Release Date: Jan 14, 2022
Genre(s): Pop/Rock, Alternative/Indie Rock
Record label: PIAS
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Artists often refer to their albums as their babies, but Orlando Weeks has more reason than most for cradling his two long players to date. Hop Up, his second solo album in seven months, finds the former Maccabees frontman preoccupied with fatherhood, which has developed since the formative stages of the first. That record was A Quickening, capturing the anticipation and barely concealed terror around the big life event of becoming a parent for the first time.
Born from song-writing sessions at home and late-night recording in a studio in Peckham during 2021, Hop Up is the sound of an all-consuming love that embraces the joy of nurturing another life in an unusual and disjointed time. Listeners are bathed in the brightness of Weeks' world from the genial sounds, the soft "ooohs" and whistles on opener "Deep Down Way Out," and this warm feeling radiates with the help of The Maccabees frontman's pure, idiosyncratic vocals. Whilst his debut solo record A Quickening was heavily absorbed in the moments of excitement --and anxiety that came with new parenthood -- on Hop Up Weeks invites listeners to share in the unfiltered joy of his reflections on such a unique time.
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