Interview with Newbury’s Joe Hicks who’s back on track with new release Time is a Thief
Newbury singer songwriter Joe Hicks lost his way after the death of his father, but with the support of friends channelled his grief into making new music, he tells Arts Editor TRISH LEE
He’s back! and he has a single out.
Releasing his first new music in three years, Newbury’s Joe Hicks has channelled grief and confusion into the dramatic single Time is a Thief.
Having steadily built his profile in the years leading up to his 2022 debut album The Best I Could Do at the Time, Joe Hicks has been praised for his solid songwriting and remarkable vocal skills, hitting falsetto notes with ease while channelling the likes of John Mayer and Paul Simon with his clean and dexterous guitar playing. A deluxe re-issue of the LP and a headline tour around the UK and Europe followed in 2023.
Then life threw the musician a curveball.
Living in Bristol in early 2024, Joe was going through a lengthy breakup, and suddenly found himself also dealing with the loss of his father.
Feeling directionless, the possibility of dropping music became stronger.
Arts Editor Trish Lee caught up with Joe:
Hi Joe great to see you back on track.
Thank you very much Trish, it’s great to be releasing music again! I really appreciate the support.
How’s the music scene in Bristol?
Vibrant! There are so many great venues for touring acts and then the music available along King Street, especially at ‘The Old Duke’, is of an absurdly high standard – well worth a visit. I moved back into the Newbury area last year to be closer to Studio 91 when recording started, and while it feels good to be back, I did enjoy the energy of the city for the 18 months I was there.
Understandably the sudden death of your dad Bill in Cyprus nearly two years ago knocked you sideways. You had a creative block? How did that affect your music? How did you channel your grief?
When Dad passed, I had been in a creative barren period for a while. At that time, I wasn’t sure I was going to continue making music. The things life had thrown at me then had put me in a mindset that everything was both pointless and meaningless.
The first few months of grief were a real nosedive into those feelings.
Luckily my dear friends - long-time producer Sam Winfield and collaborator Tom Millar - were fully aware and determined to pull me out of it.
In February 24 they sat me down at the studio and basically said “you’ve got to channel this into new music, and we’re going to start now, whatever it takes.”
I’ve always found writing lyrics as a way of making sense of how I’m feeling deep down. What came out of those sessions was certainly a release of a lot of things I didn’t know how to articulate to anyone in the ‘real world’.
Your first single since then Time is a Thief has just been released. Has your music changed direction?
The music itself feels darker, but with an optimistic defiance. The mindset we adopted at the start of last year was to explore song ideas wherever they emerged from. That has resulted in much more collaboration between the three of us, and in many instances challenged me to write from a very different place, both lyrically and melodically.
What got you back on track – tell us about the single – are you pleased with it?
Time is a Thief is probably the song that made me feel the most optimistic again.
It came from a guitar idea that Tom had, and really challenged me as a writer to tread new ground to build it all up.
When finished, it showed me the stages of grief I’d been going through since losing my dad, where I was currently at, and how that experience had shaped my outlook on life.
Lyrically it’s about getting older and going through different life changing events – losing family members, big breakups, illness – that result in picking up baggage and shedding different parts of yourself along the way.
It’s about feeling less confident than you used to, feeling like you’ve lost some of the spirit you swear you had, and trying to get that back.
It’s about fighting to pick yourself up, defiantly saying you won’t be pulled down by it all anymore.
It’s about how, as time rolls along, it both robs you of certain tools you had when you were younger, and also builds up your armour.
How is it being received?
Hopefully well..!! No, the reaction has been heartening, especially after so much time away.
I released a music video for it on Friday, and that has been working hard flying the flag for the song.
For the first shot, director Emilie Cotterill and I had to get into a very choppy sea at 6am over in Pembrokeshire, which was certainly an experience!
More tracks to come? When can we expect a new album?
There are certainly more tracks to come. I’m sitting on a lot of new music that I can’t wait to share, so you’ll have to wait and see what form that takes, but it will certainly be next year.
Now you’ve got your mojo back, any plans for gigging back in Newbury?
Absolutely! I’ll be back out on tour next year. After such an incredible time playing at a sold out Arlington Arts for the first album, Newbury will be the first date in the diary.
Where can fans download Time is a Thief?
Time is a Thief is available to download and stream via all the reputable digital music emporiums – Spotify, Apple Music etc.
Links can be found on my website joehicksmusic.com and then the music video is available to watch now on YouTube.
