Hard Life (FKA Easy Life) face an uncertain future on new single ‘Othello’

Hard Life are back with ‘Othello’, the group’s first new single since last year’s ‘Tears’ – listen to the track here.

• READ MORE: Easy Life live in London: an emotional farewell amid legal drama

‘Othello’, BBC Radio 1’s Hottest Record tonight (April 8), was written and recorded by frontman Murray Matravers in Japan after a period of change for the band formerly known as Easy Life.

Matravers booked a spontaneous trip to the East Asian country last year after feeling dissatisfied with the music he was making and spent time producing new material there before returning to Leicester to reconnect with his bandmates in December.

The resulting ‘Othello’ is a part-cinematic, part-mellow hip-hop-infused track produced and co-composed by producer and songwriter Taka Perry, who Matravers met while travelling.

Discussing the track, Matravers described it as “a pun on the board game,” and said that it “also draws from the play’s themes of trust, identity, and the destructive forces of unchecked emotions like jealousy.”

He added, “Relationships – whether personal, romantic, or professional – are rarely straightforward, and after making difficult decisions you sometimes cross this threshold of no return. ‘Othello’ captures that moment of uncertainty, where someone leaves your life, and there’s a profound emptiness that takes over as you wallow in the unknown.”

It’s their first new music in almost a year, after the band shared ‘Tears’, their first track under the new moniker, in June – the same day they announced their name change. Upon their return as Hard Life, Matravers told NME: “I really don’t want people to read too much into the name. I was nervous, because as a white, middle-class man, I haven’t exactly had a hard life. It needs to be appreciated in context.

He shared that he and his bandmates all decided on the new name instantly, adding: “We were laughing about it and I don’t think any of us were taking it that seriously, but as time progressed we went through a million of other options and we always came back to Hard Life because we thought it was funny. Everyone seemed to resonate with that, and it was the most stereotypical Easy Life thing to do.”

He also said that the band weren’t planning on making any wholesale changes to their sound or image to go alongside the name change. “I realised that I like what I do and didn’t want to change,” he explained. “The name change was obviously forced upon us for legal reasons, but other than that, that’s it.”

The previous year, they played their final show under their old name after conceding defeat in a legal battle over their name against easyGroup – the conglomerate that owns airline easyJet. They made the decision to surrender their band name, avoiding a costly legal battle in the process, while lawyers for easyGroup later called ‘Tears’ “disparaging and defamatory” at the time of its release.

Also in their interview, Matravers said that the band were “desperate to play shows again” and described the summer’s festivals as giving them “mad FOMO”. This summer, however, they’re set to play a series of festival dates, and will be appearing at the likes of Y Not, Truck, and Live At Leeds.

NME gave their most recent UK show, the October 2023 date which marked their farewell under their old name, a four-star review. Will Richards wrote: “Anger, joy, frustration: it’s all here at a strangely unique final show for a band who were heading to the top … As shown by the crowds at KOKO and in Leicester, and the unanimous support seen online, something as frivolous as a name change can’t halt the ascent of a band this charismatic and resilient for long.”

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