Nine Songs: BIG SPECIAL

In the hour we spend talking about the songs that soundtracked his formative years and inspired his transition from a solo singer/songwriter to his partnership with his best friend Cal Moloney as BIG SPECIAL, life feels anything but for Hicklin.

Since the release of their debut album POSTINDUSTRIAL HOMETOWN BLUES last May, the fusion of Hicklin’s spoken word vocal and Moloney’s drumming has seen them establish themselves as a compelling live band, selling out the O2 Forum in Kentish Town earlier this year and gearing up to play Oslo in London this month before two nights of supporting Pixies at Brixton Academy.

Hicklin’s artistic road to where he is today has been a long, winding, and at times, frustrating one. After more than a decade as a solo artist, he became disillusioned with music, but when lockdown hit he started writing demos for what would become BIG SPECIAL and sent a song to Moloney called “This Here Ain’t Water”, which convinced his friend to start the band together.

As a solo performer Hicklin felt more at home in the studio, but being in a band with Molony has seen his confidence grow exponentially. “I used to be a very nervous performer, but this felt like starting again. Cal used to say it was like leading me to the gallows to get onstage, but he’s got such good energy onstage and backstage as well”, Hicklin tells me. “Over the last couple years of playing together, we've been going out as mates, doing these gigs and playing to each other and it's really built up my confidence.”

Live performance is now a totally different proposition for Hicklin. “It's become a thing that I crave, I've always loved being in the studio, but I love performing as well now. There are two halves of us doing this, you make a good album and do a good show. If people come to see us, there's just the two of us on stage, so we've got to put on a good show”, he explains.

“We found our thing, we've got two organic elements, which is the singing and the drums, so we've got to make sure that we work that space and fill that space with them.”

BIG SPECIAL’s live shows are communal events, where Hicklin and Moloney seeing themselves as part of the experience. When I mention to Hicklin I’ve read that fans have cried at their shows, he looks visibly touched.

“It obviously means something to us, but when it means something to someone else, that's the aim with our work. It’s the same for me as a fan of art and what’s moved me, so if you do that to someone else, then you're winning”, he reflects. “And it's been fun, it's been so much fun. I love playing with Cal, it feels like everything else has been like a stepping-stone to this.”

As we talk through his Nine Songs selections, as a self-confessed music obsessive, Hicklin tells me he found the task of whittling his catholic taste into single figures was a challenge. “I had 30 songs when I first started typing them all up, so I had to cut them down, but when I finished the list and I sent it off, I realised there were ten songs on there!”

Hicklin’s final choices chart his formative love of music and take him to the present day. Each of his selections reveal a fascination with singular artists, and provide a metaphor for his own story, taking in working-class stories, the meaning of faith, friendship and the beauty of getting a second chance.