Tracks That Shaped Our Sound - ‘Echo’ by Conflict Hope
After recruiting lead vocalist and TikToker Mollie Stevenson, who has amassed over three million views and twenty-three thousand followers, Scottish alternative rock band ‘Conflict Hope’ announce their passionate debut single ‘Echo’, dropping July 14th.
Conflict Hope are a collective of four musicians who have been harnessing their song writing craft for years. Admiring their rock heroes such as ‘Biffy Clyro’, ‘Green Day’ and ‘Halestorm’, Conflict Hope have defined their unique sound by combining an avalanche of emotional vocals and meaningful lyrical approach, with huge melodic guitars and stratospheric drum grooves.
Inspired by a conversation with a fan who was being bullied online, 'Echo' is a song about accepting the damaged parts of yourself and knowing that no matter how dark, there’s always light at the end of the tunnel. ‘Echo’ defines Conflict Hope: a rally cry of powerful vocals and evocative lyricism, paired with roaring guitars and thunderous driving drumbeats.
We spoke to the band about the tracks that shaped their sound, enjoy:
Biffy Clyro – ‘Mountains’
We promise we didn’t just pick this cause their Scottish! Perhaps an obvious answer for this band but ‘Mountains’ just never gets old. It’s such a defiant song and the emotion they put into every note is breath taking. The way change from minor in the verse to major at the chorus just hits so hard, so we did the same for ‘Echo’.
Biffy will forever be an influence for us, we just love them to pieces. Mon’ The Biff!
Foo Fighters – ‘Under You’
Speaking of emotion, if this song doesn’t give you a lump in your throat, then bad news: you may be a psychopath.
The Foo’s just know how to structure a great song that just flows into each part so naturally and gets stuck in your head for hours. They can rock harder than anyone whilst writing the most bubble-gum pop melodies. We wanted to create that pop melody vibe for ‘Echo’, whilst maintaining the loud, powerful guitar tone that we love.
‘Foo Fighters’ are such an amazing band and ‘Under You’ is such an amazing song for anyone that’s lost someone they loved.
Press To MECCO – ‘Easy Life’
‘Easy Life’ makes you want to smash a window and then create the most beautiful artistic portrait of someone using the glass that’s been left scattered on the floor. The chorus is just pure perfection and the way they integrate the backing vocals were a massive influence on us. Each instrument and member have a place in the song, and it all works together to create this absolute rocker. Press To MECCO were such a unique band, they merged these super heavy riffs and time signatures with angelic poppy and screaming vocals, it’s gutting that they just announced their breakup.
Green Day – ‘Still Breathing’
‘Echo’ lyrically is a song all about accepting the damaged parts of yourself in order to see the light that comes on the inevitable horizon. ‘Still Breathing’ has the same kind of message, it’s a song that says, “look you’re still here, despite everything you’ve gone through in life, you are still breathing and have continued on” - I have this song tattooed on my chest as a reminder of that. Green Day are my personal favourite band of all time so every lyric and song idea I contribute is probably subconsciously influenced by them, let’s hope they don’t sue us one day!
Evanescence – ‘Bring Me To Life’
This was a song that our lead singer Mollie had referenced when talking about her vocal approach to our band and ‘Echo’. Mollie was classically trained as a singer, so she has this very operatic voice, similar to the style of Amy Lee. You can really hear the influence on ‘Echo’ as Mollie shifts between her falsetto and full chest voice (or rock voice as we like to call it). We also liked the sort of call and response between the lead and the backing vocals on the chorus to ‘Bring Me To Life’, and we’d just had a similar idea for ‘Echo’ so that was a happy accident!
