Richard Hawley

Plus support from Meilyr Jones

Following the announcement of his eighth studio album Hollow Meadows, on October 25th Richard Hawley will undertake a 13-date tour of the UK and Ireland, his longest UK tour in three years & kicking off in our very own Brighton.

Recorded at Sheffield’s Yellow Arch Studio in spring 2015, Hollow Meadows sees Hawley return to the classic, sophisticated songwriting and subtle arrangements that made him so widely loved and revered in the first place. Meditating on such themes as ageing, fallibility and relationships, much of the album shares a brooding, yet wistful and romantic atmosphere in keeping with early albums Late Night Final and Lowedges, as well as touches of 2009’s Truelove’s Gutter and Standing At The Sky’s Edge.

You can listen to ‘Which Way’, the first track to debut from the album: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtI9ibk9gpU

For the first time ever, Hawley demoed the songs in his shed studio (‘Disgracelands’) with his long-time guitarist and confidant, Shez Sheridan (who also co-produced the album with Hawley and Colin Elliot). This allowed him to enter the studio with fully realised songs, and many of those original demos were so strong, they form part of the finished album, including the vocal to the sublime opening track, ‘I Still Want You’ – Hawley at his most vulnerable and romantic, with one of those choruses that only Hawley seems capable of writing, like a ballroom spotlight on a glitterball.

The album features some notable guests from the UK folk scene, Hawley’s neighbour and friend Martin Simpson, and Nancy Kerr. Other guests include one of Hawley’s oldest and dearest friends, Jarvis Cocker, and the Hick Street Chip Shop Singers, who are made up of various Sheffield luminaires, including Slow Club’s Rebecca Taylor.

Hollow Meadows is an album full of exceptional songwriting, beautiful melodies and harmonies, and some of the finest lyrics and vocals Hawley as ever written and recorded.