Hippo Campus is a young band in a couple of ways: The Minnesota quartet has only been together a relatively short time, its members are barely of legal drinking age, and it’s only released one EP so far, the Alan Sparhawk-produced Bashful Creatures. But the band’s few recordings and live shows have been enough to inspire radio play all over the country, plus tours with Modest Mouse and a slot at this year’s Lollapalooza. Another EP, South, will be out in October. In the meantime, enjoy the band’s cover of Electric Light Orchestra’s classic “Don’t Bring Me Down,” a hit from 1979 that features either the word “Bruce” or “grooos,” depending on who you ask.
Posts Tagged ‘Hippo Campus’
HIPPO CAMPUS – ” Don’t Bring Me Down ” ELO Cover
Posted: August 28, 2015 in MUSICTags: A.V Undercover, Cover, Electric Light Orchestra, Hippo Campus, Minnesota
0
HIPPO CAMPUS – ” Bashful Creatures “
Posted: August 1, 2015 in MUSICTags: Bashful Creatures, Hippo Campus, Minnesota, Transgressive Records
Hippo Campus are four Minnesotan boys making music that is infectious, joyful, and thematically soaked with the sense of cynicism accompanying the youthful search of self meaning. Beans, Espo, Stitches and Turntan met in High School and are still yet to hit legal drinking age but following an explosive SXSW which marked the band’s first shows outside their native town the four teenagers that make up Hippo Campus signed to legendary indie label Transgressive Records and are now release their debut EP ‘Bashful Creatures’ (produced by Low’s Alan Sparhawk) The buzz around the band at the Austin music festival was also noticed by the producers of Conan O’Brien’s television show who booked them to perform single ‘Suicide Saturday’ at the soonest opportunity.
HIPPO CAMPUS – ” Suicide Saturday “
Posted: June 16, 2015 in MUSICTags: Bashful Creatures, Hippo Campus, Minneapolis
Minneapolis’band Hippo Campus came onto the scene last fall with their debut EP Bashful Creatures, garnering comparisons to Vampire Weekend with their lack of guitar effects and vocalist Jake Luppen’s Koenig-esque yelping. With gigs opening for My Morning Jacket, Real Estate, and Modest Mouse coming up, Hippo Campus are coming more into their own with the video for “Suicide Saturday,” a hooky pop-rock track off their Bashful Creatures EP. Director Balint Revesz’s video features all four band members flailing around with confetti, paint splatter, and silly string.
HIPPO CAMPUS – ” Suicide Saturday ” Acoustic Live at SXSW
Posted: April 4, 2015 in MUSICTags: Hippo Campus, Minnesota, St Paul
The upstart four-piece that met in art school in St. Paul may be as fresh-faced and wide-eyed as they come, but this summer they’re going to have to get used to success. Thus far they only have a six-song EP to their name, but lead single “Suicide Saturday” has the precise kind of ebullient catchiness characteristic of the most infectious summertime anthems. When we put the band in a room to record a stripped-down version of the track at uShip’s Austin headquarters, the band was gearing up for a few more SXSW performances followed by their first national tour, which will include a stop at Lollapalooza.
“It’s overwhelming a little bit,” they said about the prospect of hitting the road. “Minnesota has awesome venues and awesome fans, but it’s a dream to be able to go across the world and check out all the other places we could possibly branch out to.”
The enthusiasm in their performance for us was so genuine that it didn’t surprise us in the slightest when, suddenly, a week later they made their national television debut on Conan. It’s an achievement not many bands claim during their first trip to the West Coast, but if you’ve got the goods, you’ve got the goods, and we dare you to listen “Suicide Saturday” without it getting lodged in your head. Summer can’t come soon enough.
Watch our exclusive live session with Hippo Campus from SXSW below.
