They should have been called the soundtrack of our lives. Certainly the soundtrack of these times. In the run up to the US Presidential elections, Hope Of The States’ fusion of the epic and the emotional has never felt sharper. On a night when yet more US soldiers were killed in Iraq, songs like ‘The Red The White The Black The Blue’ and ‘George Washington’ were hammered home with intent and relevance. If the nightly news required a score, then Hope Of The States would be it.
Instrumental opener ‘The Black Amnesias’ set the tone for the night. Rising to a crescendo over its seven minutes, it swept all before it before reaching its emotive climax. Behind the wall of noise, some mean violin burst through the heart of the song, filling it with a gushing melody. From the offset it became evident that this was a night when the hairs on the back of your neck would remain standing.
Halfway in and shaggy-haired frontman Sam Herlihy took to the keyboards for the wonderfully dark and bitter ‘Black Dollar Bills.’ Though his vocals remained inaudible at times, his grainy mumble still fitted the brooding and swirling rhythms being created behind him. Indeed, the lyrics matter little when hearing Hope Of The States live. Such is the cinematic nature of their music that it paints images words cannot touch. Live, this is particularly emphasised, not least because of the three giant screens which form the group’s backdrop.
After an hour of bombastic, engaging and moving flashes of brilliance, HOTS left all on a wave of emotion but not before unleashing the magnificent ‘Enemies/Friends.’ With the incendiary lyric “Keep your friends close/ Your enemies won’t matter in the end,” it made for a riotous ending. Rarely does live music get any better.