Making his debut with laid-back offering easy for u., will hyde is the exciting new artist of this summer to keep your eye on.

20-year-old will hyde carries the sunny vibes of his native Australia across in his carefree sound, as he makes his first impression as a solo artist with easy for u. A track of longing and forlorn love, the honesty cuts across the song without sugarcoating and it’s clear that will has mastered the art of articulately conveying his feelings. Thrumming with catchy drum beats and dreamy guitar hooks, will hyde creates a lush soundscape for one’s full indulgence, and it’s an indie-pop banger that will no doubt feature on many playlists this summer.

Explaining more of the track, will says:

‘easy for u.’ is a song about giving more in a relationship than you are getting back. it’s reaching a point of awareness where you can finally see how you really stand with another person – awareness i think is the most important thing when it comes to anything…life, relationships, friendships. i wanted to write a song about reaching that point of clarity. it doesn’t mean anything has to change, i find that realisation powerful. sometimes we run into things that we don’t know how to deal with so we mask it with alcohol, pills – anything we can do to try and run away from the past. it’s tough to be a part of a relationship where you are slowly watching a person fade, or losing a part of yourself, because of it.

Speaking with will about the theme of unfulfilling relationships and the more general awareness that accompanies it, we go more in-depth into the topic with him.

What’s a motto you live by?

I live by the motto – it takes time to heal and time to love. I got a tattoo of “time” near my collarbone to remind to be patient with myself and to give relationships the space they need to grow into something. I think that sometimes when we get hurt, we have the habit of curling into a shell and not coming out, which is completely understandable yet there’s always lessons to be learned from pain. Take the time to heal but do it in a way that puts one foot in front of the other. That’s what it means to me, anyway!

If your sound had a colour, what colour would it be?

I would put the colour as an angelic white! I think that light and love breed a lot of freedom creatively, emotionally and as a human, so I hope it comes from that place 🙂

If you could set easy for u. to a movie or TV show, what would it be the soundtrack for?

I would have to say ‘my brother the devil’, it’s an indie film made in the UK and it’s one of the most moving pieces of art I’ve seen in forever. It’s about two brothers living in state housing, moving drugs and doing what they can to earn money. One of the brothers is gay and it’s a story about the family trying to accept him for it. I don’t necessarily know if the song would be a 100 fit, but I would just love to have it in there & be a part of history!!

What advice would you give to someone trying to achieve the awareness that you emphasise?

I would say – spend some time with yourself. When you are alone, with your thoughts – what comes up? Are you really in the moment? Are your thoughts carrying you away? How do you feel in public and socialising, what’s your mind doing? These types of thoughts started to make me super aware. I noticed I had really bad social anxiety, so communicating just got hard because I would always be so in my head. It made it really hard to connect and see life for what it was.

Try meditation, reiki, things which are different. I think experimentation is the biggest thing but at the end of the day – who do you want to be in 5 years? What do you want to be known for? That’s the type of stuff I asked myself and I reached some brutally honest conclusions. I think I had to change the son I was, friend I was – to others and myself from there! Be kind to yourself throughout the process!

Have you had a particularly memorable moment of awareness?

I remember one time in particular, two years ago – I think I will always remember it – I was at a festival and knew that I had everything I could ask for. I was flown up for it and stuff, but I just got hit with a massive wave of emotions (what I now understand as depression, anxious thoughts) – I found it difficult that day to really talk to anyone. There was a person in my life at that time who made that day feel like hell, just telling me things that made my depression sky rocket. I remember crying myself to sleep that night and telling someone from my team that I needed to get help when I came home. My whole spiritual journey started from there. That point of awareness being like – how do I become someone else? Then I was like, why do I want to become someone else? I’m actually tearing up writing this because my soul and my life was just in such a bad shape then.

I think the thing I always learn looking back at that story is how life changes and adjusts, nothing is constant, but sometimes it does feel like the end of the world!!

What are 5 things that you think everyone should be aware of?

