Home Video’s debut album No Certain Night or Morning is the sort of album that is hard to describe. Part electronic, part organic, but all about emotional connection, the Brooklyn-based duo have created an album that is rich with texture and intriguingly structured, delivered with a deliberate panache.
With Home Video about to embark upon their maiden Australian tour, frontman Colin Ruffino explains that the extrapolation of his and cohort David Gross’ studio-based sounds is fleshed out in the live arena by a drummer. “David has to double up on a couple of instruments,” he says, “and we have some electronic triggering. We’ve been doing it for a few years that way, and it seems to work really well.”
Home Video might have only recently released their debut album, but before that the buzz has been building for the group for some time – they originally signed to über-cool dance label Warp some years ago, and started making music as that for a couple of years before that. “We were selective about the shows that we would do,” he explains of the group’s relatively low profile, “so 2004 I guess is when we’ve been around since. We have a high standard for our live sound, so we can’t play little dives or on little systems, so there are a lot of places that are off limits. That’s really the thing that keeps us from playing shows. Also, demand for us isn’t that high.”
That seems incredibly likely to change now that No Certain Night or Morning has been released, with the duo’s debut likely to gain them greater notoriety. The response to it has been nothing short of enthusiastic, combining rich and fluent electronic instrumentation with a fragility that brings to mind the likes of Radiohead’s Kid A and Amnesiac period.
Recorded over a year ago, the release of the album was delayed as the band extracted themselves from their contract with Warp. “We had a version of it ready to go with them,” Colin explains of the album, “and then we dissolved that contract and worked on it a little bit more. A little over a year ago we had the final version as it is now and shopped it around to a few places, and had people interested and then backing out. It feels good to finally have it out.”
It was a matter of Home Video finding a home that they were comfortable calling their own, after their original label had different ideas to the duo as to where their future lay. When the option came about to get out of the contract and be able to do what they wanted to do, they jumped at the chance. Part of the reason for this was that the album they created for Warp was something that, in retrospect, they believed was not representative of where Home Video were headed.
“It included some songs that we wouldn’t include now, and we’ve since written a few of the stronger tracks, and it’s become a stronger album since then. I’m glad we didn’t release it then.”
Coming together over an extended period of time, the first song composed for No Certain Night or Morning is the finale, Melon, which began as an experiment about four years hence. ”Then songs came over that four year period. It took a while. It wasn’t like it was a plan from the beginning as to how it would come together or what would be on it, so it was a trial and error thing, and bouncing off of people. It wasn’t all one burst of energy or one thought.”
As such, one clear reference point for Home Video is Portishead, who similarly took an electronic approach to their studio-based recordings and extrapolated the sound of it in the live format, incorporating a greater ‘live’ element into their sound when they perform it. Elements of New Order also drift into the sounds found on No Certain Night or Morning, but Colin explains that variety is the spice of life.
“There’s a whole bunch of bands we listen to,” he says. ”We didn’t really get into New Order as much until recently, or fairly recently. We definitely love them, but it was the Cure more, really – the early stuff in particular.”
Meeting in high school, Colin and David had art class together and bonded over a mutual love of creation. ”We didn’t really hang out much until senior year when me and this other guy started a band, and then David came in and took it from there until the other guy went his own way and me and David stuck it out.”
Originally, the bare bones of Home Video was instrumental, with only one vocally-driven song. ”It was almost out of being a shy person, and I didn’t really get the confidence to sing until later,” Colin admits. ”We were young musicians and we’ve definitely mellowed out since then and realised it’s more about emotion rather than virtuosity.”
Colin says that the defining point was the composing and recording of Melon. “Before that we’d try to program beats that were too complicated just for the sake of being complicated. Then Melon was this really simple keyboard line and just a 4/4 beat and a nice emotional lyrical delivery, and lyrics, and it was like ‘wow, that’s what we want to do’. We want to touch people. We don’t only want to appeal to your brain but also to be some soul-stirring.”
Home Video’s No Certain Night or Morning is out now, with the duo touring Australia in early December.
FasterLouder and Civil Society present HomeVideo with My Latest Novel
Thursday 7 December – Corner Hotel, Melbourne
Friday 8 December – The Globe, Brisbane
Saturday 9 December – The Basement, Sydney
