Track By Track: Holy Esque on At Hope's Ravine

The troupe ensnared our hearts with the harrowing "Oslo", striking "Tear", and blistering "Hexx" - each song is a different look into a deeply dark sound riddled with beams of bright, white hope.

Lead vocalist Pat Hynes - a man whose voice quivers with every throat-shredding howl - has written the Track By Track guide, which gets into the symbolism, character studies, and redemptive themes of the LP.

Listen to stunning single "Tear" below, and get to know At Hope's Ravine after.

Prism

“Prism”, like another prominent song featuring on the record, was written as part of a set, meant for an EP that never came to fruition. With those other songs it means something more, but on its own the original idea was to try and represent a state of mind ('Prism') concerning three things – the past, the present, and the future. This fact also connects back to the title with the number three and the title – "Prism". The song attempts to highlight the character's personal inability to fathom what each part represents and where it takes him.

I find the opening line very fitting as it introduces a lot of feeling and intent:

Cold broken child on a path through the wild
Holding life on your way to the light

It sets you up for what to expect from the album. The finishing line is quite harrowing and again, I think it emphasises the general feel of what the album is and where it’s going to take you:

At my Prism
Final breath

Rose

“Rose” is about humanising something from nothing. Whenever I try and depict an idea, in order to make things more transparent I’ll try and connect the idea with a form of imagery or abstraction. For this song it was a catholic rosary. The idea that you could believe in something, that was never really there. Trying to relate to things that you can really take nothing from. It captures a lot of themes that are present in the album like darkness/light, hope, belonging, fear, and it can even be interpreted as love with the title possibly hinting at a persons name.

Hexx

This is one of the oldest tracks on the album. The song touches on lost love and the fear of losing good things close to you. It centres on the destruction of things close to oneself, through your own repeated bad habits and the paralysing inability to find the way out. In the crescendo, the character sees the error of his ways and discovers a path to liberate himself, finding hope when there was none.

Covenant (ill)

“Covenant (ill)” surrounds failing to recognise your true position and place in life. It’s about fear of having everything, but truly having nothing. The question of whether one’s dissatisfaction with their personal situation is just or not.

The title suggests towards making an agreement or connection with something that holds unknown negative consequences. Those negative fears come true but through that we realise that we want more than we have and we need more than we have.

Silences

"Silences" is the other song from that set destined for an EP. Quite simply the song is about fate, pre-destiny, and everything that entails from fear and time, to the unknown itself.

Doll House

“Doll House” is a track that has a connection with two other Holy Esque songs. “LadyBird Love”, “Oslo”, and “Doll House” are three tracks with directly follow the sad tale of a prostitute who loses her way, eventually being murdered in the “Oslo” finale.

It touches on the lives of her children and the overall way in which she comes to an end. It’s a powerful track that highlights the more emotive side of the band.

Strange

The primary theme in “Strange” is love/hate, which is channelled through the eyes of the character in the song. It delves further into the complication of emotions as an example to show the opposites that exist in things all around us. An example I had used in past to visualise this better would one of addiction. The love side being the addiction itself and the hate being all the terrible things associated with that.

Tear

“Tear” is a great example of two of the central themes throughout the album – darkness/light and hope. The song has an emotional weight and looks at the ever-constant fears and woes of every day life against the hope of something better. It touches on escapism and the pursuit of greater things. It’s essential to the history and makeup of Holy Esque today in the way it captures a lot of core, recurring themes and ideas.

My Wilderness

“My Wilderness” is one of the newer tracks to feature on the album. It’s a more honest and vulnerable moment than usually, personally put forward. I experienced a death in the family and the song surrounds that and everything it entails. The shock, sadness, and final acceptance. This track, like certain others, seems to carry a greater weight. Something that can’t be described.

St

“St” revolves around appreciation and belief, in life and in oneself. It portrays a character that loses everything around him through an actual fear of loss itself, which in turn, results in bitter tragedy.

The religious imagery present in the track is used to highlight the helplessness of the character’s situation when he turns to pray to a Saint with no name. The metaphor here is that the character is lost, with no idea who or where to go to. The song highlights the ever present dangers of losing things close to you.

At Hope’s Ravine

“At Hope’s Ravine” is the grand finale, the crescendo, the ultimate culmination of all ideas and themes scattered throughout the album.

This song, like certain others has a much deeper emotional connection. It is the one song that truly captures the waves of feeling felt all over these tracks. It involves hope, fear, pre-destiny, love, anger, belonging, escapism, and more. It’s the idea that hope is so close yet the chance of losing everything is ever present and ever dangerous.

I think the final verse perfectly captures the overall feeling of the album:

As I cry
This fallen try
Remember hope
Son you can cope
Oh I can see you now

At Hope's Ravine is out now via Beyond The Frequency. Have a listen below, and then check out their upcoming live dates afterwards.

April

6 - The Underground Plymouth
7 - Mono Falmouth
8 - Carriers Bude
10 - Moles Bath
13 - Soup Kitchen Manchester
14 - Liverpool Arts Club Liverpool
15 - The Sugarmill Stoke on Trent
16 - Sunflower Lounge Birmingham
20 - Lexington London
22 - Esquires Bedford
23 - Lennon's Southampton
24 - The Boileroom Guildford
25 - The Portland Arms Cambridge
27 - The Cookie Leicester
28 - The Bodega Nottingham
29 - Picture House Social Sheffield

May

1 - Think Tank? Newcastle
19-21 - The Great Escape Brighton