Award-winning Indie rock band Shortstraw have finally released their much anticipated album, ’Fine thanks, and you?’.
The 11 track album comes four years since their last, ’Those Meddling Kids’ and will be their final album for the foreseeable future.
“We wanted to give back to our fans in the form of a brand new collection of songs, because although this might be our last album for the foreseeable future, these songs will live forever,” said the band.
When the Covid-19 pandemic struck and made life difficult for the band to get together to write a new album, they revisited their vault of old ideas and voice notes from jams through the ages, and picked and chose from there.
A couple of the songs on the album stemmed from lead vocalist and guitarist, Alastair Thomas, who had doodled on his acoustic guitar. These were then fleshed out and resulted in an eclectic mix of songs that don't really have an overarching theme, but are happy songs made especially for the fans, and band members themselves.
“We just wanted to put out all the songs we were sitting on. Since the hiatus in 2018, we've been struggling to get back into the swing of things because we all have our own businesses that we love doing and it’s hard to juggle it all. This is potentially a last hurrah for us, but the show is not over because we are proud to give fans a new album.” said band members.
The title of the album is a play on the fact that they have been out of the game for a while.
“It’s like a catch up. "Oh shit, I haven't seen you in ages! How've you been? Fine thanks, and you?,” they said.
The band describes the sound of the new album as "old person with ADHD“. It is this very ADHD mindset that has made the music and albums interesting with loud chaotic songs, and slower ballads side by side.
Speaking on their album closer titled “Red Handed”, they said: “We've always thought really hard about our album closers and put a lot of effort into making them powerful endings to the album's story. For ’Red Handed’, we wanted a constant build throughout, climaxing with an onslaught of sound and a refrain of what might be my favourite lyric we've written: "If it wasn't for the smog, the sunset wouldn't be so pretty,” they said.
Alastair Thomas said: “All the lyrics I write are either about my wife, my dog, or being a miser. Or sometimes it's just a story I made up. There's a song about living in Joburg called Sucker for Punishment. So it's all over the place. But we love it all.” said Alastair Thomas from the band.
“Fine thanks, and you?” is a more mature album that features indie at heart and a pop punk influence, with melody being the focal point throughout.