Hard-Fi return to their “normal worlds of families and other jobs” as soon as their tours end.
The ‘Hard To Beat’ hitmakers – whose new EP ‘Don’t Go Making Plans’ is their first release since 2014’s ‘Best Of’ collection – reunited in 2022 after almost a decade on hiatus, and a lot has changed for the band this time round.
Frontman Richard Archer told the Daily Star newspaper’s Wired column: “We haven’t really been meeting up with other bands much.
“Now, we tour, then go straight back to our normal world of families and other jobs.”
The ‘Cash Machine’ group feel “more grown-up and chilled out” than they did at the height of their career in the 2000s, but their new EP has maintained their classic sound.
He said: “Whatever I do seems to come out in a certain way.
“When I was in OffWorld after Hard-Fi to me it sounded completely different but friends would say, ‘I played it in the office and someone said, is that the bloke from Hard-Fi?’ “
Life has changed for the band, with everyone dealing with “different” demands.
Richard explained: “The pressures are different now. Our drummer Steve [Kemp] has a four-month-old daughter, so he’s coping on one hour’s sleep a night.
“One of the band has lost his partner to cancer and has been dealing with that.
“Its great that we’re back to be around for each other, but of course it’s hard to navigate all that at the same time as trying to rehearse and record.”
Next year will mark 20 years since the release of their debut album ‘Stars of CCTV’, which topped the charts six months after its initial release, having originally go in at number six.
They followed it up in 2007 with ‘Once Upon a Time in the West’, which also peaked in the top spot, while 2011’s ‘Killer Sounds’ hit number nine.