The track finds Hands Like Houses frontman Trenton Woodley grappling with exhaustion, the feeling of falling short of expectations, and it ultimately serves as a cry for desperately needed breathing space.
“I think the song really captures that pressure we felt having to refine our raw ideas and work through our differences in taste and personality while recording,” he says.
“It’s strange that that sense of emotional claustrophobia has fast-forwarded to this literal one with COVID-19. Since we tracked it, I haven’t actually read the lyrics written down until now and there’s a strange sense of deja vu, like I wrote them yesterday, with full knowledge of everything that’s happened in the last few months.”
He finishes by noting: “I wanted it to feel tired, not hopeless, worn out but not ready to give up just yet. I didn’t want it to sound like I’d stopped trying. I wanted it to feel like coming out of a long silence, to say ‘please be patient. I can get this right. I just need a little faith, a little trust, and a little bit of space to get myself back together.’”
The accompanying video is directed by Rhys Graham and produced by Jensen Cope and draws on the single’s artwork and lyrical themes of isolation and communication.
The clip paints a cinematic portrait of a young woman’s meandering journey as she seeks to take her life in a new direction.
Watch the video for Space below:
“Our character stops off at a couple of isolated motels which lead us into the world of the band….it all very much reflects the idea of the isolation that we’ve all just experienced,” Rhys explains.
“We also used a deaf actor to reflect the ways that separation or a different way of communicating is not necessarily a lack of freedom, it’s just a different way of doing things that we are used to. That very much ties in with the emotional space in the song.”
Space by Hands Like Houses is out now on all services.
