Interview with Hollin Kings: ‘Our next song, ‘Troublemaker’, is super dirty and ominous!’

Cleveland-based rock band Hollin Kings is gearing up to release their first album next year, according to Brandon Kendig, who plays lead and rhythm guitar in the group.

One song on the album will be ‘Troublemaker’, according to Kendig: ‘It’s about a relationship gone wrong,’ he said. ‘It’s super dirty and ominous! It’s about stepping out of things and creating havoc in your personal life. It’s not actually based on someone we know, although some of our songs are based on personal experience. For me, this one has a similar feel to ‘Hold On’ and ‘Dead and Gone’. This could be our lead single on the album.’

The lyrics attest to the havoc in question: ‘Who are you when the lights go out, when no-one else is around, don’t wanna play these games, tired of being let down. I can smell the night on you, when you walk in through that door, pack your bags, no lies to tell, this time it’s on you. I told you for the last time, this will be our deal breaker.’

The band also consists of Max Ostrowski (lead vocals, lead guitar), Nathan Lapuh (drums, percussion) and David Royer (bass guitar).

All of the members of the band grew up in the same town and bonded over their shared passions for music past and present. Each member brings a unique musical style to the group and over the past two years they’ve grown comfortable in mashing those individual influences into one sound.

‘The song’s about battling inner demons, and people coming after you’

Kendig’s favourite song by the band, ‘Last Man Standing’, is slated to appear on next year’s album: ‘It’s my favourite so far because of the songwriting dynamic. In a way it’s a lockdown song or, at least, it came out of lockdown because Max and I were watching Sons of Anarchy (about a close-knit outlaw motorcycle club in a fictional US town) at the time. The song’s about battling inner demons, and people coming after you. It’s big and riff heavy like ‘Dead and Gone’ with cool instrumental breaks. My dad says it sounds like Black Sabbath! [laughs]’.

The lyrics back that up: ‘The reaper’s coming to get me, never know when he’s gonna strike, better sleep with one eye open, for he hides in the shadows of the night.’

‘The chorus is about hope and someone reaching out to you’

Their latest single, ‘Hold On’ which came out earlier this year, was written collectively and is more hopeful. Kendig came up with the guitar riff and Lapuh contributed the ending.’It’s about a battle with anxiety,’ Kendig said. ‘But the chorus is about hope and someone reaching out to you. Nate comes up with a lot of the melodies because he’s the singer and a brilliant musician.’

The riots in Cleveland in May following the police killing of George Floyd also had an impact on the band as they couldn’t get into the recording studio. ‘We didn’t get together in May but we got together after that, writing and jamming a bit. We were all working from home and none of us had any symptoms of Covid,’ Kendig said. ‘We wrote five songs in that time but I think we’ll only record a couple of them. A couple could be duds! [laughs].’

Kendig notes that he was writing from a darker place in lockdown as his mother had just passed away after a battle with cancer.

Initially, Hollin Kings started out as a cover band called Frontier. ‘There was another band called Frontier in Kentucky and they had more followers than us on Instagram, so the name had to go,’ Kendig laughed. They reinvented themselves as Hollin Kings (a reference to Lord of the Rings) in November last year. ‘We were sick of playing country covers, well country rock, really,’ he said. ‘We played people like Brothers Osborne, Kings of Leon and The Cadillac Three.’

While they all have different influences – Lapuh is a big fan of Led Zeppelin, Royer loves Pink Floyd and Ostrowski loves Welshly Arms (an American blues rock band) and Kendig himself is a huge fan of rock band Rival Sons who he describes as ‘similar to us but riff heavy!’

If they could collaborate with anyone, they’d go with US rock band Tyler Bryant and The Shakedown: ‘They’re so good,’ he said. ‘We met them at one of their shows. They’re such nice guys, too. It would be fun to play with them because Tyler and Graham (Whitford, on guitar), they’re real shredders!’

(Photo: left to right at front: Brandon and Max. Nate on drums, David on guitar at the back)