2004 - France
Post-Rock, Indie Rock, Indie Folk
This is Hitch, a peculiar little stick man one day drawn on the corner of a napkin during a boozy dinner. Five friends, Martin, Fanny, Sylvain, Guillaume and Jean-Christophe all musicians, were talking about a band they knew called Alain Delon Goes Pop, a funny name that inspired this drawing, also a mix between cinema and pop culture. Slightly inspired by Hitchcock’s North by Northwest, Hitch is full of fear, with an absurd expression like a caricature of Edvard Munch’s The Scream. This is how they found the name for the band, at the beginning of the 21st century, HitchcockGoHome!. The quintet from Grenoble then moved to Paris in order to start recording their first album, Yes You’re Dead! From Nick Drake, Bert Jansch, to Godspeed You! Black Emperor and dEUS, their influences are wide, without ever trying to belong to one genre. If we want to pigeonhole their music, it would probably lie somewhere between folk and post-rock. But mostly, HitchcockGoHome! is a French band sliding through their influences and states of mind to create something marvelously free.
Just like Alfred Hitchcock, this is not only about music, it’s about being cinematic. The collective is made of five musicians, and among them, three guitars, one bass and a banjo (as well as other instruments depending on what they want). The banjo, this beautifully sounding but rarely used instrument is one of the main tool they use to compose the melodies of their song. The opening song, Blank, is an extraordinary ballad driven by a banjo, a soft voice, with some trumpet apparitions. Picture yourself on a ride somewhere in the desert, or climbing a mountain, picture yourself moving, moving forward, reaching your objective. This is the feeling. Blank isn’t empty, it’s about introspection, releasing your fears and your determination to keep moving. Blank is the perfect way to introduce the listener to their universe, with its slow build-up with a relentless rhythm.
All along the nine tracks, it’s all in the details. Not a single song sounds like the other. After the efficient rock of Coward Song, the collective finds solace again on How to Stop It Now, an eight-minute gem where strings shines like in a chamber orchestra. The collective isn’t afraid to visit more noisy environments on Night Falls and Misty, displaying a brilliant ability to explore everything the instruments they’re using can do. Yes You’re Dead! is also structured by two voices g (Martin and Fanny), hiding discreetly in the background for the most part, but always here when the songs need more power. The use of voices and instruments with such tiny details is the precise place where post-rock encounters folk. This is their singularity. And if Blank left you thinking this was going to be a joyous ride, you now know you were wrong. With End of Me and What Have We Done? among others, HithcockGoHome! keep descending the dark path of a disenchanted world.
Somewhere lies a threat. If Hitch is scared on the cover, it’s probably because there is nothing else on the cover except a potentially dangerous plane. But he is alone. The last thing he has is stories. On I’m Not Dead, the band reflects on a news they read about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict where a man miraculously survived a bombing. On Misty, the lyrics are inspired from a miscellaneous news item that happened in 2002 when Judith Ann Black (a pseudonym) was finally found after 22 years on the run for the murder of her husband. These are stories of the world we live in, tinted of absurdity and nonsense. HitchcokGoHome! sounds like a scream telling the master of suspense to pack up his stories and go, to leave us alone so we can finally face ourself, letting go of the world around. And Yes You’re Dead! is focusing on every details within this scream. My father bought this album a long time ago. A small coffer that you open with care, revealing a piece of papier with “de l’amour” (of love) written on it, a fake green leaf, a simple booklet, and the sacred CD. It looks like a relic, and the sound coming out of it is just as precious.
Just like Alfred Hitchcock, this is not only about music, it’s about being cinematic. The collective is made of five musicians, and among them, three guitars, one bass and a banjo (as well as other instruments depending on what they want). The banjo, this beautifully sounding but rarely used instrument is one of the main tool they use to compose the melodies of their song. The opening song, Blank, is an extraordinary ballad driven by a banjo, a soft voice, with some trumpet apparitions. Picture yourself on a ride somewhere in the desert, or climbing a mountain, picture yourself moving, moving forward, reaching your objective. This is the feeling. Blank isn’t empty, it’s about introspection, releasing your fears and your determination to keep moving. Blank is the perfect way to introduce the listener to their universe, with its slow build-up with a relentless rhythm.
All along the nine tracks, it’s all in the details. Not a single song sounds like the other. After the efficient rock of Coward Song, the collective finds solace again on How to Stop It Now, an eight-minute gem where strings shines like in a chamber orchestra. The collective isn’t afraid to visit more noisy environments on Night Falls and Misty, displaying a brilliant ability to explore everything the instruments they’re using can do. Yes You’re Dead! is also structured by two voices g (Martin and Fanny), hiding discreetly in the background for the most part, but always here when the songs need more power. The use of voices and instruments with such tiny details is the precise place where post-rock encounters folk. This is their singularity. And if Blank left you thinking this was going to be a joyous ride, you now know you were wrong. With End of Me and What Have We Done? among others, HithcockGoHome! keep descending the dark path of a disenchanted world.
Somewhere lies a threat. If Hitch is scared on the cover, it’s probably because there is nothing else on the cover except a potentially dangerous plane. But he is alone. The last thing he has is stories. On I’m Not Dead, the band reflects on a news they read about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict where a man miraculously survived a bombing. On Misty, the lyrics are inspired from a miscellaneous news item that happened in 2002 when Judith Ann Black (a pseudonym) was finally found after 22 years on the run for the murder of her husband. These are stories of the world we live in, tinted of absurdity and nonsense. HitchcokGoHome! sounds like a scream telling the master of suspense to pack up his stories and go, to leave us alone so we can finally face ourself, letting go of the world around. And Yes You’re Dead! is focusing on every details within this scream. My father bought this album a long time ago. A small coffer that you open with care, revealing a piece of papier with “de l’amour” (of love) written on it, a fake green leaf, a simple booklet, and the sacred CD. It looks like a relic, and the sound coming out of it is just as precious.