The Strumbellas know that misery loves company, and that if we’re together, even in dark times, there’s some joy in that. Their songs of suffering and celebration date back to their 2012 debut My Father And The Hunter, and the band have obsessively chased big hooks, group vocal exuberance, and folk-rock propulsion through their 2016 breakthrough Hope to 2024’s Part Time Believer. The Juno and iHeartRadio Music Award-winning group’s new song Hard Lines gives listeners an urgent, new take on their iconic mix of intimate feelings with stadium folk sounds. Determined to use every tool in their arsenal to write a good song, The Strumbellas started by looking inward: random song titles, non-sequitur ideas, scraps of paper, and voice memos of half-sung melodies came from everyone in the band. From their home in Toronto, they reached out to favourite collaborators —songwriters and producers in Vancouver, Nashville, LA, and beyond —to create demos that ranged from campfire-chord whispers to radio-ready productions. The group then connected with producer Chad Copelin (LANY, Sasha Sloan, Colony House), and headed for his studio in Norman, Oklahoma. Copelin’s finely honed sonic instincts bring out a newly textured, insistently edgy side to The Strumbellas’ alt-folk stomp.
