The opening 45 seconds of Hellions’ fourth album ‘Rue’ goes from bubblegum fairground rides and cabaret welcomes to Rage Against The Machine tension and the glam grandiose of Queen without blinking.
‘X (Mwah)’ is the perfect middle ground between arena rock and boy band excitement, complete with dance routines and beaming chorus, it’s impossibly fun while ‘Smile’ finds comfort on the run, letting unpredictable danger in, while promising open window escape at a moments notice.
The rest of the album is equally scattergun, swinging between ideas, influence, genre and intention without a care in the world or trying too hard to be aloof in the face of anything goes. The band obviously have different tastes, but under the umbrella of Hellions, they’ve created something viciously unique and utterly theirs.
It doesn’t matter how far they stray from their hardcore punk roots; the band take ownership of every bold colour and comic book adventure. Art as a weapon, they’re the sort of band My Chemical Romance probably wanted to inspire.
“We’ve always had that aspect where we want to surprise ourselves,” starts Dre Faivre. “Hellions has always been a no barriers band. It’s exciting for us, and as long as you’re exciting yourself, then it’s always going to feel fresh.”
Despite heading back into the studio a couple of times to change parts of the album, it “didn’t get any more pop or any harder,” he says. “We went in with those songs and just changed a little perspective. We respect each other a lot and each person had to physically put their forward and go, let’s do it, man. Let’s get everybody’s full influences. Let’s get what we’re listening to, and what we’re hearing and represent it.
“There was a lot of self-empowerment. It was a very self-aware record where we really found each other and found being cool in our own skin. We just great at being ourselves and I love that people can’t pigeonhole us.”
