Melbourne trio Huntly land North American label deal

While building up the vibe in Australia around their debut album Low Grade Buzz, Melbourne electro-pop trio Huntly will have it issued in North America via a new deal struck with US label House Arrest.

The album was released locally mid-March through Barely Dressed Records/Remote Control and made with a grant from Creative Victoria.

Shaped around the trio’s “doof you can cry to” mantra, Huntly explains that the eleven tracks “meditate on loss, emancipation, meaning and more – the sounds and stories traverse light and heavy, hard and soft.”

Brisbane-born Elspeth ‘Elly’ Scrine and Andrew McEwan met while trekking through Nepal.

She and Charles Teitelbaum began talking about music at the Meredith Music Festival.

Scrine moved to Melbourne and became a key member of the LISTEN collective which promotes the visibility and experiences of women, gender non-conforming, LGBTQIA+ and POC within Australian music.

The theme is carried through in the video for current single ‘Giving Circle’, the song about the social messiness that follows a couple’s break-up.

It features a choir, improvised performance and spontaneous dancing.

Scrine explains, “Creating a collective space for Andy, Charlie and I to play this song in – to have that group of people sing those lines and move their bodies together with us – it was a sincere kind of subversion of the social displacement that I wrote the song about.”

Video director Dylan Corbett notes: “For me, a choir is the perfect metaphor for the way Huntly brings people together.

“I wanted to honour the space their music creates, the expression, the connection and the love.”

After a packed set at Sydney’s Golden Age Theatre, the trio have a launch show on Thursday, May 9 at the Northcote Social Club in their hometown.