Girls In Hawaii - Wistfully indie-pop

Urban legend has it that it all began with a group of scouts, in which Antoine Wielemans and Lionel Vancauwenberghe acted as group leaders. We're in Belgium, late '90s, the kids are strumming guitars, and amid the usual campfire classics they soon start slipping in a few self-written songs with a breezy pop feel. The two bring in their respective brothers, Denis Wielemans and Brice Vancauwenberghe, and along the way a couple more friends: Christophe Léonard and Daniel Offermann. A sizeable core group realizes it has something to say, and in 2000 the first ideas are laid down on an eight-track recorder. The result is a set of crystalline melodies heavily influenced by the contemporary (or slightly earlier) indie scene, particularly by Grandaddy, a comparison that many critics and industry insiders would often draw with the band.

While some of them are studying Communications in Brussels, Girls In Hawaii (this being the quirky name they settled on) start gaining live experience around their home area, until a demo gets reviewed by the local press and by the French music magazine Magic, even managing to win a contest for emerging bands that draws curiosity and attention to the group. 2003 marks their first official release, the EP Found In The Ground – The Winter, a transitional and still somewhat uneven work made up of five tracks (including a feisty "Bees & Butterflies" that would later be reworked in a much slower version on their debut album) and released by the independent label 62TV, whose roster also includes well-known acts such as fellow countrymen Venus. It's hard to say whether dEUS, Belgium's most famous musical export, were a point of reference: what's certain is that this crop of artists proved just how capable little Belgium was of producing acts of undeniable worth, a shot of courage for all the young local musicians, so often relegated to the fringes of the empire. Following the hype generated by their debut EP, Girls In Hawaii embarked on their first tour, taking in Belgium and France. The time had come to put together their first proper album.

In November 2003 (though it would only gain real traction across Europe the following year), From Here To There was released, its cover depicting a reassuring landscape beneath clouds that could be read either as threatening or as the leftovers of a storm that has already passed. The impact is striking: across twelve tracks the band sketches out its own indie-pop aesthetic, made up of thoroughly pleasant, melodically flawless songs, where voices and guitars (often acoustic) weave together superbly, the rhythm section holds up the scaffolding, and the electronics chip in with well-judged flourishes. It's far from common to come across a debut of such compositional quality, one capable of drawing together the finest strands of recent English tradition, all gathered within the dense hive of pop music. As if that weren't enough, the band shows real technical skill, painting in excellent instrumental passages, and above all knows when to end a song, avoiding pointless padding and instead betting everything on the kind of concision that leaves you wanting to hit play again immediately. The morning greeting comes via the pleasant birdsong that opens the opening "9.00 a.m.", a song both simple and oblique, perfect for listening to at the exact time named in the title. But the whole album is a run of perfect pop songs that lodge themselves in your head: "Time To Forgive The Winter" is a sweet hurricane born of the most electrically intense Blur, carrying all the combative alt-rock flavour of the still-recent '90s, "Found In The Ground" is a miracle of pop roundness, "The Ship On The Sea" is the authoritative instrumental interlude that neatly splits the album in two, while the following "The Fog" aspires to replicate the apathetic sketches of Thom Yorke's "Amnesiac". Then there are the aching ballads (among which "Short Song For A Short Mind", "Casper" and "Organeum" come off best), lending the record its slightly autumnal mood. And just when everything seems to already be flowing along wonderfully, track 9 brings the most surprising moment, one that further raises the album's specific gravity, and which the band still uses to close out their live sets with a bang today: the explosive "Flavor". It's the track that sweeps away any remaining doubts about the extraordinary quality of this record.

Following up the perfection of From Here To There wouldn't have been easy for anyone, and indeed it took a full five years (the band were never exactly prolific) to deliver the follow-up. But in 2008 Plan Your Escape doesn't disappoint, even if it sits a notch below their acclaimed debut in terms of quality. Plan Your Escape is a more meditative album, on which the sextet once again proves masterful at blending moods, moving confidently and skillfully from introspective ballads to decidedly more hummable tunes. This time the mood is autumnal-to-wintry right from the packaging, but despite that framing the band still manages to surprise, especially when they hit the accelerator and go for brighter, livelier melodies, as happens on the opening "This Farm Will End Up In Fire", on the following "Sun Of The Sons" (which nods to the Beatles by invoking "Here Comes The Sun"), and above all on the anthemic, energetic "Bored", capped by a fine instrumental coda. These are the album's first three tracks; after that it slips into far more restrained territory, starting with the instrumental "5.20.22", which serves as an intro to the acoustic ballad "Shades Of Time". Elsewhere on the record, highlights include the Radiohead-style surges of "Colors", the radio-friendly feel of "Birthday Call" and "Summer Storm", and the robust guitar work of another instrumental, "Road To Luna".