1. I think everyone needs to be aware of how they feel. It’s so important to take the time to check in every day. We wanna be happy and that’s just an input to happiness which is a major key. You don’t get happiness without soul searching.
2. The way we talk to other people. It’s so important to observe how we talk to people we love, how you talk to strangers. Generally, I’ve found that the way we talk to our family is a great indicator of how we value human interaction. They’re the closest people to us in this world – so if we don’t talk to them right, it’s a red flag for sure. Just my opinion.
3. The drug culture that our generation is struggling with at the moment. We face a lot of denial about that. I never wanna judge anyone that takes drugs – that is counterintuitive and makes people defensive – we have a problem though. I think once we realise that it’s a problem, we can have an open chat about it without it being so taboo. That’s when we can make progress and understand it better. I’ve seen regret with drug use, just something to think about. Our lives are short – how can one reach natural highs without relying on substance?
4. The energy we wanna bring into every day. What do we wanna bring into the world today? It’s a big question but makes each day have purpose. It could be as simple as complimenting a stranger – in other words trying to bring more love into the world. If we were all 5% happier, it would be a different place. I think that’s a start. We don’t need to get to 100% happiness, life has pain and challenges – but let’s try get 5% happier.
5. The way we judge. Whenever I assume I ALWAYS make an ass out of you and me. We try to put things into buckets, figure out a person without understanding their complex story; we all have such deep lives and big stories. Assuming always limits our potential to connect. It’s something I’m continuing to work – I find if I’m judging then that’s because I am unhappy with myself. Happy people say happy things!

Confronting the past isn’t always easy, as you note; what have been some instances when you have confronted the past, and what has helped you to be able to do this?

I have had to face the past by making peace with relationships that I don’t have in my life anymore. The hardest thing is when I leave relationships without clarity, how do you find clarity after that? That takes me going back into the past, forgiving myself and the other person, trying to allow myself to move on and leaving negative emotions I’ve picked up from it. Moving on from rejection is always hard too. It feels personal, when it isn’t. Outside of those things, I would say making peace with the person I was in the past has been a big thing. It took me a long time going through spirituality to finally realise I never needed to change in the first place. I have always been enough. That’s when I stopped running and decided to face things.

Meditation has helped with both of those tasks for me. It helps me be less emotional about it, it keeps me grounded and stops me from going down a dark hole of over thinking. Having a great support network has also been key for me. When you reach your lowest point, which happens to all of us at some time, who is someone you can lean on? Who will take my call when no one else will? Those types of questions have helped me navigate and find the people I want in my life – loyal people are the best thing ever. Reliability is key. Another thing I ask is, is this person genuine? That’s important because unfortunately there are people with external motives so I just am aware of that – I’ve had a lot of practise with that thankfully. Be kind to everyone but know what you deserve.

What are you most looking forward to doing as a solo artist, and how does this contrast to being in a duo?

I’m excited about everything, honestly. I really connect with my own music now, which fills me with a lot of love when someone makes a kind review or just appreciates it. I didn’t feel much for the music I made in the duo, I just wasn’t mature enough to understand what I was doing it for. I was doing it for external validation which never gives you permanent satisfaction. It’s fleeting, as hard as that is to swallow! No matter how many streams you get, as humans we are never happy. So setting my own definition of success and creating my own space with what I’m putting out is thrilling to me. I can also dress how I want now & say what I want – all things I am forever grateful to be able to do with this project.

And finally, what does music mean to you?

I was thinking about this recently, like, why do I do music? For one, making music means I am building a better connection to myself, expressing who I am. Secondly, I love the concept that something I’ve felt can be put into a song and could help another human get through what I just went through. Overall though, the answer I came to when I thought about this question was, music isn’t about me or you – it’s about everyone coming together. Music has the power to bring so many humans together. Bringing 50 people to a show under the same roof is pretty powerful, then scale that to 20,000 beautiful humans just vibing together. Music just has that enchanting power. Likewise, whenever I put out a song, it isn’t about me or the song – it’s about what that song can become for someone else. Otherwise making music would just be egotistical lol!