HIPPO CAMPUS – ” Suicide Saturday ” Live Session
Posted: March 20, 2015 in MUSICTags: Bashful Creatures, Hippo Campus, Indie-Pop, Minnesota, Woodbury
Recorded live in Austin by Do512 The Band Hippo Campus, Their album “Bashful Creatures” is an unabashedly fun guitar pop record that only grows more rich with each listen. Alright, listen. What I’m trying to say is that it’s pretty much perfect album .Favorite track: Suicide Saturday.
HIPPO CAMPUS – ” Bashful Creatures ” Best Albums of 2014
Posted: March 13, 2015 in MUSICTags: Bashful Creatures, Best albums of 2014, Hippo Campus, Little Grace, Minnesota, St Paul
Bashful Creatures is an unabashedly fun guitar pop record that only grows more rich with each listen. Alright, listen. What I’m trying to say is that it’s pretty much perfect.Favorite track: “Suicide Saturday”.
Four-piece rock band Hippo Campus, made up of ’13 grads from a charter high school in St. Paul, managed to emerge with a debut song and video that are at a higher quality than many of the veteran bands performing around town.
“There’s so much talent in younger bands nowadays,” says Jake Luppen, who leads Hippo Campus along with co-frontman and guitarist Nathan Stocker. “We have a bunch of friends who are doing the high school thing like we were doing last year. They’re all really talented, but it seems like a lot of venues prey on the fact that they’re so young, and make them sell a bunch of tickets. It’s a really big problem. These booking agencies, they don’t compensate for performances. You play shows for free unless you sell a bunch of tickets.” the band feed off of each other’s frenetic, restless energy. The band met up between recording sessions for their almost-finished debut album, The Halocline, which is being produced by the guitarist Dustin Kiel (who most frequently performs with Dessa), and are clearly raring to get back into the studio to knock out the last few takes and start mixing it into the final product. Though they have only been performing together for a year, the four musicians in Hippo Campus have already spent time refining their skills in other bands—Lussen and bassist Zach Sutton played together in Whistle Kid, while Stocker and Allen were in a band called Northern. The four met up at the St. Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists and became fast friends, which eventually led to them forming an exciting new project.
On the band’s one and only single, “Little Grace,” Sutton leads the quartet through a buoyant, beachy guitar jam that could easily be mistaken for a Vampire Weekend B-side, if only because his voice closely mirrors Ezra Koenig’s tone and inflection. But just don’t tell the band that they share similarities with that chart-topping indie band.
In reality, the band says the are most influenced by Bombay Bicycle Club, Last Dinosaurs, Little Comets, and the defunct Manchester group WU LYF, who also had an enduring philosophical impact on Hippo Campus.
HIPPO CAMPUS – ” Little Grace “
Posted: March 9, 2015 in MUSICTags: Hippo Campus, Minnesota, Woodbury
Hippo Campus performs “Little Grace” live in the studios of 89.3 The Current. Hippo Campus are kinda pop from Woodbury, Minnesota,
The four members of Hippo Campus are tucked into the couches in the corner of the Bad Waitress on Eat Street in Minneapolis, and throughout the interview they finish each other’s thoughts and feed off of each other’s frenetic, restless energy. The band met up between recording sessions for their almost-finished debut album, The Halocline, which is being produced by the guitarist Dustin Kiel (who most frequently performs with Dessa), and are clearly raring to get back into the studio to knock out the last few takes and start mixing it into the final product. The band Hippo Campus sound like Vampire Weekend. On the band’s one and only single, “Little Grace,” Sutton leads the quartet through a buoyant, beachy guitar jam that could easily be mistaken for a Vampire Weekend B-side, if only because his voice closely mirrors Ezra Koenig’s tone and inflection. But just don’t tell the band that they share similarities with that chart-topping indie band
Though they have only been performing together for a year, the four musicians in Hippo Campus have already spent time refining their skills in other bands—Lussen and bassist Zach Sutton played together in Whistle Kid, while Stocker and Allen were in a band called Northern. The four met up at the St. Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists and became fast friends, which eventually led to them forming an exciting new project.check out the EP Bashful Creature available on bandcamp
The Fat Angel Sings 