Album Review: HONNE - 'OUCH'
HONNE’s Ouch is a rewarding, ethereal, Sunday morning autumn listen that feels like a relaxing, warm hug – but at the same time, an ode to parenthood and the lessons learnt from therapy. It’s a personal album for the London based two piece, Andy Clutterbuck and James Hutcher – who herald their arrival with single “Girl in the Orchestra”. It’s a mixup of a variety of instruments that collide with the anthems of their youth, and opens the album with a delightful ode to the past following the short Serenade in E Major – it’s a lengthy album, coming in at just under fifty minutes, so buckle up – we’re in it for the long haul – Girl in the Orchestra has the band singing against a girl in the Orchestra, who the lead is obsessed with, and it’s based off Andy Clutterbuck’s own experiences of joining the Orchestra to get closer to her. The music reflects that, eclectic, clumsy and messy – a build-at-home song that feels authentically raw and deliberately whimsy. Not a bad way to start an album that muses from 90s hip hop to 21st century pop.
What follows is fifteen songs of tight, focused, if not groundbreaking but consistently entertaining music. SHHH joins Serenade in E Major in being an eclectic collection of building chaos that leans into Imaginary, a song about making up first meetings – complete with a stop motion animated video - “someone like you don’t talk to someone like this guy,” has the band narrating about This Ain’t One of Those Imaginary Tunes, Where Imaginary Me Meets Imaginary You, It Happened and It actually came true,” switches gears a tad from Girl in the Orchestra to tell the story of a relationship forming that almost feels too good to be real, the constant nagging of self-doubt about whether or not this is actually real running through the middle of the song. Dents in the Sofa then follows – about a deeply personal tune about life; questions – and the possibility of losing a loved one. It’s deeply affecting, and learning the story about Andy’s wife coming close to dying during the birth of his first child, it’s hard not to find meaning and desperation in these words, coming to term with potential loss.
Happy Day is brighter – a song about the ideal day, and we’re back to a short gap with Strawberry. The best track on the album is its final one, Life_ you only get one, a Wes Anderson-esque ballad about making the most out of life, above the ground. There’s no need to hurry because it’s not getting any longer, it encourages you to slow down and concentrate on making memories. There’s nothing groundbreaking about any of the lyrics here, we’ve heard all of this before, but there’s a touch of charm and whimsy about HONNE that makes it instantly appealing. There’s even an harmonica in Life_you only get one, making the song a surefire favourite with me. It’s a message to Andy’s children after all, and the audience – and as good as a song to end on as any.
Backseat Driver is the latest single and the one that accompanied the album release earlier this week. Like the whole album, it feels therapeutic, introspective, self-reflecting. It’s a song that allows Andy Clutterbuck the chance to look at life from the outside in, enjoying the backseat and going unnoticed for a change rather than being someone more outgoing, reflecting on the clash of the introvert and the extrovert. More importantly this album is the band’s own – there are no walk-on roles here which dominated their last album, Khalid, Griff, Niki and Pink Sweats, and instead it’s a narrative, of life, evolving from that of a teenage crush to a family lifestyle. Dents in the Sofa is the band’s most emotional core – reflecting on Andy’s close brush with fate and the near loss of his wife - “If there weren’t any NHS staff or doctors around she probably would have died,” he notes in the album’s press release. “There was this moment in the hospital when a big red button was pressed, the room flooded with doctors and I was pushed to the back. The lyrics imagine she had gone, and there’s just a dent in the sofa where she once was. It’s a dark story, but it’s ultimately a positive experience to come through it.” You can only imagine how hard a subject it would have been to come to grips with, and how therapeutic it would’ve been for him.
Ouch is playful, inviting, a coming of age tale that feels like a very strong, if well-worn entry to the alt pop genre. It’s effortlessly cool and shows an embrace of pop soul that encourages self-reflection and improvement, whilst remembering to show that yes, we can be vulnerable too.
Words by Milo MJ
