The Hot Prowlers on their new record, 'Neon'

LEO caught up with Hot Prowlers guitarist Drü to talk about their new record, Neon, and the evolution of the band, prior to their set at Poorcastle on Sunday.

LEO: Your first release, Killer, from November of 2015, you labeled as ‘rowdy new wave.’ It’s easy to hear 1980s references on tracks such as “On My Knees” and “Hungry,” evoking the brash post-punk gothic sounds of Siouxsie and the Banshees. Other songs such as “Hysteria” and “Street Lights” bring more of a Bauhuas/Birthday Party sound. All of which are clearly rooted in 1980s gothic/post punk. What were your influences while writing and recording this album?

Drü: The Killer EP was a collection of songs we wrote over our first few months as a band. When we came together, we didn’t know what kind of band we wanted to be. It was more about us four wanting to make music together. Punk definitely came up, but we wanted something beyond that, as well. We started playing and writing just to see what came out, and that was Killer.  New wave was never discussed or planned — it was more a realization after those first few songs, and we had a chance to step back and listen to them. Looking back, it seems like a natural direction for the four of us to move towards as a group. Foxie [vocals, synth] draws a lot of influence from the ’70s glam scene and from the synth sounds of the ’80s, TJ [bass], with two-tone ska and funk. With that, and all of our punk history, we share a lot of the same influences as most of the early New Wave bands.

LEO: Your next release, Neon — due out the weekend of Poorcastle — could be seen as an evolution, not just with the band, but also in influences. If Killer was heavily influenced by the 1980s, Neon seems to draw from late ’80s/early ’90s noise pop such as Garbage and The Jesus and Mary Chain. Was this a conscious effort to expand your sound and influences?

D: We haven’t heard the comparison to noise pop yet, but you’re also one of the first people to hear the new EP outside of our inner circle, so it will be interesting to see if other people make that connection, too. It wasn’t a conscious effort to go that direction, but it might be a fitting observation since we are fans of bands like Lush and The Raveonettes. Neon was us as a band looking at the work we did on Killer, expanding on what we liked, and casting aside what we didn’t. We were writing material for Neon pretty much as soon as the masters for Killer were being done.  The sound really expanded when Foxie brought in a second synth, and we refined our writing process.

LEO: Aside from the new album being released, what else can we expect at Poorcastle?

D: We will be debuting a new song in addition to playing a couple old ones, and Neon in its entirety.  You will also see all of us standing up front to watch Tall Squares. •