Heavy Harold
Philly’s new DIY pop duo Heavy Harold; press photo courtesy of the artists.
Meet Philly’s latest heroes with Heavy Harold as they premiere the brilliant “My Friends Don’t Want Me Around” taken off their album Giants In Our Own Minds available now via Little L Records. The grand follow-up to Will Butera & Steven Wadden’s debut EP We Really Should Be Sorry is something for all the lonely & low feeling/low flying hearts alike. These are the songs for today’s uneasy & extremely uncertain times where Heavy Harold wears their heaviest sentiments boldly on their sleeve like a badge of pride & honor that broadcasts sentiments that are typically reserved for the most privy of phone calls & heart to hearts.
What would normally be a personal one on one discussion of self-conscious behaviors is instead put on blast with a strong power-pop verse & chorus arrangement. Heavy Harold’s “My Friends Don’t Want Me Around” owns up to being the oddball, the outcast, the weird one, where all the awkward perceptions of the self & surroundings are neatly wrapped up into an anthem for introverts & mopers without a cause. The song sees Will & Steven seeking out new places & new faces where the title is repeated in the chorus with the lump in the throat reckoning that greets the uncomfortable situation with the power chord progression arranged surmising of “’cause I always seem to fuck up their good time.” Never before has social anxiety been expressed through the most evocative chords & deliveries that edifies & extols the virtues of the underdog through a righteous electric ballad worthy of thousands upon thousands of listens. This is the song for everyone that has desired to change their scenery, or wanted to trade-in their lame fake-friends for a better support set. Heavy Harold tackles the weights of these matters with the utmost respect for both parties feelings while keeping the honesty pouring into a mold of one of the most clever pop rock arrangements ever.
Will and Steven from Heavy Harold provided us with the following thoughts on the formation of the band & the making of their new album:
“We (Will and Steven) have been playing music together since the eighth grade, spending hours jamming and writing and scheming in Will’s basement. We have spent years building up our own private band mythology. In our opinion, Heavy Harold is already a band of legendary stature, an undisputed titan of rock and roll. Unfortunately, nobody else seems to share this opinion.
Many of the songs on this EP tell tales of dark internal struggle and isolation. We consider ourselves to be a pair of sexy and mysterious loners, possessed of a brooding magnetism à la James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause. Unfortunately, this too is objectively false. We are, in fact, a pair of relatively well-adjusted young suburbanites, who would be most accurately described as timid and polite.
It is this apparent rift between our own self-perception and the perception of the world at large that gave us the title for this, our debut EP. We truly are Giants in Our Own Mind, equal parts self-deprecating and self-obsessed. We hope that one way or another the tunes of Heavy Harold will charm their way into your hearts and ears, so that we may become giants in your mind as well.
Getting to know & getting heavy with Heavy Harold; press photo courtesy of the artists.
Heavy Harold also shared the following perspectives on their new single with us as well:
Steven was having a bummer time at college. It was hard being at a big new school with lots of new people, trying to make friends while still feeling so strange and out of place. He was worried that the other students didn’t want to hang out with him, that they didn’t really… want him around.
One day he was in a particularly mopey mood. He sat down and wrote a little tune about feeling lonely. Hey… he said. This tune is kinda catchy! So he whipped up a demo and sent it over to his good buddy Will. Hey… said Will. This tune is kinda catchy! So he laid down a drum beat and played it for his buddy Nick. Hey… said Nick. This tune is pretty goddamn catchy! So he worked his production magic to bring out the subtle shades and tones in the music, making all the different sounds and textures pop. And that was how “My Friends Don’t Want Me Around” became the band’s first single.
We chose this song to be the single because we like the way that the somber lyrics contrast with the upbeat charm of the instrumental. Despite the depressing title, this tune is more of an uplifter [sic] than a tear-jerker. We like to think of the chorus as our conch shell battle-call to all the other shy folks out there. When you’re feeling blue, just sing along. It’ll lift you right up outta that funk! It will also irritate everyone within earshot and make them truly not want to have you around, but then you can just listen to the song again, creating an endless cycle of self-soothing and continued isolation.
Heavy Harold’s Giants In Our Own Minds is available now from Little L Records.
