Frankie Stew and Harvey Gunn- Handle With Care Album Interview
Today, Brighton duo Frankie Stew and Harvey Gunn dropped their most recent project, Handle With Care; an immersive body of work that explores Frankie’s mind over the past year, addressing freedom, loss and the importance of relationships; all laid over soothing, melodic production courtesy of Harvey.
Best mates since the age of 15, Frankie and Harvey have spent the past decade slowly but surely bringing themselves up the ranks as part of an entirely DIY duo. Their sound offers a deeply personal mix of producer Harvey’s richly textured beats, which are given an upbeat swing courtesy of U.K. garage drums, and Frankie’s reflective and heartfelt raps, which touch on subjects from coming of age to his mental health. “Some artists spend their lives trying to find that producer they click with,” Harvey says. “We were lucky enough to find one another straight away.”
2020 saw them drop the album, Breathing Exercises, which was released into the world shortly before Coronavirus and the subsequent global lockdowns took hold. Frankie’s lyrics on the album, touching on themes of anxiety, stress, panic, and isolation, couldn’t have been more timely. “I want to be a voice for everyone who feels the same way I do,” Frankie explains of his therapeutic style. “There’s no playing to the gallery, it’s just me airing my feelings.”
Their radical honesty is more pronounced than ever in Handle With Care. Recorded partly in September last year in a converted barn on a farm in Hazelmere, and then back in Brighton in early 2021, they had nothing to focus on but making music and looking at sheep across the Buckinghamshire countryside. The result of this process? A project that perfectly echoes the mood of a turbulent year, touching on struggles most of us have faced, creating a reflective and downbeat tone with a glimmering light of hope buried amid the melancholy. “It’s a snapshot project and one that’s very reflective of these times,” Frankie says, “A lot of people will relate to these universal feelings.”
We caught up with the guys for an in-depth chat about the project.
Yo guys how you doing?
Frankie: I’m alright mate, as good as you can be right now.
Harvey: Yeah, everything’s obviously a bit fucked at the moment but I’m well man.
You’re right, not the best situation is it. I think I’m right in saying this project was made over lockdown (s) so Frankie, where was your head at during the time of making it?
FS: All sorts of different places mate. The whole thing was made throughout lockdown as you said and I found this most recent one very hard, to be honest, so the album, body of work, whatever you wanna call it represents how I was feeling during that time. There’s still hope in there though, as dreary as it may predominantly sound, there’s a little bit of both.
I noticed that hopeful side you know, around halfway through, Constellations I think the track is? The beginning and the end are slightly more melancholic then you’ve got that more hopeful track pretty much in the middle.
FS: Yeah man, I don’t think we did that on purpose but that’s just how it turned out.
HG: To be fair though I like to have an arc in my music. When we’re putting together a project I think it’s nice to have that rise and fall- the pace of the album builds around the middle then ends in a more reflective way. It was a similar thing in Breathing Exercises as well.
FS: Bit of a headfuck isn’t it, you start thinking it’s all gonna be happy then back down again.
You’ve just said that you like false endings, what was your plan when making the beats for the album Harvey?
HG: It’s like trial and error with sounds, then when you hear the one that resonates with you, you’re like shit yeah that’s the one. It just happened to be the melancholic ones that I was feeling. I kind of had the inkling it was going to be quite an introspective piece of work, I don’t really think it had the headspace for placing the bangers in there. We know when it’s album mode really and we just get stuck into it and try not to think too much about it. As well, it can’t even be considered a project until you’re like halfway in and that’s when you can start placing tracks or whatever. But this one was very honest, I don’t think it had much pre-meditation to it. We rented an Airbnb back when you could and just went to the countryside for a week, wrote music and came out with a few tracks for the album which kind of kicked off the process and set president for the album moving forwards. So yeah man, the beats were just the kind of sounds I wanted to be hearing, those deep keys etc, I didn’t really wanna be hearing those energetic ones, I just didn’t have it in me.
So what was inspiring you in a world where there’s not much to be inspired about?
FS: Nothing particularly outside the way I was feeling. When I write that’s putting how I feel onto paper, and then making it into music. If I can turn a negative thought into music then that’s a bit of a touch man. I’d be lying if I said there were loads of external cool things inspiring me.
HG: I think that if you take away all external distractions, there’s nothing else we can do apart from live inside your own head so that’s always gonna be the prevailing influence. That’s why I think this project is quite unique in the sense that we’ve created something very specific to this time. If we’d had put more tunes in there then recording would have continued into spring which I think probably would have resulted in a less cohesive album.
FS: That’s actually a really good point, I hadn’t thought of that.
You’ve got some sick features on the project, Kofi Stone, Ocean Wisdom to name a couple. Chat to me about the choice behind them!
FS: Kofi actually supported us on our last tour so we got to know him then and said we needed to make something, then we were just constantly listening to stuff with Kofi in mind so yeah that just came about naturally and ended in him killing his verse. With Ocean Wisdom obviously we’re from the same place so it’s been kind of an overdue thing for a while now, he’s a great guy, super quick at writing-
HG: Professional don.
HG: Cam, who features on the final track, we first knew about her when she did the dream factory challenge, so we hit her up and ended up working with her. Eleni drake features on tears on my window and that was a sample from one of her tunes. Half the tracks have got little features on them which makes it really fun man, big ups to all of them.
How was it working with them in the current climate? Were you able to get some studio time with them?
HG: The only person we got in the studio was Cam, which was at a time where we weren’t in full lockdown, so yeah everything was pretty much just back and forth online aside from that.
Sounds difficult. How else would you say the scene has changed over this past year?
FS: I think everyone’s just had to adapt, to be honest- that’s the main thing. It’s been hard for all of us and it’s been a bit of a DIY situation for underground musicians but the scene is healthy still, people need music more than ever and great things come out of hardship and shit times.
I think that really resonates, the idea that people need music more than ever.
FS: Everything creative man, everyone needs everything more than ever. Music, film, radio, friends, love- everyone needs all of this right now so anything that’s gonna lighten the load of what’s going at the moment is super important.
Obviously, the logistics of things were a bit different, how else does it differ from previous projects?
HG: Our working hours changed quite a lot for this one-with breathing exercises it was a seven days a week kind of thing which became jarring and quite unhealthy, so with this one, we utilised our time a lot better and I think you can hear that in the album. Musically, as well we incorporated new things, brought In new singers, songwriters etc.
Handle With Care- what’s the story behind the name?
FS: There hasn’t been a more important time for people to look after themselves. Obviously, it’s easier said than done but yeah it’s just that really, I don’t think there’s ever been a period where taking care of yourself and being kind to yourself has been more vital. I’ve learnt a lot about myself over this past lockdown and it’s highlighted for me what I need to try and do and to work on so that I can take some positive things back into my life when we go back to normal- I’ve been doing exercise, meditating, drinking my herbal teas and that sort of thing.
When we do go back to normal, what have you got in store for us?
FS: We’re in the middle of rescheduling tour dates.
HG: It’s been so long mate I’m gonna be shitting myself. A lot of the festivals we were booked for are in the process of being moved or whatever- but yeah there is a good few due to be announced.
Well, hopefully, I’ll catch you somewhere sunny this summer. That’s all we’ve got time for guys, thanks so much for your time, I can’t wait for the album to be released into the wild.
FS: Appreciate it mate, might see you around Brighton at some point!
HG: Yeah thankyou man, peace.
The album is available to stream on all platforms, as well as the option to buy on vinyl. Why not have the full Handle With Care Experience and listen whilst sipping on some herbal tea, courtesy of the Handle With Care Package, which can be found here.