’s been no industry involvement in the making of this record, there’s been no advice from a label. There’s been no one in our ear giving us creative input. It’s been the four of us and the environment that it’s been recorded in. I think often with a second record, there’s a process where you hear “Here’s what was successful about the first. You need to write more songs like that. Your fast songs of streaming more, or the ones where you sing streaming more”, that is how second records get created. They get A and R’d into existence from track one to the end, and ours is not going to be like that. Ours is just the band in a room making their own decisions. We did well enough to warrant a second go, I think, not that that’s even necessarily the metric of whether or not you should put out another album. But there are bands with two albums out who didn’t do as much business as us. I think we earned a place in music.
Hani: A few things happened very quickly, at the wrong time. Maybe if one of those things had happened, we’d have felt alright, but when two or three or four things happen in quite a short space of time, it definitely grinds you down. There is the literal obstacles it presents: having a label to release music, having finances to go into studios, all the same things that bands have had to deal. It’s not necessarily a new story, but there’s the mental side of it too. You do get to a point where you’re juggling life and you want to put everything into the band. You get to certain age where, okay, so you need to have a job to make money, like everyone does. I’m not talking about it like it’s a brand new story, but overall that’s been the hardest thing. But with all the things we’ve been through, I think we’ve come out of it in a good way. And it’s definitely meant that we’ve had more time to just focus on the songs themselves. If we’re going to be sat here without a record deal, without a tour then let’s make a really fucking good record.
In what ways are these songs different from Tired of Liberty?
Herbie: I think, from my perspective, the songs are a delivery system of what we want to say. I like the way the album sounds, but to me that’s just the best way getting our opinions out, how we think or descriptions of what we’ve been through, our opinions about the world. I think the songs proceed the music, if that makes sense. I’m more excited about that because I think it’s the meaning coming before anything technical, and hopefully that comes through. I think each song has a message or a way of conveying meaning rather than something that just happens to come out through sonic experimentation.
Hani: I think we’re more sure of what we’re trying to do now. We’ve 12 plus songs for the album and we’re now getting to the point where we’re going through every song and cutting the fat, discussing arrangements. Now it’s about making sure that the idea in our heads, making sure it gets across to everyone else.
Herbie: I think the reason it’s different is because, although we’ve had quite a unique experience for people our age (The Lounge Society signed for Speedy Wunderground for the album Tired of Liberty as teenagers), I do think that confusion is fairly common to our generation, going through a period of a few years of mania followed by waking up one morning and not knowing what’s coming next in life. Because of the state of the entire political situation in the country, and because of what decisions you’ve made, whether that was to get going in a band and tour the country, or whether that was to study a degree and be told at the end this is never going to get you the job. I think that’s a fairly ubiquitous experience for people at our age. I think people will be able to see that this record is about that carnage and uncertainty of young adulthood, because that’s where people make decisions about their lives. Everyone’s still there a little bit, however old they are, because either it’s coming that thing where you make your first step into the world, or it’s still affecting you, that period of your life. I hope that this is a decent expression of the frustrations and the highs and lows of that period of life. And I don’t think the first record was that, it was something else. It was maybe more scattered topically. This is something which I really hope can be part of the conversation about what it means to be that age and not know what’s coming next, because we still don’t. We don’t know where our lives are going.
You were asked to do a fundraiser at The Golden Lion for Crisis but the request was for an acoustic set. I understand that was a learning experience for you.
Herbie: Yeah, going back to zero. On an acoustic guitar you can’t have fazer and you don’t have a high hat to rely on, it’s just about delivering what you’ve written in a kind of abstract sense, as though the sheet music, as though the words written on the page and the sound of your voice have nowhere to hide. And so going back there, while we were still writing those songs and performing some of the new songs for the first time in a totally unvarnished way, it taught us how to write better. I think we were still able to get the songs across and still create the emotion, through the notes of choosing the words, and how fast you do it. That’s what songs are. We had to go right back, were forced to learn the basics and have something to say. Because if you can’t move someone with the acoustic version then all you have is an inflated version of that in the end.
