Review Fix Exclusive: Clyde Hargrove Talks Hydrogen Child EP and More

Review Fix chats with Hydrogen Child guitarist Clyde Hargrove, who discusses the band’s new EP. Formerly known as “Super Water Sympathy,” the band added two new members to their lineup to create an even richer sound to their signature “Shimmer Pop” formula.

Review Fix: How did the band get together and what has the journey been like up to
this point?

Clyde Hargrove: The band formed in August of 2010 with its original line up known as “Super Water Sympathy.” In the summer of 2013, the drummer and bassist left the band and Ansley Rimmer (vocals), Clyde Hargrove (guitar), and Jason Mills (keys) brought on Hali Kha (drums) and Chris Rimmer (bass) to solidify the line up. I think the journey is really illustrated between the first album “Vesper Belle,” second album, also called “Hydrogen Child,” and our current sound under the name Hydrogen Child. Bringing on Hali and Chris as the rhythm section really boosted the sound and gave the songs more punch and attitude. The touring aspect has been really great as well. Everyone really loves sleeping in the van in Wal Mart parking lots and waking up at odd hours of the night to go check out their $5 movie bin and see what kind of characters are lurking around. Right now we are touring the southern region and preparing for Operation: Swarm & Swoon.

Review Fix: How was “Sirens” written?

Hargrove: The bass line and guitar riff had been on the back burner for a while as random things to play during sound check. Probably about a year. We locked ourselves at Ansley and Chris’ house for the entirety of December 2013. This month consisted of writing, eating home made tacos, and playing with the multiple cats that live in the house. During that time we wrote about 15 songs and Sirens was actually the last one to come out of the session. We actually completely forgot about Sirens until the last day of writing. It came together at the last minute. We originally had a different chorus, but after a night of whiskey binging, came up with the current chorus and decided that really took the song to the next level. You could say the song was completely inspired by a house full of cats and Jameson.

Review Fix: What song on the EP do you feel is the most indicative of your sound?

Hargrove: That’s a very hard question because each song on the EP has its own personality. The whole thing has an over all tone and feeling, but we didn’t want to be one of those bands that puts out an EP or album that has a bunch of different versions of the same song. We are always trying to progress our sound and see what we can do differently on the next song or album. We released Sirens as a single to draw people in, but it isn’t necessarily going to be an EP full of songs that sound like Sirens.

Review Fix: What was the creative process for this EP like?

Hargrove: After the December 2013 writing/cat camp, we flew our producer, Frequency, down to Shreveport from New York to record for the first two weeks of January. Frequency really is a beast in the studio. There really aren’t a lot of people that work the way he works. In September, we went to his studio in New York to work on final mixes for the songs that are going to be on the EP. Of the 5 songs that we recorded in January, we ended up choosing three to be on the EP because we wrote two more songs after recording that we felt were a better fit. Wed tracked another song at Pond Studios with Jimmy Wooten in August. Frequency mixed one of the songs and the other was mixed by JK Royston and Dan Mineart out of Richmond, Virginia. We are currently getting the songs mastered and putting the ideas together for EP artwork and finding new ways to stuff flounder for Ansley’s upcoming cooking podcast.

Review Fix: How would you define shimmer pop?

Hargrove: Warm ambient synths with shimmering guitar riffs on top of colorful bass lines and jagged rhythm.

Review Fix: Why should someone listen to you guys?

Hargrove: People should listen to us because we believe in space exploration and peacefulness of birds. We really want to create tranquility in your brain when there is chaos and create chaos when there is tranquility. We want to evoke, provoke, and make you feel vulnerable. I believe that’s the job of an artist.

Review Fix: How do you want this EP to be remembered?

Hargrove: Ideally as the EP that put us on the musical map and led to an incredible full length album.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Hargrove: Only time will tell, but for right now we’re touring and touring and touring. We will hopefully continue to gain a few new fans and friends in each city along. When we get back to Shreveport we’re going to eat at Tacomania and get some brisket tacos. In the words of Robert Frost, “You can never have too much cilantro.”

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 13820 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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