Hope And Ruin doesn’t ease you in; it grabs you from the start. Written during a 10-day stay at Shaken Oak Studios, it’s the second full-length album by English post-hardcore band As Living Arrows, and it’s not trying to be comfortable. The name change from Dead Bird marked a shift, and this album solidifies it. The band has embraced the weight of the world’s struggles and found ways to release it through atmospheric guitar swells and piercing screams.
The track-by-track journey is intense. As Above, So Below calls on the memory of loved ones to pull you through hard times, while The Greatest Weight captures the raw exhaustion of depression, with a riff that refuses to quit. The songs vary from jaded bar observations in Life Noir to the realization of broken promises in Sky Reflects Itself. Each track builds on the theme of battling demons and searching for clarity.
We caught up with the band to give you the full rundown track by track – check it out below.
The album’s rawness is undeniable, especially with the lead single Our Meridian, a song about how life’s major events fade, leaving unexpected moments as our most cherished memories.
The band doesn’t promise easy resolutions. Instead, Hope And Ruin serves as a challenge—an invitation to reflect on the complexities of life, where hope and destruction are often intertwined.
With Peter Miles at Middle Farm Studios capturing the band’s live sound in two 3-day sessions, the recording is unpolished, but purposefully so. The imperfections aren’t flaws—they’re part of the narrative.
As Living Arrows’ Hope And Ruin is as much about the journey as it is about the end. Each song moves from hope to ruin, challenging you to make sense of it all, while reflecting on what’s really worth fighting for.
See the full song by song commentary of “Hope and Ruin” written by the band’s lead vocalist Thomas Wagstaff below.
“Hope And Ruin” is out now via I.Corrupt.Records (EU) and Best Life Records (UK) and available through all streaming platforms as well as on limited vinyl.
1. AS ABOVE SO BELOW
This song started off as what I thought was a throw away track, but fast became one of my favourites on the record.
It’s about the idea of being able to call on the spirit and memories of someone to get you through hard times.
It also looks at the idea of regret. “You can look back, but please don’t stare”.
It’s the idea that you can learn from the past but you don’t have to get stuck in it.
2. THE GREATEST WEIGHT
This is about depression and finding the flimsy reed on the river bank that turns out to be the life line you need to pull yourself back out.
This song includes my favourite riff on the album – although I’m not happy with my vocal take.
This was at the end of recording and I’d come close to blowing my voice out.
In fact, here I think it is. But it’s there, in all it’s human imperfection to be judged for the rest of time.
3. ALTRUIST
What’s the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results.
This song deals with addiction and embodies it as a person. Or something like that. This track is a weird one, I still don’t know if I feel it’s finished.
It includes my favourite atmospheric part, where Tim and Matias play some incredible swells together over some of my simply strummed chords.
What is it they say about art? It’s merely abandoned?
4. LIFE NOIR
Spending most of my earlier life in bars, you see some things. You live some things.
This song puts you in the place of an observer at his usual spot at the bar looking in at a new courtship.
Imagining the outcome with all the jaded wisdom that position holds.
The piano part was written only because there was an old grand at the residential rehearsal space where we wrote the record.
Listening back to the demos I realise there are a few chords missing but the track serves its purpose on the record.
5. OUR MERIDIAN
This was our lead single, like a sibling to As Above, So Below – the song explores how the significance of life’s moments shifts – how seemingly major events of the past fade into insignificance, while those once overlooked emerge as our most precious memories.
6. SUN KING
This song again I thought was a throw away song. I don’t know if we have done the song justice on this recording.
But it does have its moments. It looks at people who seem to have found the answer.
I feel a lot of the time people prey upon others who are in a weakened condition both spiritually and mentally.
They promise everything from enlightenment, Spiritual Well Being to losing weight. There can be worth in some peoples words.
I am no one to Judge. But I would stress to keep your wits abut you.
7. SKY REFLECTS ITS SELF
There is a single lyric – Trust was earn’t then it was burnt to the ground.
This can be heard from alternate view points.
It looks at how sometimes, despite the hope and honesty in your intentions, everything you promised would never happen can still ultimately happen.
8. THE TOWER
In a strange way this is the beginning of the record to me. It embodies how sanity was lost and the rest of the record is a grappling attempt to make sense of the situation.
Perhaps we should have flipped the track order. But as the title of the record suggests we go from Hope to Ruin.
This was a bug bear for most of the band when recording – I felt it needed more. Listening back, I don’t think it did.
