RedHook: Saying What They Want To Say
“We want to piss people off by getting the song stuck in their head!” Emmy Mack, vocalist with Australian genre-hopping alt rock outfit REDHOOK asserts. If that’s their aim, arguably they’ve done the exact opposite; their second single ever saw them being told there was a slot at Download Festival for them (“we were just like, sure you do,” as she recalls their initially sceptical reaction) and since then they’ve gone on to pack out venues across Australia, especially hometown shows, and have caught the attention of THE SMASHING PUMPKINS’ Billy Corgan.
But where did it all start? Emmy grins, “I was a massive metalhead in high school and I was obsessed with 80s music. Bands like METALLICA, GUNS N’ ROSES, SKID ROW… I wanted to be a female Axl Rose!” Laughing, she recalls how “for the first couple years out of high school I was in this really cringe 80s inspired, gothic hair metal band.” Despite describing her first band as cringe, it certainly gave her something; the knowledge that she belonged on a stage, in a band.
It was a long journey, though, from there to the REDHOOK of now, although their arguably auspicious first show under that name was supporting MÖTLEY CRÜE on an Australian tour. “We changed our name for that show! My old band was meant to open but our guitarist left,” she recalls. “At the time I was working with a producer, and the sound started to change and evolve from those glam metal roots I started with.” Once she met Craig Wilkinson, REDHOOK’s guitarist, though that all changed and the creative partnership started to flourish and bear new fruits.
The first of those was debut single Minute On Fire, closely followed by Turn Up The Stereotype, in which she states the aim with their music was always to be fluid. “It’s a spectrum of heavy music, it’s intentionally very elastic, but it’s driven by a real pop sensibility. That’s just how I like my music to be.” Those songs are indeed packed full of hooks, with the title track of the debut EP Bad Decisions being a stellar example of their love of a good earworm melody. It’s also, as Emmy describes it, “music that has something to say. Every song has a message or an experience there, a story being told.”
But what made now the right time to tell those stories on debut album Postcard From A Living Hell? “We weren’t even sure,” she admits. “We’ve made a conscious choice to be an independent band. It’s been a slow build, we’re seeing our fanbase grow… but it still felt like a bit of a dice roll.” Despite that, she says they felt the time was right in part because fans would always ask where the album was, “so this was something we decided to do because our fans wanted it so much.”
Warm and open throughout our time, Emmy opens up on what their new debut album means to her, and why it’s such an important piece for them. “Postcard… is a snapshot of myself and a point in my life. A lot of the songs deal with heavy themes like sexual assault, trauma, being manipulated, as well as depression and intrusive thoughts of self-harm. Part of the reason music is so important to me, and always has been is because it’s always been there in my darkest time, as a comfort to help me feel less alone.”
While many of the themes are autobiographical, Emmy makes plentiful use of metaphor throughout REDHOOK’s lyrics, from science fiction to fantasy. “I’m a massive geek! I was raised by movies and TV, they taught me wrong from right, social cues, so those references are ingrained into my daily existence” she grins in response to being asked about the references that run through their songs and video concepts. Jabberwocky references Alice In Wonderland, Imposter takes cues from Invasion of the Body Snatchers, while Postcard Xo’s post-apocalyptic video and its themes of giving in to self-destructive behaviour.
On the surface, it’s a bleak album, but she also sees it as having an undercurrent of hope for people. “It’s a postcard, so it’s sent from a time when shit was really fucked up,” she puts bluntly, but it’s a place she’s no longer in and can look back on after healing. That’s in part because of writing the songs themselves. Jabberwocky and Imposter are two we discuss at length; the latter was the latest single from the album ahead of release, a more straightforward pop-rock number with towering hooks and a guest spot from fellow Aussies YOURS TRULY, dealing with manipulation and deception by a loved one, where Jabberwocky deals with the aftermath of sexual assault and pretending it didn’t happen, like the titular creature’s existence is denied, rather than processing it properly.
“It’s a temporary destination,” she stresses, “when you have those shit times, whatever you’re going through… a lot of the songs on this record felt [to me] like rock bottom, but it’s temporary, you’re just visiting..” As challenging as she finds it to write from those places, ultimately it’s part of her own healing as well as something to help others who’ve been through similar things. “There’s a lyric on [MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE’s] Danger Days, “you only hear the music when your heart begins to break”; you don’t appreciate it until it’s there for you. And that’s why music is so fucking important.”
Postcard From A Living Hell is out now via self-release.
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