Hamish Hawk - A Firmer Hand [Clear Vinyl with Black & White Splatter]

Format: LP
Catalogue No.: SOAKLPB511
Barcode: 0822166001154
Release Date: 16 May 2025
Genre: Indie/Alternative

Standard weight, Clear Vinyl with Black & White Splatter 

TRACKLIST: 
1. Juliet as Epithet 
2. Machiavelli’s Room 
3. Big Cat Tattoos 
4. Nancy Dearest 
5. Autobiography of Spy 
6. You Can Film Me 
7. Christopher St. 
8. Men Like Wire 
9. Questionable Hit 
10. Disingenuous 
11. Milk an Ending 
12. The Hard Won

“Writing this album, I opened up my closet, and a skeleton came out.” In a café just around the corner from his Edinburgh flat, Hamish Hawk is contemplating his extraordinary new record, A Firmer Hand. “The thing that links all of the songs is a sense of the unsaid, whether out of guilt, shame, repression, embarrassment, coyness, whatever it might have been. I realised: I am going to say these things, and not all of them are going to make me look good. The album made so many demands, and I just gave myself over to it.”

At this stage, where only a handful of close associates have heard the finished album, Hawk is still unsure of what the reaction might be from fans, critics, even family. He jokes that A Firmer Hand is the first of his records that his parents might not enjoy. “But the fact that it makes me nervous tells me it was the right thing to do.”

It takes only a couple of listens to be sure that it was a risk worth taking. And just a couple more to determine that A Firmer Hand is the best and boldest record Hamish Hawk has delivered to date. “It’s a bit of a coming of age record,” he says. And a record for the ages.

PRESS/ONLINE: Confirmed reviews: MOJO, Uncut, Record Collector, NARC, Louder Than War, HI-FI+ and more tbc. Support for campaign so far from: The Line of Best Fit, Clash, Our Culture, Dork, CMU, Live 4 Ever, Under The Radar + more.

RADIO: 
BBC 6 Music: Steve Lamacq premiere x 2, B List playlist for Big Cat Tattoos
BBC Scotland Quay: session confirmed
BBC Radio Scotland spot plays

TV: STV Interview ‘What’s on Scotland’

LIVE: 
Dec 2024 Supporting Travis on UK Arena Tour including Glasgow Hydro Arena (14,000 cap)
Jan/Feb 2025 Headline UK Tour including shows at: Usher Hall, Edinburgh (2,200 cap) Shepherd's Bush Empire, London (2,000 cap)
December 2025: Barrowlands, Glasgow x 2 (3,000 cap x 2 = 6,000)