Van Gogh, to Sylvia Plath, to The Smiths. Descending from this long line of miserablists, Olympians, the Norwich 4 piece who last year instructed listeners to Dance Like Everybody’s Watching and They Hate You, return later this month with their new collection of tone poems for disaffected millennials, the aptly named Reasons to be Tearful.
Ahead of its release, we’re delighted to be able to premiere their first slice of sadness, ‘Cinema Hotdog’, an ode to the escapism offered by the big screen to an estranged lover. Hopelessly self-deprecating, the track finds vocalist Dan Harvey lamenting an inability to match up to ‘bright sitcom scenes’, instead offering ‘something real and fine and broken and rotten’. Musically, the track matches the emotional heft of such lyrics with rousing emo guitar lines, glockenspiel twinkles and crowd singalongs.
If this whets your appetite for world-weary math-pop musings, be sure to keep your eye out for the album on 23rd June via Barely Regal and Neat Is Murder. In the meantime, get yourself further in the mood by visiting http://reasonstobetearful.com for a collection of spirit-crushing aphorisms, musings and statements (personal favourite – ‘you don’t hate parties, parties hate you’).