Their live shows reveal a band with a devastating impact, just as convincing when working with fine detail as when they choose to unleash electric explosions without mercy, at times even deploying four guitars, with all the hallmarks of a great rock band.

In 2010, just as Girls In Hawaii seemed destined for a future of great success, a tragic event struck that seriously threatened the band's fate: drummer Denis Wielemans was killed in a car accident. The band was left reeling, and his brother Antoine (who had become the group's central figure) chose to face the loss by retreating to the Ardennes, far from the noise and bustle of the city. It was in this state of grief and disillusionment that the first sketches of the material took shape that would allow Girls In Hawaii to have a future.

In September 2013, Everest came out, a deeply melancholic work shaped by Denis's death; he was first replaced by Andy Reindard, then by Boris Gronemberger. Meanwhile Christophe Léonard had also left the group, replaced by Francois Gustin. The world's highest mountain becomes the perfect metaphor for the difficulties and obstacles one can encounter both in the life of a band and in everyday existence. Everest sets a dark tone right from the opening notes of "The Spring", and a sense of deep, aching emotion lingers through much of the tracklist, from the wonderful "Misses" and "Changes" to the lesser-known but still touching "Here I Belong" and "Head On", through to the closing "Wars". The livelier bursts of energy are rarer than in the past, but when they do occur, they stand out even more sharply. That's the case with "Not Dead", with "Rorscharch", and above all with "We Are The Living" and "Switzerland" (with breathtaking synths in its closing section), the album's most rhythmically engaging moments. "Mallory's Height" (built on an atmosphere halfway between Radiohead and the Portishead of "The Rip") delves into the singular story of climber George Mallory, who disappeared in 1924 during an expedition aiming to conquer the summit of Everest: his body was only found in 1999, just a few metres from the top.

Even when they lean into quieter tones than usual, staking everything on emotional climax, Antoine Wielemans, Lionel Vancauwenberghe and co. remain a wonderful listen, on an album that constantly searches for light amid the eternal snows and biting cold of the world's highest mountain.

The promotional tour for Everest also took in Italy, with dates in Padua and Rome, proof that, despite the years gone by, audiences hadn't forgotten them.

Sealing the tour, a live document, Hello Strange, arrived in 2014, recorded during the Belgian dates. Some older songs performed on the tour are reworked in acoustic form, while others get a more electronic makeover.

In 2015 the band received the prestigious "Les octave de la musique" award, given each year to the best French-speaking Belgian musicians who have distinguished themselves abroad.

The next chapter in Girls In Hawaii's discography, Nocturne, was released at the end of September 2017. Acoustic strings and piano open the gentle, faintly hypnotic "This Light", then the strings come in, and gradually everything else follows, a faint light cutting through the dark, with Antoine and Lionel staking everything on grace and melancholy ("Guinea Pig", "Willow Grove", "Up On The Hill"), ingredients that are certainly nothing new for them, but handled with an added sense of overall serenity, the result of an ever-greater mastery of their craft paired with adult life, which inevitably brings a more meditative, less impetuous outlook, and above all, the role of family men.

The wonder of birth softens the sense of loss of loved ones, and the telling title chosen for the Belgian band's fourth album certainly doesn't hint at electric outbursts, but rather a desire to capture new feelings in small, not always conventional vignettes. The spectre of Radiohead looms over both the sublime "Cyclo" and the musical coils of the verses in "Overrated", while the electro leanings crafted for "Indifference" and "Walk" (these too nothing new) arrive just in time to inject momentum into the sequence of songs, shaking the tracklist out of a torpor that might otherwise have pulled the record toward overly shadowy territory. Every track plays up a taste for emotional depth, and almost always shows interesting shifts, as in the case of "Blue Shape" and "Monkey", which start off very slow before building rhythmically toward their endings.

Girls In Hawaii never disappoint: doling out releases sparingly - despite countless difficulties - they keep spreading their subtly fragile music, in which acoustic, electric and synthetic elements come together with rare beauty and effectiveness

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