Hope of the States @ Stereo, Glasgow, 5 Dec
Reuniting for a handful of shows 18 years after their split, Hope of the States sound as riotous and invigorating as ever before, hinting at new music to come
For a small but dedicated cluster of people there was nobody quite like Hope of the States. Packed full of hope and noise and gathering gloom, the band initially formed in 2000, and capitalised on the early echoes of the online world to gather a staunch community around them. They released their debut album in 2004 amid a swirling mass of deep personal sadness but also gentle word-of-mouth hype, which saw The Lost Riots very nearly land in the top 20 of the UK albums chart – when such a thing could still make or break a band.
Their follow-up, Left, came out almost two years to the day later, but just a few weeks after its release, that was that. With little fanfare, they announced that their performance at Reading Festival that summer would be their last, and though there have been a few off-shoots from various members, that’s how it’s remained for nearly 18 years.
The context of which is important because, mostly out of the blue, the band suddenly announced earlier this year that they were reuniting for a handful of shows. A gorgeous, expansive new song swiftly followed and suddenly, unexpectedly, Hope of the States were a thing all over again.
All those years ago, nestled in the crumbling edges of the UK’s indie-rock scene, the band never quite fit. On stage in Glasgow, in the gripping winter of 2024, it’s a different world to the one they left behind, but that sense of outsider spirit finally comes to fruition, the 2024 version of the band sounding anything but dated as they rip through their messy, heartfelt, all-encompassing post-rock-ish soundtrack of sorrow.
Image: Hope of the States @ Stereo, Glasgow, 5 Dec by Tom Johnson
There are, understandably, cracks at the edges, but Hope of the States never let such things get in the way, even at the peak of their initial rise. And when it all comes together – Sam Herlihy’s strained voice, Mike Siddell’s spiralling violin, the cascade of guitars and drums – they sound as riotous and invigorating as ever before.
Ripping through the majority of that fabled debut album, the loud-quiet dynamic allows the packed room space to wander off into memories of all the time in-between, but always drags the show back into the here and now, never leaning into nostalgia. Indeed, the smattering of new songs – which hint at something far more solid for the band’s future plans – sound perfectly, rousingly placed in these unsteady times that the band find themselves in.
But music, of course, has a way of dragging you into its own universe, if even for just an hour or so. And as Hope of the States fill this underground space with a heartfelt cacophony of noise; as they heave us and themselves through these skewed anthems of exhaustion, the sound they make, burdened by the years, seems to carry a little extra weight once more. Sad but hopeful. Same as it ever was, in their own special way.