For the past couple of years, the name hard life has been everywhere. Or, the name’s predecessor: in 2023, Murray Matravers and the other members of the band formerly known as easy life were issued with a lawsuit alleging copyright infringement and denouncing them as “brand thieves”. When faced with the decision of either fighting a multi-national corporate airline in court or changing their name, the Leicester band backed down, and hard life was born. Now, they’re back on top form with their new album onion and an accompanying tour, but in accordance with said album’s title, Matravers is still peeling back the layers of life.
In May of this year, hard life made their return with appearances on festival stages across the country. “It was crazy”, Matravers says, “we hadn’t been on stage for so long, and for so much of my life I’d been gigging constantly. I’d never stopped. Ever since we started this band, we were always on tour. Then all of a sudden we had this hiatus where I kind of forgot what it feels like to be on stage. Stepping out on stage again is just the best feeling in the world”.
“All of us in the band have had a change in attitude, since we no longer have endless amounts of gigs. When we did, slowly they all became more and more meaningless because you think you’re invincible, and that this is just going to keep happening forever. Now, every time we step on stage, we’re like damn, this could be our last show. Anything could happen. The world is a crazy place. I feel like we’ve got a new sense of gratitude, it’s a really powerful thing and I think it’s tangible in the performances. I think it’s very obvious that we’re all really glad to be there”. This gratitude was clear to see at their BBC Radio 1’s Big Weekend set, in particular, which proved to be a triumphant return as the band performed old classics and newer, reflective material.
When asked whether there was any point in the past two years that he thought he wouldn’t be able to return to the stage with his bandmates, Matravers admits that “every single day, I’m constantly wondering if we’re going to carry on. As a band, touring was our main source of income, and the fact that we couldn’t do that anymore was logistically a problem. We realised we were going to have to do other things with our time, and lots of the guys in the band now have other pursuits that bring them satisfaction, but also have other work too”.
“Being in a band is never straightforward. There’s so much that goes on behind the scenes, and music is so fast. You can be so relevant, the flavour of the month, and then all of a sudden no one cares. I think I’m okay with that, if we have to stop the band I’m kind of cool with that too, and the right time will present itself. When we went through everything we did with the lawsuit, for some reason it just didn’t feel like the right time for us to end. We felt like we needed to come back. We owed it to so many fans that had been with us for so long to show that we could be resilient enough to put one foot in front of the other and carry on. And I’m really proud of the band for doing that, but it wasn’t a simple process and there was a lot of discussion about not continuing, but I’m glad we did”.
The band’s prospective court date was due to be in July of this year, but now the date has passed, Matravers has no regrets on backing down. “We couldn’t afford to fight back, it really is that simple. If we had deeper pockets, then perhaps I would have made a different decision. I’m not a lawyer, I don’t really give a fuck about British law, certainly not British corporate law. And very quickly, every single one of my days was filled with meetings with very interesting individuals, but all we’d talk about is law and copyright and trademark infringement and all this shit that is interesting if you do it for like a day. But I realised that if I were to fight this in court, I’m just going to be an expert in IP law, but I’m not going to have a clue what’s going on in pop culture and I’m going to have to change my whole life”.
“I know it’s only been two years, but two years is a long time, and the idea that we’d only now be going to court is actually insane to me. The idea of having to fight this, that entire time, I don’t regret our decision for a second”. While a lawsuit of this calibre threatens to overshadow everything else and take over lives, Matravers has admirably managed to find humour in it. “I don’t mind retelling the story over and over again. It’s interesting, I often thought that maybe I would be remembered for some of my best work, but I feel like now we’ll be remembered as the band that got sued by an airline, which is quite funny. I don’t feel like people will remember me anyway, and that’s also okay. I like talking about it, I’ve been dining out on this story. People are like, you know, tell me the most interesting thing about you, and I can have the attention of the whole room, it’s brilliant”.
Upon the announcement of the band’s first album under the hard life name, many were baffled by its title, onion. “There’s so many fan theories around the album title, but I actually just named it after the studio we recorded it in. My friend in Tokyo has this amazing studio, and it’s called Onion Studio, so I just named the album after the studio in which it was made. And then it was later on that people were thinking it’s because the album is layered and it’s raw”.
Matravers’ time in Tokyo was undoubtedly an important influence for the album and its themes. “I remember where I was when I wrote all my music, and my geographical environment is incredibly important for all the music I make. What I found in Tokyo was a loneliness that I’ve never really experienced anywhere else in the world. 98% of the population of Tokyo is ethnically Japanese, and most of them don’t speak English, so I spent most of my time feeling very alone there. But that gave me the time and the space to allow myself to be introspective and ask myself these big existential questions about what it is I wanted to do, and if I wanted to be in the band, and I don’t think I could have done that in England. I just don’t think I would have afforded myself the luxury of being so alone anywhere else other than Tokyo. I really think I if I made this record anywhere else, it would sound very, very different”.
Geography isn’t the only thing that inspires Matravers, though: since the inception of easy life, he has cited other art forms such as film as influences on his music. “I love music so much, but something that is sad but true is the longer I work in the music industry, the less I get to enjoy music, and something that is yet to be tainted by any exterior force is film. There’s a song on this album called ‘Jane’, which is inspired by a film called Mysterious Skin, which is incredibly dark and moving”.
“I was inspired by one particular line from the film; the main character is a gay sex worker, and he says he hates it when his men look like Tarzan, but sound like Jane. And in an otherwise dark and horrific movie, that line really made me laugh. It stayed with me and I wrote it down on my phone, and I took it to the studio the next day and I showed it to Taka [Perry], my producer. Film for me can spark these tiny little ideas that might not even be related to either anything to do with the film itself, really, but if you want to write, you need to absorb shit. And whether that be absorbing life, or absorbing other music, or absorbing film, or talking to friends, it’s so important”.
Matravers is evidently looking forward to showcasing his influences on stage at hard life’s upcoming headline tour, and is happy to reminisce on previous times on the road, citing a show at O2 Victoria Warehouse in February 2023 as “one of my favourite gigs I’ve ever played in the UK”. The show occurred during a tour in support of sophomore album MAYBE IN ANOTHER LIFE: Matravers reflects on the tour as “super special”, but notes in particular that “Manchester’s fucking great. It’s a bit overlooked, that pisses me off. Everyone’s always banging about London. Loads of my friends from Tokyo are visiting me all the time and I always ask if they’re going anywhere else. But it’s just London. Manchester has a unique flavour, and the people are great”.
hard life are due to make a stop at Manchester Academy on November 6th, where audiences will be able to witness the glory of their return in a city they love.
Listen to onion here.
