A Quick Q&A With Hannah's Little Sister

Liverpudlian outfit Hannah’s Little Sister have made a triumphant return in the unlikeliest of years, their latest singles from their upcoming release, ‘EP.mp3’, are both sparkling examples of their riotous, deeley-bopper punk. Edie McQueen chatted to the band over zoom to talk about the more important things in life; lockdown, their new music, and CBBC’s Trapped.

2020 has not been what anyone expected. How was lockdown for you, and indeed the current tier three status in Liverpool?

Will: Lockdown’s been rough to say the least. It’s weird not gigging or getting out and doing any of that stuff.

Meg: I’ve not minded it too much! As a band obviously it’s frustrating cause there’s loads that you can’t do and we can’t see each other really, you have to find other ways to do things. But on an individual level I’ve not minded being a bit more solitary and working from home. And in that way it’s been alright, but as a band it has been really difficult. We’ve had to do things like zoom meetings where you’re relying on poor connection, trying to figure out how to do artwork or videos when you can’t see each other.

Nina: Though we were pretty good at doing a lot of regular zoom meetings at the beginning of lockdown. I think we met up more over zoom than we would ever do in reality! I think it’s also had a nice effect of slowing things down a bit, obviously for the saddest reason, but it just took the stress out of things.

Will: I hate it.

The new EP sounds great. What was the process of putting that together like?

Will: It’s quite a long process I guess.

Meg: These are all the songs we have basically. We were like, ‘we need to get these been recorded’ – we’ve had these songs since last September. We recorded them with magical music man Saam in Manchester – he’s amazing, he’s so good. Recorded them all in the studio, did a few mixes here and there, and have just been sitting on them through lockdown waiting for the right time to put them out.

What’s it like releasing music into a pandemic? Was there any talk of delaying the release?

Nina: There was talk of it, but we just thought it had been six months since we recorded it and the songs have been around for a while as well, so it was like; let’s just get them out anyway. And in some ways I think it’s nice to see it as a time where we can provide some entertainment and a bit of cheer up for some people. Even if it’s just one person who can have a laugh out of it, that’s better than nothing.

You’re full of references to things like 00s kids TV shows and the school playground – where’s all this pop nostalgia coming from, and how does it influence your musical output?

Meg: We love CBBC! Well, as a kid I loved CBBC. It started out as a joke I guess, but it’s kind of become a big part of the way we present ourselves. We just bonded over our love of Tracey Beaker and it’s spiralled from there. I think that whole look of CBBC is just so fun and bonkers. And Will’s been on CBBC, let’s not forget – Will, a child star, was on Trapped! I remember watching it when it aired when we were kids. I’d been to a piano lesson and I came home – and then he was on the TV. I was like, ‘mum, Will’s on the TV, what’s going on?’. That’s our claim to fame as a band, we’re never gonna beat that.

Is it fair to say you guys went quiet for a while after you released ‘20’? What were you up to?

Will: Oh yes.

Meg: It was a weird time to be honest. A few of us were finishing uni and a few of us had just finished, and we just got swept up in work life and that. We did for a hot minute have a manager and it just didn’t really work out, it was sending us down a completely different route that we weren’t really into. They had a really different image of us as a band and it brought a lot into question for us. When we let the manager go we were all a bit deflated, and it took us a while to get back into it. We had a switch of bassists as well.

Will: It was a confusing time. We were still playing quite a lot, though. It just felt like we were maybe going somewhere we didn’t want to go, and it took a while to recover from that, and recalibrate.

Meg: Nina fixed it.

Nina: Yeah it’s all down to me really.

What is next for Hannah’s Little Sister in a world where touring is somewhat off the cards?

Will: We’ve not really discussed it to be honest. Touring is difficult to do – the logistics of it are very up in the air, of how it would actually work.

Meg: We’ve had a couple of gigs in the woodwork, it’s just that they’ve been cancelled and rescheduled.

Nina: The size of the venues that we usually play, if you did that socially distanced you could fit in about eight people.

Meg: Hopefully, once we get out of tier three, we’re just gonna start rehearsing again and start working on new music. We’ve had these songs for ages, we want new ones.

Any plans to retrain, re Rishi Sunak’s suggestion?

Will: No he can go fuck himself.

Meg: You know what, I just really want a job in cyber, that’s what this was all about.

Regional identity seems really important at the moment, particularly with the way the government’s handling the pandemic and all these local lockdowns. How do you think your respective backgrounds have influenced your music?

Meg: We all live in Liverpool, but actually none of us come from here. Me and Will are from Burnley, Ash is from Crewe, and Nina’s from Munich. I think by default sometimes there’s a northern thing put on us, because I sing in my accent, or just because of the colloquialisms we use. It does come across, but I think it’s fun to have more than that. Having Nina in, and forcing her to sing German for ‘Bin Mouth’. I love Eurovision and European music – a proper dance, pop vibe, I love throwing that in the mix, and I think that’s been really influential as well. It has influenced us, but more in the way of just naturally a part of who we are. I think having Nina in has brought more into that than just…that.

Nina: I don’t know how much it has to do with how much we regionally stem from, but I do think we have a lot in common when it comes to our views on the world. And maybe that aligns with a Northern viewpoint, but I don’t know if that’s where it really comes from.

Meg: I think also just being in Liverpool is definitely really influential. Not even just in terms of the mindset here, but just because there’s so much good music, and great humans. Our mates have been really influential for us. I’m still discovering new music scenes in the city and I’ve been here six years.

Nina: That was a big thing at the start of this year, I wanted to venture out again and I found so much cool stuff.

Meg: It’s all just hidden away.