Hot Club de Paris track by track guide to ‘Live At Dead Lake’ by Paul Rafferty

3 months ago 25th Jun 14:38

Hot Club de Paris’ affable frontman and bassist Paul Rafferty offers us his inner perspective on each track from second album ‘Live At Dead Lake’, released this month on Moshi Moshi.

Live At Dead Lake 1. Call Me Mr Demolition Ball I’ve loved demolition balls for ages. It’s such a clumsy and cruel way to demolish a building. This song is about being an awful companion and likening yourself to a demolition ball. People destroy each other in the clumsiest and most cruel manners. I’m guilty, so I wrote about doing it.

2. My Little Haunting I never understood why there are never any contemporary hauntings. I mean, monks and headless cavaliers are totally ace but why do we never see ghosts from the last 10 years floating around? For example, where’s the ghost of the dead scally that wrapped his dad’s car the day he passed his test? This song is about the ghosts of relationships that haunt you as you attempt to embark upon the rest of your life, with a hint of Scooby Doo slapstick.

3. I Wasn’t Being Heartless When I Said Your Favourite Song Lacked Heart How crazy are we for having such long song titles? This one is the longest one on the album. It has a whole 12 words in it! I sort of regret writing that line. It should have been called “Maybe I was Heartless When I Said Your Favourite Song Lacked Heart”, because the former is essentially a horrid thing to say to someone. The song is covers similar themes to Call Me Mr Demolition Ball, but talks more about ripping your teeth out and stuff.

4. For Parties Past and Present For Parties Past and Present is about finding a crumpled phone number in your pocket when you’re at the laundrette washing your clothes and it reminds you of some week night where you stayed up all night and got completely wasted at a party and fancied a girl who was wearing an awesome plaid dress and for some reason you didn’t talk to her and you saw her leave and since then you’ve been wondering who on earth she was and what she was like.

5. Let Go Of Everything Sometimes when you do something and it’s not as good as you hoped it’d be, you kind of wish that you’d given more of a shit. And then sometimes things you’ve been worrying about aren’t that bad and you kind of wish you’d given less of a shit. And then you reflect on all this stuff and it’s mainly pointless to do so because you should just be carrying on doing your life and looking on the bright side.

6. Friendship Song This is an instrumental song, but I can tell you that it’s named after a song in the Paper Route episode of Stella Comedy. It’s on youtube somewhere and is beyond hilarious.

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