February 18, 2020
By: Edwund F
Hourstone is a multi-talented artist from Singapore who just released his latest single “I Will Find A Way”. A characteristic that we often appreciate in artists is when they display honest emotion. This is true, especially when a song is written from an introspective mindset. Those who write personal and meaningful songs tend to deliver tremendous emotion throughout the single. This was consistently noted and delivered in “I Will Find A Way” as Hourstone eloquently projects a haunting mix of vulnerability and passion.
“I Will Find A Way” is a song based upon resilience and overcoming hardships. Every person has their own private struggles. Although unique to a personal path, everyone has a story, including Hourstone himself. Hourstone emerged from countless years of playing the piano to help him through a dark time in his life when he lost a loved one. The meaning behind “I Will Find A Way” is powerful and relatable to a wider audience on a deeper scale. Despite the substantial message contained within clever metaphors, Hourstone takes the listener on a deeply personal, but mystical journey accompanied by an atmospheric and dream-like production. If you’re touched by “I Will Find A Way” and wish for more, Hourstone has released a visual to complement this single.
Listen to “I Will Find A Way” by Hourstone here.
Welcome to BuzzMusic, Hourstone! We're really intrigued by all of your recent success and can’t wait to hear more! Tell us a little bit about your story and how you discovered your love for creating deep house music.
Thank you! I feel very blessed that people are connecting again to authentic music, where an artist can be the whole package: songwriter to a singer to the music video creator.
A lot of people start out wanting to be performers, but I was always enamored with songwriting. I learned classical piano as a child but didn’t connect to it (at all) and stopped at the age of 14, with no interest in ever playing again. However, soon after, my father and uncle suddenly passed away. My family was in disarray and I ended up alone in a foreign country for a year. While in a foster home, my struggling self discovered a piano nobody was using and I started making up music as a sort of companion. I later taught myself music production, started singing and posting my music online. Strangers started sharing very generous feedback with me - and since then, everything has snowballed, getting bigger and bigger, which I’m so grateful for. For me, music and art always come first. Being a big fan of music videos, I then started creating my own. I’ve never studied art or played in bands, I confess, I just create what I believe in and what I myself want to see and hear. When people connect to that, it means they are really connecting to my inner world, which is still mind-blowing to me. Good songs are like little companions for your life that you remember for a long time. I don’t write what I think most people will like. I write what I hope will truly resonate with people for a long time, because it’s authentic and means to them what it means to me. I put different beats under them to carry them to listeners that would otherwise never meet them, but the core is always the songwriting, the words and the worlds in the videos. You, the listener, are the core if you’ve ever felt what I’m writing about.
How do you feel music trends in Singapore differ from North America? Do you face any challenges as an artist because of this?
The community in Singapore is very small but very diverse and people respect each other across genre borders. Twenty years ago, it would have been very hard to gain a large enough following if confined to one small country. However, I’m a big fan of technology and these days can reach people in the US and across the world with it. This allows me to be my most original self because I’ve found a community of people all around the world instead of having to compromise for a smaller audience. I would say there are two differences between myself and other artists based in South East Asia. First, a lot of people here look towards China for future listeners, while I look at the whole world. Second, I used to live in the US, UK, Germany and for a long time in Japan, so I use inspiration from several different cultures. For example, you can see that I’ve used Japanese/Chinese characters in the music video for “Halfway House” and now a lot of Scandinavian runes and an ancient magical stave from Iceland in the video for “I Will Find a Way”. This is because after using Asian characters, I felt that I should try using Western characters in art, too, and runes were the best I could come up with (laughs). Creating the video made me realize how little I really knew about the runes and left me wondering why we in the West don’t even teach them in school even though they are our cultural heritage. At the same time, a lot of us use them in tattoos, so I’m really curious about how people will react to the music video! So to answer your question in another way: Singapore is very diverse and international and I’m an international person myself, so it’s a natural fit. And personally, I prefer to throw my arms around the entire world.
Your new single "I Will Find a Way" is a breath of fresh air that we all needed to hear! This song is very relatable for someone who's overcoming hardships. What message do you wish for listeners to take away from this song? What does "I Will Find a Way" mean to you?
When I started writing this song, I intended it to be something to give myself strength in the face of adversity. At first, it wasn’t intended for anyone else. It has some structures that most songwriters wouldn’t use, but I felt this is exactly what expressed my inner world. It’s a song that will grow on you when you listen to it more than once. Having completed it, I decided to share it despite it being so raw, honest and, well, private. We’ve all been in situations where we need this when there is nothing we can do but rely on ourselves and gather our inner strength. I think that’s why it works so well because it’s so raw and honest. The song is an inner dialogue that a lot of us have with ourselves. And usually, we don’t share that inner dialogue, but through this song I do. We may all have different challenges in our lives, but we have a lot in common in being human inside and “I Will Find a Way” lets you know that what is happening inside of you is also happening inside of me and that you can gather your own strength and overcome your challenges.
What can we expect to see next from Hourstone?
The music video for “I Will Find a Way” premiered on Monday via The Hype Magazine! Because the video has so many meanings layered over each other, you can enjoy and discover more when you put on headphones and listen to it while reading the words. What happens when in the lyrics, in what you see and hear is all connected and intentional. It has real depth. At the least, follow the pathfinding magical Icelandic stave that comes out of the sun and later switches between black and white. Note that the entire video is developing in a kind of primordial, natural world, this is your inner world. Only at the end, after you have gathered yourself, do you fly across the water and towards modern civilization on the horizon behind the snowstorm. Now you are ready. I plan to share more of the meanings behind why I chose which rune when in the video. A lot of that is personal and is interpretation since not every piece of wisdom incorporated in the runes has been handed down the centuries to us, but I’m taking the runes as far as one can take them in the arts, I think, and you’re invited to the journey. If this song and video become what you return to when you gather your inner strength to overcome something in your life, then the song has arrived where it should be. I definitely have more songs, videos, and remixes on the way within the next few months. I’d love for you to come along on the journey!