Happiness Hurts

By Andy Welch.

Whether flying around Europe to launch their album, performing live, appearing on TV, getting dolled up for photoshoots or recording with Kylie, Hurts have been busy boys during the past few months.

So busy, in fact, singer Theo Hutchcraft doesn't actually have anywhere to live at present, so instead, he's occupying different hotels up and down the country, depending on where he's needed.

"It's a bit disorientating," he says. "But on the plus side, I've got a massive bag full of little shampoos. And I can get sandwiches in the middle of the night if I want. I feel like Alan Partridge, living in a hotel."

It's little wonder Hutchcraft - and his bandmate Adam Anderson - can find the funny side of his current predicament.

This time last year things were a lot less rosy for the Manchester-based duo, who had been on the dole for the best part of three years.

"If things ever get a bit much, I just give myself a split second to think back to that time and the world instantly becomes a better place," says Hutchcraft.

While the experience isn't one either band member looks back on fondly - Anderson can only just about bring himself to talk about his time signing on, living on £40 a week - their debut album owes the Job Centres of Manchester a great deal.

"We've actually thanked the Department of Work and Pensions in the album's sleevenotes," he says.

Perhaps surprisingly, their striking look came from their weekly visits to the dole office.

Sharp suits, Grandad collars, braces, Chelsea boots and Brylcreemed hair are the order of the day, and have become Hurts's defacto uniform.

"The Job Centres in Manchester are demoralising places, so we both used to wear suits to go in," says Anderson. "If you go in looking smart, when you leave, feeling like a loser, at least you still have your dignity. It's a question of pride, really."

"Once you start doing that, you can't stop either," adds Hutchcraft. "We'd be getting the Megabus down from Manchester to meet record labels and we'd have to leave at 2am because it takes seven hours, so we'd arrive all crumpled and tired, but if you have a suit on, it works out and you feel OK."

This formative experience isn't just responsible for the band's aesthetic, either. Much of their forthcoming debut, Happiness, deals with themes of hope and desperation, mirroring their situation.

"Wonderful Life, Unspoken and Evelyn are all very desperate sounding," says Hutchcraft.

"Hope is very important. I think for a lot of your life that's the only thing you've got, hope. That's why the album is called Happiness too, because it's about that pursuit. That's what most people do with their lives, they strive to be happy. But the journey there can be difficult."

"Now we're happy. Before we weren't, but now we are."

A big turning point for Hurts was the BBC's Sound Of 2010 poll, an annual list of bands expected to succeed compiled by the country's tastemakers.

Hurts appeared at No 4 on the final shortlist, solely on the strength of Wonderful Life, the only song any journalist will have heard at the time.

"It was so exciting to get in that list based on one song, but we'd done most of the album by then. We were thinking, 'They're excited about Wonderful, but we've got all this held back'."

"After we got a record deal, we were looking for another 'Wonderful Life' moment. We've been saying 'How on earth did we do it?' and we try to do it again, but then I suppose we don't feel like that anymore."

"I can totally see why bands mess up their second albums," says Anderson. "I think you make your best music when you're slightly uncomfortable."

Looking at the grainy, black and white video they made themselves to accompany Wonderful Life last year, it would be easy to assume Hutchcraft and Anderson had overdosed on Anton Corbijn's Joy Division biopic, while the sheen of their press shots suggest an obsession with New Romantics Duran Duran and Spandau Ballet.

In reality, neither accusation is true. Hurts's music is certainly dramatic and atmospheric, but owes more to Depeche Mode, Tears For Fears and the more contemporary songwriting of American hit-maker Ryan Tedder than anything else. With different production in place, it's easy to imagine JLS performing Sunday, while there will be pop bands up and down the country who'd give their right arm for songs as strong as Evelyn, Illuminated And Blood, Tears And Gold.

"I love that period of mid-to-late-Eighties," says Anderson. "Electronic music has never sounded as human or as natural. That's something we've aimed for on this album, to make it dramatic, but warm. Earlier electronic music was cold and synthetic, and we never wanted that."

Excellent songs aside, the album is also notable for the appearance of Kylie Minogue. Originally featuring only Hutchcraft's voice, the duo decided after recording the album that the song had space for a female voice.

"A lot of the record is about women, and the trials and tribulations that brings, so it needed a moment of salvation," says Hutchcraft. "We made a list of people we'd love to have on the album and dreamed about it when we were on the dole."

"We just thought Kylie's voice would sit really well next to mine, so we wrote to her - you don't ask you don't get and all that - thinking we wouldn't hear back. But then we got a letter saying she'd love to do it."

The result is stunning, Kylie harking back to her dark, Confide In Me days to deliver a vocal that is somehow both powerful and delicate.

"She sounds amazing," says Hutchcraft. "We were there when she recorded it. That was a special moment, watching Kylie Minogue singing our song."

"When I think back to what we were doing a year ago, it seems even more remarkable."

Extra time - Hurts :: Theo Hutchcraft, 23, originally hails from Yorkshire, but moved to Manchester five years ago. Adam Anderson, 26, was born in Hazel Grove near Stockport.

:: Happiness was recorded in the ironically named Sunshine Dance Studios in Manchester. "It was a dark room in a basement with no windows," says Anderson. "All we could hear when we were making the record were the dance classes upstairs, playing R Kelly and Black Eyed Peas."

:: The original black and white video for Wonderful Life, which the band made for £60, has been viewed more than five million times on YouTube.

:: When the band perform live, they have an opera singer on stage with them, Richard. They discovered him during a performance of Pirates Of Penzance.

:: Hurts release their debut album Happiness on Monday, September 6. They begin a UK tour on October 2. Their current single Wonderful Life is out now.

:: Tour dates: Saturday, October 2 - Brighton Concorde; Sunday, October 3 - Leeds Cockpit; Monday, October 4 - Glasgow Oran Mor; Tuesday, October 5 - Manchester Ritz; Thursday, October 7 - Birmingham The Library; Friday, October 8 - Bristol Trinity Church; Saturday, October 9 - London O2 Shepherds Bush Empire :: Hurts release their debut album Happiness on Monday, September 6. They begin a UK tour on October 2. Their current single Wonderful Life is out now.