INTERVIEW: Let’s Trim Our Hair In Accordance With The Socialist Lifestyle

Figuring out where one concept ends and another begins within the music of Let’s Trim Our Hair In Accordance With The Socialist Lifestyle is an art form in itself. The collective came together in 2013, first as a duo comprising Oliver Lewis and Joe Millar, Newcastle University friends who found a band name before they even considered any sort of musical inspiration. The duo became a trio with the addition of Middlesbrough-based visual artist Graham Williamson, transforming the outfit into the fully-fledged multimedia project you can peruse today.

Let’s Trim… have four – or maybe five, depending on who you ask – albums to their exceptionally long name, the most recent of which being the tricky double album Automatic Writing/Enemies of the Roman Order. Four years in the making, and combining two seemingly polarising album concepts of clairvoyance and ambient country soundscapes, their first release post-COVID explored “our sense of reality and connection to the unseen, how we define sanity and our place in the world – and musically too.”“For our Hélène Smith concept album, we did tons of research; I even spent an inordinate amount of time developing a theory about how her techniques could help us communicate with ‘Goldilocks zone’ exoplanets,” says Joe.

Now, they revisit this release with a new EP, Madeline. Taking one song from each disc of the double album and coupling them with previously unreleased b-sides to round off the release. “We’re not really a backwards-looking band,” explains Graham. “The Madeline EP really came from wanting a succinct final statement, a distillation of the double album before we move on. Every now and then I’ll listen to an old album and enjoy it as a snapshot of where we once were.”

With an unreleased back catalogue that rivals some artists’ live repertoires, narrowing down what makes the cut the first time around, let alone a second, is quite the process. “It’s often shaped by the circumstance of recording. We have very limited resources which limit what we do, but we try to embrace that, work at the outer edges of the limitations and vary how we record. Often that means tracks that made sense for one album won’t easily carry over. Sometimes though, ideas linger. As a band I like to think we are quite democratic, we will follow any member’s ideas through to conclusion if they believe in it. Naturally, sometimes things don’t fit,” Oliver says diplomatically.

“It’s about the gut feeling of excitement and how long that lasts over multiple listens,” adds Joe. “Plus, more analytically, how much we can develop and enhance an idea. I do have a golden rule that we always go for what is best for the song, with no thought whatsoever to practicalities or personal cost – otherwise we would have been way more ‘sensible’ and never followed through on stuff like adding a horn section and turntable to Ghost Light, turning The World Turned Upside Down into a multi-part epic, or doing those abrupt song tempo changes on Tributary.”

We’re sold – it’s time to do a deep dive into what may be the most eclectic mix of songs an artist has ever created. There’s only one thing left to do, and it’s to trim our hair accordingly in a manner in keeping with a socialist lifestyle. The cut in question? “I’d like to make the case for the ‘90s floppy centre parting as a socialist hairstyle,” concludes Graham. “In a truly equitable society, the workers will be allowed access to Camdenite decadence.”