Honeyglaze - Real Deal
Welcome back to the cinematic world of Honeyglaze. It’s a world illuminated by the warm glow of the TV screen, the cold light of the mobile phone. On Real Deal, their sophomore album, the band invites us back into familiar surroundings, this time, with a newfound vigour. We caught up with Anouska Sokolow (guitar, vocals), Yuri Shibuichi (drums) and Tim Curtis (bass) ahead of the record’s release date to talk about the new album and the process of putting it together.
Double meanings, mixed messages and ambiguity have always characterised Honeyglaze’s output. I recall seeing the band perform back in 2021, watching Tim deliver deadpan jokes to a bemused audience, the trio revelling in the confusion. Embarking on our conversation, I half expected a similar manipulation of the format. Previous interviews have featured teasing untruths and their Spotify bio describes them as ‘the ungodly fusion of 3 humans into a clamouring superorganism that ‘eats only fish’. In reality, the superorganism was open, candid and I didn’t have to feed them any fish.
On Real Deal, Anouska guides us through her internal trials and tribulations, expertly tracing firm footsteps upon unsteady emotional terrain. Sokolow uses the intimate imagery of the home, of everyday motions and thoughts, to deliver excruciatingly poignant commentary. The scene is set in the context of screens, movies, images and ideals - that Anouska constructs, hides behind and turns back at us to reveal ourselves. Her writing breaks the fourth wall and reconstructs it as a mirror, pulling you into her world, her insecurities and in turn, making them feel like your own. This lends itself well to the prevalence of double-meanings and mirrored images, self-observation hidden within a smokescreen of contradiction. I pointed this out to Anouska, and asked if it’s an intentional practice. She paused to reflect, and admitted “I’m always quite aware of contradictions. I like playing with multiple points of view at the same time. I think that’s just how I see the world, or how I think.”
Tim and Anouska at Middle Farm Studios. Credit: Yuri Shibuichi
We observe our narrator as she watches TV, folds sheets and begs a cold caller to stay on the line. Her house, anxieties and loneliness all become ours. It’s a hazy, dream-like walk through a carnival mirror maze, placed delicately inside a suburban dwelling. The imagery can be seen as a continuation of their first record. In this sense, Real Deal feels like a true cinematic sequel. It’s the same world, mottled, patinated by the passage of time.
“We had a kind of snake-like approach to the first album. It felt like we were shedding a skin. We just wanted to get all those songs off of us, and do the tour, and then move on…as it came out it was such a relief that we were like OK, we have time to do something new now”, Anouska reflected during our conversation. “Like a crab, as well”, Tim interjects. If album one was like shedding a skin, what was album two? Anouska laughs: “like a LION”. It does seem that way. The album is a bold statement, put forward confidently, with a self-assured cadence that reflects their collective evolution.
To do things differently was an expressed aim this time around. Having recorded album one with Dan Carey of Speedy Wunderground - a notoriously fast-paced process - they felt the need to slow things down. Alongside the nature of a Speedy Wunderground recording - fast, minimal takes - the process of commuting on the tube and returning to busy shared houses had clearly made its mark: “we wanted to not be in London, to just be living together, churning it out together and living it fully”.
Middle Farm Studios. Credit: Yuri Shibuichi
Real Deal conveys a sense of isolation, and in doing so unites us in the universality of these feelings. Instrumentally, it delivers on both the peace and turmoil that Anouska depicts through her lyrics. In order to achieve this, it was important for the band to escape everyday life, and crucially, to get out of the city. They travelled to Middle Farm in Devon to record with Grammy-nominated producer Claudius Mittendorfer (Parquet Courts, Interpol, Sorry). Once they arrived, creating the right atmosphere was their main focus. “The whole set up, and the whole job, was about getting in the right mood. It was planned very well in a way - that we’re going to get there, we’re going to know how to play it, and now we just have to create the right mood to play it like we mean it”, Tim reflects.
“The mood we achieved at the farm was necessary to be able to perform like that. It feels almost lonely. We’re there together, there’s nothing around, we can really just be free. Say if we were in a studio in London, commuting on buses and trains, it’s very hard to get yourself into that mindspace” Yuri explained. Living as a unit, taking it in turns to cook for each other, making coffee, taking walks; a clear sense of cohesion emanates from the three as they describe the experience.
Tim and Anouska at Middle Farm Studios. Credit: Yuri Shibuichi
It’s clear that different songs on the album demanded a different headspace to record, and this comes across in the final product. “‘I Feel It All’ was one of the songs where we all had to feel very particular about it…We started with songs like ‘Pretty Girls’ and ‘Cold Caller’, because they took less emotional investment when you’re performing”, Tim explains. They had a shared understanding of what songs would be more mentally and physically draining to perform. Tim highlights ‘Hide’, the opening track, as a particularly difficult song to record; after nine takes, they resolved to take a break and reset. Venturing out into the surrounding countryside, they “walked up the hill, sang the whole song in acapella and danced around like idiots”; Tim laughs as he relays the memory. “We came back to the studio, tried it a couple of times and got it. There were these little things that we did to try to adjust our mental state, whether that’s going for a walk or having a coffee, having food or having a nap. Seeing the hairless cat walk around and getting scared”.
‘Don’t’ landed as the lead single for the album back in May, and proved that although their deft stylings were here to stay, Honeyglaze were back with a twist. It’s a song full of catharsis; the band take the emotional sentiment of ‘Young Looking’, a delicately potent song from their debut exploring the experience of repeated patronisation, and turn it into something fierce. “It’s the perfect progression, it’s exactly the same concept but it’s just mad” mused Anouska. ‘Don’t’ reflects the pinnacle, the emotional climax, of ‘Young Looking’. It’s a strong choice as a lead single. Yuri explained that the band wanted “to come back out of the darkness with a boldness. This song is probably the most aggressive, in your face tune on the album. It’s a one off. There isn’t a song on the album like it.”
Middle Farm Studios. Credit: Yuri Shibuichi
As I enthuse about ‘Don’t’, Anouska laughs at a recent Youtube comment: ‘They said “I wouldn’t go out with her if she was complaining all the bastard time”. I thought it was the funniest thing to say ever. This is perfect. This is the perfect comment. I think we had a similar kind of reaction to young looking.” It seems almost too ridiculous to be true, that someone could hear this song and only feel their frustration at a woman describing her experience, voicing her rage. Anouska continues: “I just love seeing it because it’s just like you are who this is about, and you can’t even tell, and it’s so funny. You can't even have the self awareness that this is literally about people like you.” "Tim points out that “the people it’s actually about never seem to get that. Everyone who gets it has already learned.”
The progression from ‘Young Looking’ to ‘Don’t’ embodies the transition from debut to sophomore album. The band are the same, the themes are the same - but now, they are firmer, stronger, more defiant in their sound. Real Deal reflects this, with the quiet, potent confidence to state what is not 100% true as fact, to repeat it, to will it into being until it is so. The band are not asking for anything; they are claiming it.
Real Deal by Honeyglaze is out Friday 20th September via Fat Possum Records.