Spare a thought for Hemi Hemingway, who really sounds like he’s going through it. On his new album, Wings of Desire, he’s in full pining mode, aching hard. Wrestling with the end of a long-term relationship as well as relocating from London to New Zealand, the past few years have been something of an emotional rollercoaster for him. His world is one full of yearning. The New Zealand songwriter approaches love like it’s the be all and end all of existence; naturally when he looks forward to a life without love, it might as well be the end of the world.
And none of this is too surprising if you are already familiar with Hemingway’s music. Though crafted with a genuine longing here, leaning in heavily to the role of the down on his luck guy with a heart as big as a football stadium is all part of Hemingway’s raison d’etre. On previous records his influence was crooners of rock and pop from the 50s and 60s; it played like a homage on 2021’s The Lonely Hunter EP, but come his 2023 debut album Strangers Again he was sinking into the style, almost letting it swallow him as much as it sounded like his grief and longing was.
On Wings of Desire, Hemingway emerges with the dregs of his favoured influence still biting at his heels, but he’s also wandering down paths of new influences. 80s synth pop and new wave influences are peppered across the album, making for fun and intriguing sonic ventures. The woozy synth of “Desiree” feels pleasingly alien, adding a touch of the unreal, like half-remembering a drunken walk home at night. Elsewhere on closing track “No Future No Future No Future” Hemingway shifts gears to address the New Zealand government and its attempts to legislate away the rights of Māori people. There’s a seething ire rippling through the angsty electric and nocturnal synths, a rare moment where Hemingway sounds like he’s channeling an anger he can’t quite put to words.
Across much of the rest of the record, Hemingway finds plenty to say, spilling out his heart to the world. “I shoulda called you, baby / I shoulda given anything to keep you with me,” he aches over sultry sax on the opening title track; a call to arms of heartbreak to usher the listener into his world of woe. Georgia Gets By adds a softer edge on the brokenhearted ballad “Promises” as Hemingway sings “Nothing’s gonna change the way I feel for you / Nothing’s gonna break the chain I wear for you” like the wind machine is pointed right at him for full dramatic effect. “Life is cruel / If only you knew,” he offers on “(To Be) Without You” as synths pulse and flicker, like passing streetlights on a nighttime drive.
At times Wings of Desire reminds me of Grapell’s 2021 album The Answer which had a similar heart-on-sleeve sincerity. Hemingway does the same, but somewhat grander: the gestures are big, the sax plentiful, and the yearning served up in heaps. It’s not so much heart on his sleeve as it is a whole big heart-shaped outfit he’s wearing. Sometimes it veers into sounding a little too pastiche: “Long Distance Lover”, with its spoken word come-ons (“I’ll be puttin’a pillow under your body… And we’re gonna make a mess!”) comes off more like fellow New Zealander Jemaine Clement doing a bit as part of a Flight of the Conchords sketch. It’s likely intentionally cheesy and overcooked, but it does also feel like Hemingway has mined the heartbreak quarry to the point he has to resort to mocking himself – which does dampen the feel of genuine misery surrounding the track.
And even if you are fully invested in Hemingway’s style, Wings of Desire becomes exhausting and tiring all too quickly. Crisper production helps here, but big moments still don’t soar as much as they should, and by the end of the record a fatigue of sorts sets in. “Writing these songs was a grieving of this long-term relationship, but it was also a sort of rediscovery of myself,” Hemingway explains of the album’s creation. Like a good friend, we can be there while he’s going through the motions and support him in whatever way we can. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t tiring hearing him retread the same old ground. Even if he does it with some new features, there does come a point where you want to tell him to just get over it.
