He’s spent over two decades as the stalwart bassist for The Libertines, playing clean, precise and steady as his bandmates incite chaos and stage invasions, adding a net of safety to proceedings. With The April Rainers however, John Hassall steers the melody with fluid, undulating melodies.
‘Doing Time’ arrives with that 60s jangle and warm, melodic swing. For years, his job has been to anchor crashing tempos, whereas ‘Doing Time’ carries a soft, undulating rhythm that cushion his melodies.
It’s not a complete escape from The Libertines world with this new single, as Peter Doherty features a songwriting collaborator. This is the second release from the April Rainers self-titled second album, set for release through Crystal Lawn Records on July 17th.
This comes a few weeks after the release of first single on the album, ‘Miracles’.
Talking of the new single, John Hassall said: “Most of Doing Time was written around 20 years ago, though I could never find a good verse part to it. When I played it to Peter (Doherty) he immediately came up with the chords to the verse.”
He continued: “That night he also lent me Waiting for Godot and I got the opening line for the lyrics from there “Nothing to be done”. The song is about striving to find patience, hope and inspiration when it feels like there is none.”
The April Rainers all live in Hassall’s home city of Aarhus, Denmark, and recorded at his home studio. The band is made up of John Hassall (Vocals and rhythm guitar), Jakob Bruno (Drums and backing vocals), Erlend Eggestad (Bass and backing vocals) and James Jefferys (Lead guitar and backing vocals).
This album comes as the follow up to the bands debut ‘Wheels to Idyll’ in 2017. John Hassall said: “These 10 songs are the ones that survived, grew and took on a life of their own. Lessons were learnt from Wheels to Idyll and a new musical development runs through it. Whereas the last album was recorded pretty much live.”
Most of the songs were cowritten by John and longtime poet collaborator Steev Burgess exploring memories of school days, journeys and adventures, fading dreams, ancient empires and even somebody’s trinket collection.
John Hassall and the April Rainers will be announcing their run of UK shows soon, and John will be appearing with The Libertines across a run of UK and Europe summer festivals and shows.
Written by Brad Halcrow for The Songbird HQ
Photo Credit Marine Gastineau