Hutch share new EP ‘Mrs Sunshine’ right in time for summer
The Brighton psych rockers deliver an exceptional EP.
Photo: Ele Merchant
Hutch are back with their delightful and addictive new EP, Mrs Sunshine. The band are bringing back retro psychedelia with a great collection of infectious mid-sixties dream pop. The songs float inside a heavenly dream cloud and are simply impossibly uplifting.
The Brighton-based band are intent on bringing back the sunshine, and Mrs Sunshine’s sweeping and lush dreamlike songs are perfect for the early summer sun. In much the same way that The Lemon Twigs are conjuring up a faithful homage to early 1960’s pop music, Hutch are cooking up an equivalent, equally as fun continuation from the psychedelic songs of the mid-60’s.
The EP opens with the title track, which takes inspiration from the Revolver-era John Lennon and Pet Sounds-era Brian Wilson. It is wrapped up in everything that makes the band so great: gorgeous Beach Boys-layered backing vocals, punchy production and an arrangement that is somehow simultaneously tight and packed yet loose and fluid enough to feel suitably dreamlike and transcendental. These are songs that are snug and cosy and yet just when you think you could be feeling too comfortable, they shift, change and loosen up.
Thinking The Same, for example, has the most beautiful weaving arpeggios and guitar lines that are simply made to be listened to with a nice cup of tea, dreaming and watching the sky fly by. However, the next track and second single, Pepper Kettle, wakes you straight back up with its infectiously joyful energy and catchy chorus. Hearing it is like floating inside a dream. Just as you get comfortable letting the effortless melodies and jangly guitars seep into your subconscious, the song transforms into a sonic hellscape of psychedelic noise. Hutch have already become masters at singing you into a blissful lullaby before shocking you back to your toes.
It all closes perfectly with the lovely Taking Your Time. Its sprawling instrumental outro provides the band with one last chance to really let loose before coming crashing back in with one final massive, cacophonic, cathartic chorus. It’s certainly a memorable way to leave us.
On Mrs Sunshine, Hutch have put together an incredibly warm, welcoming and wonderful collection of songs that each sound distinct whilst also managing to form a delightful, cohesive whole. Let’s just hope they put the kettle on again and brew up another collection of dream-pop songs as good as these soon.
Mrs Sunshine is out now. Stay up-to-date with Hutch here.
