May 2011

It only takes a few bars of Keep The Fire, the first single to be released from the album, to tell you that you are in the presence of Big Music. This west London five-piece are not in the business of half measures, not interested in anxious, apologetic, half-baked landfill indie. Goldhawks make their ambitions clear from the start.

Two years ago, under his own name Bobby was releasing a single, Deja Vu, whose sweeping strings and acoustic shuffle saw him quickly bracketed alongside the likes of Laura Marling, Jamie T and Mumford and Sons on the dawning London skewed-folk scene. Already, people whose curiosity had been aroused by Deja Vu's gentle acoustica found themselves faced with a very different prospect live. "The songs were getting much heavier," Bobby remembers. "On the one hand, I was drawing on a passion for Ryan Adams. But then I'd find myself being inspired by filmic and more textured music. And it was obvious to everyone that this big, majestic sound wasn't just down to me."

Listen to tracks like Where In the World and Running Away and it isn't difficult to see why people emerge from the band's shows in a state a euphoria. More like revivalist meetings than gigs, Goldhawks' live performances have reminded older hands of the zealotry and ferment of Echo & The Bunnymen. To their own generation, Goldhawks represent something that can often seem like it's in very short supply indeed: music that has nothing to do with striking attitudes or ticking commercial boxes, and everything to do with what Bobby calls his only reason for making music in the first place: because he has to, he's "got no choice".