Dripping Gold

With the core of frontwoman Ilsa Wynne-Hoelscher and her guitar-playing father Anthony, the first formations for HoneyBird took place back in 2010 – the mutual goal: to write songs that moved them. Three years have passed since then, but finally the band have a debut record to their name and a solid line-up of versatile players rounding out the quintet.

“We had a few line-ups before this final [one] and you'd always get to a certain point and then someone would leave or you'd get to a certain amount of tracks on your setlist and then someone breaks an arm and you'd just have to start again,” Wynne-Hoelscher laments. “Because even if you have to replace just one member you have to catch them up. We definitely thought for years we were [taking] two steps forward and one step back, but we've never really wanted anything more to come of this than to play and make music.”

Taking on lyrical duties for the band's debut, Ilsa penned the lion's share last year. She recalls the time as being filled with hope in what lies ahead, trying to seek truth rather than dwell on negatives following the breakdown of a relationship. “A lot of the tracks, they seem a little heavy and dark in the lyrics, but in the actual music and the melody of it, we've tried to marry it with this beautiful light – getting that light and shade.”

To achieve that balance in their bluesy rock, the vocalist leaves her written lyrics with the band to craft music around. The completed tracks that then return are often in a completely different light. “It's great to collaborate with others but to have that starting point and get broader rather than be so focused,” Wynne-Hoelscher relates.

After embarking on the songwriting journey that's resulted in their debut, A Golden Thread, back in 2011, the quintet locked in studio time this year to provide that “deadline pressure”. Ilsa admits that the tracks changed a lot from their original incarnations, some with more polish, others with a newfound rawness – the end result being an eclectic album that mirrors their live shows. Now, since finishing the recording in April, the band have been tightening up their chops, ready to deliver the new music to fans, while also offering “a couple of covers that influenced the songwriting process”.

“We're definitely inspired by those rocksteady riffs from the '70s; that vintage feel and live sound,” the frontwoman tells. “And we're not really sticking to one particular influence – we have so many.”

With a generationally varied line-up that includes members who lived through that golden era of rock'n'roll to ones whom have simply been bred on those sounds, HoneyBird simply rely on that unbridled musical passion and the onstage chemistry it spawns to hold their own identity.

“I grew up listening to The Doors and Pink Floyd, and that's all I've really known. As much as we do listen to modern bands – contemporary music – and get a kick out of different genres, that bluesy rock is just deeply seeded within us,” Wynne-Hoelscher concludes. “I mean, I don't know how many times I've watched that Woodstock documentary.”