You’ve announced a gig at The Golden Lion on 27 September (now sold out) and Mutations festival in Brighton in November. What would ideally be the next steps for The Lounge Society?
Herbie: We just need one person to take a risk on a band who aren’t pretending they’re the best band in the world. A band who have an album ready to go, who care about what they’re doing. Who are committed and will do whatever it takes to make it work. In an ideal world, someone at a label to take a punt on an album. Someone to bet on us, to roll the dice because we’ll do our end of the business. We’ll turn up to those shows whether there’s 1000 people or no one there, we will do the drive, we’ll lose the cash, we’ll eat horrible foods!
Hani: All the most important albums in our record collection weren’t what was trending at the time, or what the industry wanted to happen, whether it’s Bowie or Iggy, or whatever, there are numerous examples. There were albums that came out and didn’t really fit in. I’m not saying this album is going to change people’s perspective of music, because it probably won’t. But it might be refreshing for some people who are quite sick of state of the music industry. I do think it feels like it’s time for there to be a resurgence in guitar music and proper songs, like Herbie was saying earlier on about songs that we played on the acoustic guitar. I think we’ve always had that philosophy, we’ve always had that thing of getting together. A lot of the songs for this album were written in my bedroom or Herbies bedroom with two acoustic guitars, and then you plug it in, and that’s the fun. We love making lots of noise. I’m sure we’re not on our own with this, I’m sure there’s numerous bands who also don’t have a record deal and maybe have never released an album, who are trying to do the same thing. They’re also trying to write songs with their mates on acoustic guitars and trying to get them out. We’re not on our own with this. We just happen to have we got one foot in, you know.
Herbie: I agree with that. There is a tide, basically an uncontrollable tide. I think it’s only a matter of time, there are so many people who really feel they have something to say, who have no way of saying it, it’s a story as old as time. We literally used to be able to get our music out, now we can’t out. We can’t get the economics right, but that’s the state of the music industry. That’s what’s going on. And like you say, there will be a load of bands, and there will be a load of artists – eventually it has to explode. I didn’t used to think this was true, but actually, having been through a hard time I do now genuinely think that expressing yourself through song or hearing someone else do the same can actually get you through things. I really believe that now. And for the younger generation particularly there is an economic war on creativity and if we lose that war people turn to other outlets.
It’s a part of the human condition, isn’t it? We need creativity in all its forms, and we need the shared experience.
Herbie: The truth is payday makes people safe, it doesn’t make people happy. We all know that we only have a certain amount of time left, and what we’re all trying to do is be happy. People need a way of getting their feelings out there.
Hani: For a while I would listen to a band, and if it was really good, I was annoyed it wasn’t me!, which is really egotistical, but it’s true, and that’s what the industry does to you. For a small amount of time, and I can say it now because I’ve come out the other side but it did ruin the only thing that really mattered to me, music. And for a while I found it hard to love the only thing I did love. But a couple of weeks ago, me and Herbie went to a couple of shows in one week: PJ Harvey and The The. The last time we went to show together was probably about a year ago. We both came out of it a bit relieved, our faith had been reignited. Two very different shows. One venue which was nearly 10,000 people, one was about 500 people. We haven’t talked about it, but it has given me a boost of faith.
Herbie: Seeing The The in a small venue was absolutely transformative. We’ve been fans for a long time, but I spent that week doing my research! I mean, I’m still doing it!. Honestly, the impact is insane. I now have a Google doc where I’ve got the entire set list, including the encores and have a full set of lyrics in a script, and I’m going to print it out so I can study what happened that day. You know prior to that I was not having a good time and it was a genuinely uplifting music experience. And I’ve really had very few of those you know, which are totally transformative: Nick Cave, Aldous Harding, PJ Harvey, Kendrick Lamarr, it’s like being reminded of the existence of magic.
The Lounge Society play The Golden Lion, Todmorden on Friday 27 September and Brighton’s Mutations Festival in November.
