‘Never Settle’ is the debut album from Milton Keynes based duo Hope In High Water, and perfectly encapsulates the wanderlust and sense of movement that carries through their music and their lives.
Both spent much of their childhood travelling, Carly with her dad’s work that pulled her from place to place and country to country and Josh with his Blues musician parents who showed him the joys of a bustling bar on a Saturday night.
These experiences left a longing in the pair that would lead both to independently start bands and tour the UK and Europe throughout their early twenties.
Surprisingly, considering that together they have gone on to be at the fore of the UK Americana/folk scene, both Josh and Carly started out in the punk scene, night after night churning out high energy performances and angry, politically charged music.
This sometimes comes as a shock to those who have come to know the pair for their intense and authentic brand of folk. However, it is from these roots that Hope In High Water developed a strong belief in the importance of honest and sincere song writing and a taste for the darker elements of the American folk tradition. By combining that approach with an intense love of various traditional forms of music from blues to country, folk to soul, the pair has found an original way of interpreting these traditional sounds.
It is through the travelling lifestyle that the two were to meet in a London venue in 2010. Crossing paths again several years later, the pair quickly formed a bond and within months were both living together and beginning to collaborate musically. With the demise of both of their respective bands, Josh and Carly both quickly began to feel that familiar pull of the road and decided to take the dark, roots inspired brand of folk they had been honing at home out into the world.
Shortly before coming together, both Josh and Carly had worked through personal challenges that would become highly influential in the writing of ‘Never Settle’, Josh having lost one of his best friends to cancer and Carly confronting the turbulent fallout of years of addiction and the challenges of staying sober. In this way the album shifts between light and dark, savouring in blessings whilst also coming to terms with and openly discussing the darker more challenging parts of life.
The music itself draws heavily on the lonesome, soulful influence of America’s musical traditions, reminiscent at times of the field songs of the south or the blues of the Delta and combining this with modern folk/Americana/country influences such as Justin Townes Earle, Shovels & Rope and Andrew Combs.
That said, Josh and Carly are acutely aware of their own roots, being based here in the new city - a million miles from Route 66 or the romanticism of the American landscape.
Their debut EP ‘When Sorrow Calls’ was issued last year to stirring reviews, and they have stage-shared with prominent artists in the scene including Nikki Lane, Willie Watson (Old Crow Medicine Show), Cale Tyson and Beans on Toast.
'Never Settle' was recorded in a mere four days with Luke Yates (Crazy Arm). The process was swelled by drummer Darren Capp and Luke on fiddle, helping to create the full, warm sound of a band recording without losing the intimacy that the songs required.
They share a hope that in a music industry full of idealised versions and un-realistic aspirations, a glimpse of vulnerability, honesty but also hope and appreciation for the simpler joys, may provide some with a renewed sense of interest in the UK’s burgeoning folk scene...
For music and more information, check in with Hope in High Water here
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