A culmination of life and musical experience, uncompromising in its vision, STONECHILD, the new studio album from Jesca Hoop, is a self described “compassion project”. Venturing south to Bristol to team up with producer John Parish (PJ Harvey, Aldous Harding, This is the Kit), helped clarify Hoop in her ideas and subtly yet effectively realigning her sound. The simplified arrangements draw focus to the fundamental sophistication of the songs. While Hoop’s trademark finger-plucked guitar and ethereal textures remain, the songs and their presentation are ever more direct.
The album, Hoop says, is intended to “wrap its arms around our human planet spinning in its increasingly precarious wobble”. Today Hoop is sharing the video for the album’s lead single Shoulder Charge. The video’s director, Nick Middleton expands on the video and his relationship with Jesca below: “Jesca Hoop is a saint, someone who I believe considers the lives of others as sacrosanct and who sees very deeply into our private worlds. We spoke on the phone quite a few times before making this video.
My intention for this video was that it would capture something from those phone calls – the delicate, tender world that the song exists in.
Jesca Hoop: Shoulder Charge (ft. Lucius)
The video is about meeting someone by chance, who makes you see the world differently, who changes your interior world. Fredrik Quinones is a Swedish/Chilean dancer known internationally as Fredrik Xtravaganza. Leah Abraham is a model and advocate for a so nurturing lifestyle that focusses on the individual and others around them.”
Jesca Hoop: Shoulder Charge ft. Lucius Lyrics:
I’VE BEEN GOING THROUGH SOMETHING QUIETLY
SO QUIETLY
NOBODY KNOWS MY TROUBLE
NOBODY KNOWS
I DRESS MYSELF FOR CITY STREETS
THESE LEATHERS SHIELD MY SADNESS
SO NOBODY SEES
NOBODY SEES
NOBODY SEES ME
NOBODY SEES
NOTHING
NOT MY SKIN
KEEPS OUT FROM IN
I CAME OUT OF THIS WORLD
NOT IN TO THIS WORLD
I REHEARSE MY HELLO’S HELLO HELLO
TO REFINED DECEIT
AND HEAD OUT TO MEET A FRIEND FOR COFFEE
ARMOURED IN MASCARA
I HIT THE STREET AND JOIN THE SEA
OF ISLANDS WALKING THE ISLAND
ALL OF THEIR STORIES UNDERNEATH
IN CURRENTS OF UNCONSCIOUS
DRIVEN BY DEEP WATER
HEADS ABOVE THE WATER
BARELY ABOVE THE WATER
NOTHING NOT MY SKIN
KEEPS OUT FROM IN
I CAME OUT OF THIS WORLD
NOT INTO THIS WORLD
NOTHING KNOWS A FINISHING
WHERE NOTHING BEGINS
I CAME OUT OF THIS WORLD
NOT INTO THIS WORLD
NOT FROM OUTSIDE THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
I LIVE AS THE WORLD
IF I TOLD YOU WHAT WAS REALLY GOING ON
SURELY I’D HAVE LOST YOUR LOVE
THERE WAS NO ONE I COULD TRUST TO UNDERSTAND
SOMETHING PERSONAL
BUT AT THE STATION
IN A MOMENT
OF SONDER
ON THE PLATFORM
STANDING SHOULDER
TO SHOULDER
TO SHOULDER
TO SHOULDER
TO SHOULDER CHARGE
STANDING SHOULDER
TO SHOULDER
TO SHOULDER
TO SHOULDER CHARGE
I FOUND MYSELF HOLDING THE THREAD
THAT I MIGHT TRUST A FRIEND
THAT WE MIGHT JUST ALL BE IN THIS TOGETHER
EMPATHY’S CONTAGIOUS
WE GATHERED ROUND A SPRING FED WELL
WHAT A TALE TO TELL
AND WHAT A FUCKING RELIEF
THAT NOTHING ONE CAN GO THROUGH
HAS NOT BEEN SHARED BY TWO
NOTHING ONE CAN GO THROUGH
HAS NOT BEEN SHARED BY TWO
NOTHING NOT MY SKIN
KEEPS OUT FROM IN
I CAME OUT OF THIS WORLD
NOT INTO THIS WORLD
NOTHING KNOWS A FINISHING
WHERE NOTHING BEGINS
I CAME OUT OF THIS WORLD
NOT INTO THIS WORLD
NOT FROM OUTSIDE THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
I LIVE AS THE WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
OUT OF THIS WORLD
