Boston, Massachusetts is home to some amazing artists regardless of genre, but has a streak of being the origins of incredible artists in the alternative music world. Four Year Strong, PVRIS, The Hotelier, Have Heart- the list goes on forever. No matter what year it is, there is always a promising musician from Boston that people from all over should keep their eyes on.
Have Heart-a hardcore band first started in 2002, released two incredible albums, and then disbanded in 2009. In 2015, members of Have Heart (Pat Flynn and Shawn Costa) made their way back into the music world with members of Basement, Big Contest, and Stand Off with a new band- Fiddlehead. They released the EP Out of the Bloom in 2015, with a follow up debut album Springtime and Blind in 2018. Originally Fiddlehead’s discography was supposed to be this EP and album, but it expanded into sophomore album Between the Richness (released in 2021). The success of Between the Richness has had worldwide eyes on Fiddlehead and no one should consider looking away now because on June 7th they announced their third album Death is Nothing to Us with lead single, “Sullenboy.”
“Sullenboy” is an unexpected track from the post-hardcore legends in the making. With the first two albums having different vibes-Springtime and Blind being more “aggressive” and embracing the hardcore roots of vocalist Pat and Shawn’s previous band while also exploring a different sound versus Between the Richness being a lot more polished and shifting further away from the hardcore influence. Fiddlehead figured out what the strongest parts of their previous albums were and combined it to release a banger.
Like every Fiddlehead song, “Sullenboy” starts with a somewhat long instrumental bit which usually sets the stage for what the tempo and vibe of the song is going to be. In this case the instrumental bit starts off somewhat slow, but gradually increases into a faster tempo- this tempo stays the same for the majority of the song, only to slow down briefly during the 2nd verse, only to get right back to the fast (if not even faster) tempo than we were first greeted with. The instrumentals, paired with Flynn’s vocals create this interesting “call and response” where instrumental heavy sections of the song start off loud and then with the vocals respond to those instrumentals the volumes change. With each listen you find something new about the song that you didn’t notice prior, and it keeps you hooked. You could listen to this song fifty times in a row and still find something new each listen.
Of course it wouldn’t be a Fiddlehead song if the lyrics weren’t some of the saddest lyrics you’ve ever heard and there wasn’t some reference to the subject of grief in their songs. Flynn admitted in an interview that it wasn’t intentional to write a song with nods to that subject matter but the lyrical content explores the subject matter about how life can be after experiencing the loss of someone and while you might have “moved on,” there’s still going to be that lingering feeling throughout for years to come. These lyrics paint a very vivid picture of how these emotions can affect someone’s day to day as well as being able to articulate the specific feelings.
In short, the latest and greatest from Fiddlehead is an aggressive yet upbeat sounding song with very vivid imagery through the lyrics, and definitely proves that they’re not slowing down anytime soon-even if they are not a “full time band.”
“Sullenboy” is out wherever you listen to your music and their third album, Death is Nothing to Us is out August 18th through Run for Cover Records so be sure to preorder and listen now to their newest single.
