The Beat Surrender

Hitchcock release their brand new single Smack Boom on 18th May through Starbase Music and The Beat Surrender took the opportunity to grab Matt Droog and Andy Huckvale together to discuss amongst other things Duran Duran, scaring the punters and what their plans are for the rest of the year.

Duran Duran’s Nick Rhodes has described you as ‘’one of those rare bands who capture your imagination’’. Indeed, one of the striking things about Hitchcock is the range of influences from music, film, theatre, art and fashion. Tell me how these all work together?

M-To be honest we don’t know, it just does. Andy and I are very interested in a range of the arts, not wanting to sound pretentious, and have tried to throw all of that in to the band, it’s great to be able to play with other dimensions and introduce a strong visual side to what we do.

Your sound is also a fusion of different styles. How would you describe it and what makes it stand out?

M- Well, its high energy pop with a dark edge, a twist if you will. I think we have a little more dimension to our sound than a lot of bands at the moment not wanting to sound arrogant. I would say a key feature that makes us stand out is our live show, we put a lot of effort in to the overall look and vibe, seemingly more than some of our contempories.

Matt, you’re best known for producing The Enemy; and Andy you’ve worked with an array of significant producers as well as performing yourself. How did Hitchcock come together?

A- A glorious mistake. I had been writing and producing my own songs after Apartment 26 (previous band) had split up and thought it would be great to get Matt’s voice on there, as I loved his tone. It was just an excuse to go round his place, have a few drinks, play with some beats and watch Hitchcock films…we never expected it to go beyond that at the time.

Your live shows have been likened to a David Lynch movie: dark, surreal and dreamlike. You have quite a presence on stage. What can people expect from a live show?

A- We painstakingly cut all our visuals together, mostly weird old public domain stuff. We didn’t want to have an ‘image’ as different band members, we would listen to the music and just create something visually from that. Then it seemed to take a life of it’s own, and the show has become something like a macabre cabaret.

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