WXJM presents The One AM Radio tonight in Transitions
With his third album just released, artist Hirway leaves L.A. to tour
By Jill Yaworski, a&e editor
Posted on February 26, 2007

Thousands of miles away from his sunny Los Angeles apartment, Hrishikesh Hirway, the mastermind behind The One AM Radio, played the drums — loudly. In his vacant childhood home in Massachusetts, Hirway would spend a year in solitude creating his third album, This Too Will Pass.

Spending the previous few months moving around and sleeping on friends’ couches throughout the country, Hirway felt isolated and lonely. So Hirway found himself back in Peabody, Mass., surrounded by forgotten memories and family tokens.

“There’s something about being on the road constantly and in different cities that makes you feel alone, even when you’re surrounded by a lot of people. I needed some place to connect to, a place to belong,” Hirway said.

While sadder and darker than his previous albums, This Too Will Pass relies heavily on Hirway’s unique sound — which is difficult to describe. A dreamy electronic mix of guitars, synths and ambient beats, Hirway creates a sound that can be compared to The Postal Service and Nick Drake. But it is Hirway’s powerful lyrics that draw the listeners in as he reminisces emotionally packed experiences through sleepy vocals.

“There is no one way to describe my music, because it is different for everyone,” Hirway said. “There are things in it that people can relate to, whether it is folk or punk.” 

Hirway began experimenting with electronica when he was a teenager. In fact, the first thing Hirway ever recorded was drum loops on his first EP.

“I had a little tape recorder,” Hirway recalls. “You could even hear me hitting the play and record buttons on the tape.”

Although he began playing the drums in high school, living in L.A. didn’t allow him the chance to play them very often.

“The walls in my apartment were really thin, so I did a lot of my work electronically with headphones,” he said. “That way I wouldn’t disturb the neighbors.”

But alone in his home in Massachusetts, Hirway dusted off his old drum set and spent hours playing. Immediately he knew he wanted to play live drums mixed with electronic drums on the album.

Having produced and recorded his first two albums, The Hum of Electronic Air! (2002) and A Name Writ in Water (2004), by himself, Hirway felt ambitious on the third album. “With each record I get better at figuring out the process and all the technical aspects that go into making an album,” he said. “On this album I really felt like I knew what I was doing and exactly how to produce the sound.”

Hirway has come a long way since he began performing as The One AM Radio as a junior at Yale in 1998. The name came from his childhood, when he was living in Peabody. His mother worked late, so his father would take Hirway with him to go pick her up.

“As we waited in the car my dad would turn the AM radio on,” Hirway said. “I would be in the back seat watching my father listening to the radio, and I would try and stay awake. The memory made a huge impression on me, and whenever I hear the static on an AM radio I always think of my father and me in that car late at night.”

Soon afterward he dubbed himself The One AM Radio, he played a gig with a solo Ted Leo, who is now the front-singer for the Pharmacists. Hirway and Leo hit it off and collaborated to release a split seven-inch together, which sparked the future for Hirway’s musical career. Last Tuesday, This Too Will Pass was released to much acclaim.

WXJM Radio is bringing The One AM Radio, along with The Wild Animal Party and The American Tourist, to JMU tonight at 8 p.m. in Transitions.

“Whenever I play live I want people to be able to connect to something emotionally in my songs,” Hirway said. “I would love it if people felt like I’ve reached them on some intrinsic emotional level and allowed them to reach feeling that they keep locked away and under wraps.”