Why Hurry didn’t put their new album, ‘Zoned Out,’ on Spotify
Hurry frontman Matt Scottoline sat down with Mike Vasilikos in the studio to discuss the album’s inspiration, working with Gerard Love and Ian Farmer, and why it’s not available on Spotify.
Hurry | Courtest of the artist
Philly’s indie pop rock outfit Hurry is celebrating the release of their seventh studio album, Zoned Out on Lame-O Records. The band just threw a show marking its drop at Johnny Brenda’s last week, with Sad13 (Sadie Dupuis’ project that dropped a new mixtape, 1331, the same day) and stand-up comedian Dina Hashem (who joined Hurry on drums for a Pixies cover at the gig) also on the bill.
Before the show, Hurry frontman Matt Scottoline stopped by WXPN to chat with host Mike Vasilikos about how Zoned Out came together, why it’s not on Spotify, and more.
“It’s surreal,” Scottoline told Vasilikos. “ You spend so much time in this album cycle promoting it that now that it’s the week of, it’s a little hard to believe.”
While the record is out now, you won’t find it on Spotify, Apple Music, or other major streamers (three singles have been released on streaming services, and it’s available to stream on Bandcamp, however).
”I think a lot of things have changed. Especially with Spotify over the years — even in the last two, three years — with how the algorithm works and the sort of built-in payola system they’ve created, where you can sort of give up more of your revenue to be served in the algorithm more,” he said. “There’s not a lot of natural discovery happening anymore.”
Eric Osman, founder of Lame-O Records, suggested to Scottoline the album stay off streamers for those reasons.
“ He made a pretty compelling case. I felt like, why not try it? What do you have to lose,” he said. “ I think there’s better opportunity for people to build a real connection when you have to put in a little more effort to find something or get something or engage with an album.”
Even though fewer people may hear the album due to the decision, he hopes they have a more profound experience when spinning it.
Scottoline said in the intervening years between the band’s last record, Don’t Look Back, and Zoned Out were personally transformative, which led to Zoned Out featuring somewhat uncharacteristic undertones of struggle.
“ There’s always some amount of struggle,” he said. “ My relationship with music is always kind of evolving, too. I’ve found that writing songs is just sort of like how I express what’s in my head in a way that I maybe don’t always do conversationally or just in my normal life.”
Scottoline said sometimes during promo cycles he will listen to a newly released Hurry song a year or so after writing it and realize, “That’s what I was thinking about” in the moment.
“Everything kind of comes out in the songs,” he said.
While putting the record together, he pulled in some all-stars for assistance. That includes Ian Farmer of Slaughter Beach, Dog and Modern Baseball, who typically masters recordings for bands, but recorded and engineered Hurry’s two most recent albums.
”He has this infectious, excited, and I mean this in a good way, almost childlike relationship with music that I feel like has been sort of beaten out of me over the years a little bit,” Scottoline said. “He’s such a refreshing person to be in [a recording] environment with.”
He also tapped Teenage Fanclub’s Gerard Love to play on the album.
”One of my favorite bands,” Scottoline said of the Scottish pop rockers. “If you hear my music, I think it’s pretty clear, the direct influence.”
He and Love met a few years ago while Hurry toured the United Kingdom and Love agreed to play with the band at a Glasgow gig. At that show, Hurry and Love joined up for a cover of Teenage Fanclub’s “Dont Look Back,” which Scottoline said was the inspiration for naming Hurry’s last album Don’t Look Back.
”We just kept in touch a little bit over email since then,” he said. In the early days of Zoned Out coming together, friends and colleagues encouraged Scottoline to ask Love to contribute vocals for the song “Moving After You.”
Love agreed and sent his vocals in digitally. But Scottoline’s nerves got the best of him.
“I was almost afraid to listen to the files when he sent them,” Scottoline said. “And I just sent them to Ian.”
Despite not being a listener of his own music, Scottoline found himself listening to “Moving After You” thanks to Love’s contribution.
”I’ve gone back a few times, and I listen to it, and it still, I don’t think, fully registers with me when I hear it.”
Hurry will head back to the UK for eight shows in August in support of Zoned Out, but before they jet off across the pond, they’ll play Main Street Music in Manayunk with Planette Automatic on Aug. 1.
Listen to the full interview below: