Ever wondered what your furniture gets up to once you leave the house? I’m sure everyone has done that at some point. Especially after watching movies like Toy Story, you can’t help but wonder whether inanimate objects have a life of their own. While it might be completely bizarre and ludicrous to see these objects come to life in person, Ha the Unclear’s frontman Michael Cathro has decided to humour our fascinations with the release of their latest video. In this latest single by the intriguingly odd New Zealand indie pop band, Cathro sings from the perspective of a coffee table with a perhaps-not-entirely-healthy fixation on the person whose living room it occupies.
Putting something that we’ve all thought about onto screen, Ha the Unclear show their chops at putting together something both weird and wonderful on Secret Lives of Furniture.
Back in 2014, we did a little intro piece on the undoubtedly eccentric indie pop band. But just to give a recap on who they are, Ha the Unclear is a four-piece band based in Auckland, New Zealand. Led by the enigmatic Cathro (vocals, songwriter, guitarist), he is backed by Ben Sargeant on drums, Theo Francis on guitar and Paul Cathro on bass.
The band provides a cathartic blend of jangly indie-folk and off-kilter, hook-driven pop. Accompanied by Cathro’s witty songwriting, their music delves into absurdist narratives which includes: a break up song through an intercom (Growing Mould) and this particular diddy, a love song from the point of view of a coffee table called Secret Lives of Furniture, all delivered with a poignant Kiwi twang.
Secret Lives of Furniture is an unsettling anthropomorphic account of a coffee table’s infatuation for its owner; recorded and produced by Oli Wilson (Males, The Chills, Knives at Noon) with engineering assistance from Mike Holland at Dunedin’s Albany Street Studio. For the video, the band came up with an ingenious low-budget concept that examines the relationship between people and the furniture they own in an interesting way, while highlighting Cathro’s clever, albeit slight creepy lyricism (did I hear the lyrics ‘ovule blood’?)
Their eclectic sound and slap-you-in-the-face lyricism has been rapidly sinking hooks into audiences across New Zealand and today, Ha The Unclear announces that they’ll make their debut journey to Australia for a string of shows this February.
Australian Dates:
Fri. 19 Feb – Melbourne, VIC @ The Tote (Upstairs) w/ The Finks & Jessie L Warren
Sat. 20 Feb – Ballarat, VIC @ The Eastern w/ Trash Fairys
Thu. 25 Feb – Melbourne, VIC @ The Grace Darling w/ Lisa Salvo & Gumboot
Fri. 26 Feb – Adelaide, SA @ The Format w/ Margie Jean Lewis (IRL)
Sat. 27 Feb – Adelaide, SA @ The Crown & Anchor w/ Duncan Turner
For now, take a gander at their debut album, Bacterium, Look At Your Motor Go before they make their way across the pond.
