Snakehips Eying Aus Collab As They Shake Up Release Plans

In 2022 the UK house music combo Snakehips will turn 10. And, coincidentally, they'll also deliver their most ambitious project. Indeed, DJ/producers Oliver Lee and James Carter are assuring their legacy while looking to the future.

"We are doing an album this year," Lee announces of their anniversary plans. "So I guess maybe that is our marking of it, in a way – but I don't know if we did that consciously… But, yeah, it will be 10 years since our first-ever tracks at the end of this year – which is a pretty crazy thought." 

Snakehips are back in Australia for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic, again joining the regional touring festival Groovin The Moo (they were previously billed in 2017). The pair rarely, and selectively, grant interviews yet share an easy dynamic – the very-blond Lee chatting the most with his distinct South Yorkshire accent, as a baseball-capped Carter offers affirmations. Initially, this midday Zoom chat was supposed to be audio only, but the lads – on computers in different hotel rooms – bashfully smile down their camera lenses. (Carter jokes, "I'm not wearing any trousers!")

It transpires that Snakehips have been in Sydney a week, jetlag now behind them. "We're okay," Lee states. "We had a bit of a gap between our shows, so we just got in a bit early." Carter adds, "Yeah, [we] acclimatised." 

Snakehips welcome playing to Australian crowds. "It's always been great," Lee enthuses. "I feel like Australians have just got way more energy than everyone else. It's always been more of a party down here. All of the festivals we've done in Australia have been crazy."

Have Snakehips discerned any changes to party atmospherics on returning to the circuit post-lockdown? "Not hugely," Lee starts. Carter picks up, "People are definitely more excited, right?" "Yeah," Lee ponders. "People just seem happy to let loose. I think, at the beginning, people were going to clubs still wearing masks and stuff, which was a little bit peculiar." "Yeah," Carter agrees. "When we were in America last year…" "Yeah," Lee finishes, "but it feels like everything seems a bit more relaxed – and everyone's just happy to be out again."

Typically, Snakehips straddle '90s house and R&B, distinguishing their aesthetic from the nu-garage Disclosure. Mind, says Lee, their sound is "developing constantly". Though Snakehips bear a nostalgic orientation, they love the new and the next. "I love listening to music as much as I love making music," he notes. And being exposed to fresh influences prompts Snakehips to "up their game." In 2021 the two surprisingly united with US house legend (and speed garage don) Armand van Helden for Freedom (You Bring Me).

Snakehips issued their inaugural single, Days With You (featuring Sinéad Harnett), back in 2014. But their signature tune remains All My Friends with Tinashe and Chance The Rapper – the high-street bop certified multi-platinum in Australia. Even today, Chano infrequently cameos, his participation a coup. "It had such a big kind of pop chorus, but with elements of R&B and hip-hop and stuff," Lee reflects. "It just seemed to resonate with so many people."

Seven years on and Snakehips regularly chat to the ever-versatile Tinashe. "We saw Tinashe last week, actually – or was it two weeks ago?," Lee divulges. "We still work with her a bunch, so we keep in touch with her. She's great. [We] haven't seen Chance for a few years, but it's all love. I don't know – he's busy man."

In fact, Chance has maintained a low profile since his 2019 wedding album, The Big Day, copped a backlash from hip hop heads. "I loved it," Lee extols. "There was a really good track on there that [Chance] did with Lido – Get A Bag… There's a few amazing records on there. I remember really loving it when it came out. Yeah, good vibes!"

Over the past decade Snakehips have focused on singles. Yet this year they will furnish a debut album, following other successful UK house acts: Basement Jaxx, Groove Armada, Disclosure and Gorgon City. "We've always done EPs and singles, [but] we just wanna do something a bit bigger now, just to show the different sides of what we're working on all the time – just because there's different sides to our sound and there's different ways that we write songs," Lee explains. "I think, if you just put one track out every few months, it's difficult to show everything that makes up your sound and your vibe. 

"Of course, everything does seem more just about kind of viral TikTok hits these days. But we would very much like to take it to a place where we can release a body of work and have people that really appreciate it still listen to it and enjoy it for what it is."

After recording with Chance and Tinashe, Snakehips have secured guest vocalists like Anderson .Paak, ZAYN and HER for tracks. Mid-2021 they launched a label, Never Worry Records, with Run It Up, bolstered by Southern rap eccentrics EARTHGANG. And, Lee teases, they have similarly bold ideas for their album curation. "We were talking about this earlier – we were thinking it'd be amazing to do something really classic like working with Janet Jackson or Mary J Blige or someone like that and doing a kind of throwback, flipped R&B thing."

However, Snakehips are likewise committed to elevating underground and emerging cohorts – Lee namechecking UK indie R&B-type Finn Askew and resurgent Canadian singer/songwriter Rochelle Jordan. "We wanna kind of combine a bit of 'classic' with 'new' with the album and just shine a light on maybe where our inspiration comes from and then the stuff that we see as new things that are gonna be really, really amazing." 

There could even be some Antipodean identities. "We're loving BROODS and Mallrat. There's a bunch of singers that we're really into from out here that are just killing it and that we're trying to work with as well."

Meanwhile, Snakehips are rolling out another single, Water, alongside Cali rapper/singer Bryce Vine, the son of soap star Tracey Ross. "There'll be a few singles and tracks leading up to the release of the album over the next couple of months," Lee says.

But, first, Snakehips will bring the party to Groovin The Moo and side-shows. "We've done so many new edits of old tunes and re-flips of some of our classic things," Lee promises. "So it's a lot of energy, just good vibes and some nicely re-edited things that I think people are gonna really enjoy."

GROOVIN THE MOO 2022

Maitland, NSW - Saturday 23 April 2022
Maitland Showground

Canberra, ACT - Sunday 24 April 2022
Exhibition Park In Canberra (EPIC)

Bendigo, VIC - Saturday 30 April 2022 
Bendigo’s Prince of Wales Showgrounds