BIG SPECIAL announce their debut album, POSTINDUSTRIAL HOMETOWN BLUES
BIG SPECIAL have announced their debut album, POSTINDUSTRIAL HOMETOWN BLUES, alongside their first new music of 2024, in the shape of lead single, "DUST OFF / START AGAIN".
“’DUST OFF / START AGAIN’ is a bolt of cursed vomit, spewed into a stewpot of English class issues regarding housing, ownership, mental illness, appropriation and human rights. It’s about the disregard for the common man. And how it is expected of anyone, regardless of their situation, to carry on, struggle through and go to work," says lead singer Joe Hicklin.
"It’s about how the privileged and powerful attempt to define, debate and justify the social positions of all whilst the ideals of our governing systems are pressed upon the working-class youth, so that they quietly accept their role as a commodity and place blame on each other, as they wave the flag that keeps them down.”
Continuing about the album he says: “POSTINDUSTRIAL HOMETOWN BLUES is an album about depression. It's about the different shapes it takes; personal, social, generational... and it's about coming face to face with those ghosts and what we do or how we feel when that happens. The album offers no answers, it is just an honest expression of a working-class experience in modern England through the eyes of ill mental health, a pursuit of art and political disenchantment; a story of rumination, realisation and reaction.
"POSTINDUSTRIAL HOMETOWN BLUES is about learning that we are connected by our common struggles and though dark and rageful, the album holds a quiet sentiment of love and hope. It's about laughing at the face of the void, recognising its oppressive weight, holding hands and moving forward.”
POSTINDUSTRIAL HOMETOWN BLUES is set for release on 10 May via SO Recordings, and is available to pre-order now.
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