Hamish Hawk

Scottish new-pop crooner Hamish Hawk continues his prolific run of albums with ‘A Firmer Hand’ out on new label So Recordings.

Following 2021’s breakthrough ‘Heavy Elevator’ and 2023’s ‘Angel Numbers’ Hawk and Co. have performed live relentlessly climbing from the pub circuit all the way to Glasgow’s seminal Barrowlands in 2024.

They have also still managed to produce another exceptional long-player full of voyeuristic vulnerability and subtly vicious vignettes, observational dramedy and decoded confessional cries plucked from the ether. Never knowing exactly whose vantage point you’re intruding on is all part of the mystery. Literal and lateral characters again inform and transform the textual tales. Step forward Jacques Brel, Frankie Valli, Tommy Cooper, Franz Kafka and Niccolo Machiavelli, never before seen in the same room.

Hawk has said that this is his first work that proffers the ‘real’ him, ‘more natural … personal … grittier’, no affective-protective shield in front, ‘warts and all’ on full display. There is a definite feel of ever-growing confidence and maturity throughout. Lyrically, musically, thematically. Emphatically.

Like in any walk of life, if you taste success you don’t change a winning team. Therefore, this album was again produced by Idlewild’s Rod Jones at Post Electric studios in Leith, Edinburgh. Additionally, once more, the songs were written by Hawk with Andrew Pearson (guitars) and Stefan Maurice (keyboards and drums), who form the core of his band alongside Alex Duthie (bass) and John Cashman (keyboards). Familiarity breeds ascent. The results are more panoramic. More macroscopic. More euphoric.

Citing it as a ‘coming of age’ album Hawk casts a forensic look at issues of ‘masculine currency’, ‘desire’ and ‘animalism’ and how secrecy and subterfuge can all wreak havoc upon the idea and performance of manhood, Hawk also turning his analyses on himself giving new meaning to the term ‘cock-rock’.

To the untrained senses Hawk’s output ‘all sounds the same.’ His Caledonian burr apparently applying homogeneity to every high note, low swoon and straight-ahead cry and sigh. The wry brow raised invisible to those unable or incapable of discernment. Progression is a subtle process and sometimes subtlety is simply too much for some to take.

‘Nancy Dearest is a sister to ‘The Caterpillar’, a throbbing disconfessional crackling with femmergy. The John Barryesque ‘Autobiography of a Spy’ reeks of noirish intrigue, a cloak and dagger existence forever on the verge of revelation. ‘Milk an ending’ is pure sexistentialism, where unbridled lust meets needs must. Fear and loathing on an ad hoc basis.

Hamish Hawk has done it again. Like his pop forebears he evinces a wryness that liminally lulled her … or him. Offering knowing-cheek with growing-chic. Autobiographical ambiguity combined with theatrical acuity.

Less nudge-nudge, more wink-wink.