27 August 2018

BASEMENT REVOLVER is a Canadian indie trio led by winsome songwriter and striking vox Chrisy Hurn. The band just released their gripping debut LP entitled HEAVY EYES. A highly captivating collection of mixed emotions musings drenched in a turbulent bath of stirring guitar fuzz. Here are songs many of us feel/felt familiar to in one way or another. Intense reflections about being grief-stricken and sorrowful, hurt and confused, lost and puzzled. Amplified and soul-stirring pop heartbreakers you’ll love to have as sonic companions when feeling down and melancholic. This is deeply human music that has the healing force to set your troubled mind free in the end. Comforting music for the twilight hours.

It’s truly a great pleasure for Turn Up The Volume! to have Chrisy here revealing
the artists who influenced Heavy Eyes, track by track. Here we go…

The songs

.
The inspiring artists,
track by track, with Chrisy…

1. BABY
“When I wrote Baby I was heavy into Turnover. I had just watched them open for mewithoutYou in Las Vegas at the Brooklyn Bowl. I think I was just trying to capture
a similar emotion that their music made me feel. It is almost a nostalgic feeling but
like, a sad nostalgia.”

2. JOHNNY
“Johnny was written a few years back, almost three years ago actually, and it was when Archie, Marry Me by Alvvays was playing EVERYWHERE. And what a good, good song to be playing everywhere, may I add. When I heard that song for the first time, I remember thinking, “this is what I have been looking for!”

3. DANCING
“Dancing is a newer song for the band. For a long time we called it Joy Division because we thought the bassline could be from a Joy Division song. We also wrote this one starting from the bassline, it is what shaped the song. I think I was also watching a lot of Stranger Things because it was when the second season came out on Netflix, and yes, I think that is very relevant!.”

Joy Division‘s legendary bass player Peter Hook

4. FRIENDS
“Definitely a Frankie Cosmos inspired song. I was listening to her music
pretty much exclusively at the time and wanted everything to sound like her.”

5. Knocking
“I think when I wrote this song I was going for a Big Thief‘s Mary kind of vibe.
That song is so freaking beautiful.”

Arresting live rendition. Awesome voice

6. JOHNNY PT. 2
“I don’t know if I can pin down who inspired this song. I honestly forget a lot of the
time surrounding its conception because I was very, very sad. I will say that on the
“Sunday drive downtown” where “Johnny” and I broke up, we were randomly listening
to an Adele CD because it was the only CD in my parents’ car. So maybe the memory
of the breakup brought out Adele-like sentiments?”

7. WORDS
“Mmmm… Words was my first venture into writing music with guitar pedals and vocal effects. At the time I was listening to a lot of Youth Lagoon and Wild Nothing. Maybe that somehow got in there?”

Youth Lagoon effects

8. WAIT
“I think Wait was probably somehow inspired by Diet Cig. It is also in drop D
tuning which consequently makes me feel like a badass. I don’t know why, but
it makes me feel a tiiiiny bit metal. I think we just wanted to write a song that
sounded a little bit darker and heavier.”

9. TREE TRUNKS
“Manchester Orchestra most definitely inspired this song. Most definitely.”

Basement Revolver Orchestra live

10. YOU’RE OKAY
“A little bit of Frankie Cosmos, a little bit of  The Weakerthans, and very much cheese went into this song. Also very much crippling self-doubt. We wrote it in a band practice – and the thing I like the most about it is the breakdown that happens in the second chorus. You can thank my days spent as a scene kid, and every hardcore band I used to listen to in high school for that.”

11. HEAVY EYES
“I am gonna say that Dilly Dally inspired me to be a little bit heavier for this one
and to throw on that overdrive. I like playing this song, because the sentiment of
being very tired is very real most of the time for me, and it also makes me feel
tough. I don’t feel like I have to be anything other than myself when we play it live.”

Dilly Dally’s Katie – energetic impact

12. DIAMONDS
“Diamonds was written many moons ago when I was deep into the folk music scene. I was listening to a lot of Valley Maker – please everyone go listen to Valley Maker – and Right Away, Great Captain! at the time. I was a young 19 years old, and unrequited love was the most painful feeling I had ever experienced.”

Thank you Chrisy Hurn!
May the road rise with Basement Revolver!

HEAVY EYES out now and available here.

BASEMENT REVOLVER: Website – Facebook – Twitter