Steady Hands’ New Music Video, "Indifferent Belushi"

Steady Hands comes from a tight knit music community in Philadelphia where there seem to be links connecting everyone. Sean Huber, most commonly known as the drummer for Modern Baseball, began a solo project in 2012 that placed him as the front man and guitarist of what would eventually become Steady Hands. Though Huber did backing vocals for Modern Baseball, he now primarily flexes his vocal chords by singing punchy lines that dominate Steady Hands’ songs.

Beginning as a solo project, Steady Hands quickly turned into a collaborative hodgepodge of Philadelphia musicians filtering in and out of Huber’s creative space. From the many people and friends who came to play with him, Steady Hands eventually solidified into a five-piece alternative rock outfit —that aside from Huber — includes William Lindsay, Andrew Kirnan, George Legatos, and Richard Straub. At first glance, and with no prior context, these men in floral button downs and skinny jeans invoke an instant thought of alterna-synth, or some off-the-wall DIY genre. However, looks can be deceiving.

While the band certainly has the DIY ethos covered and in a different way quite moody, Steady Hands jumps at you with aggressive percussion, driving rhythm guitar, and a singer that pulls on the emotional strings of adolescent excitement and urgency that lingers in all of us. In addition, their producer Brian McTear no doubt plays a large role in crafting their sound. He highlights Huber’s voice above the instrumentation by making it crisper while maintaining its absolute imperfection, which lends itself well to Steady Hands’ youthful, grungy style. Initially released through Alternative Press, the band’s new music video for “Indifferent Belushi” continues to play on the youthful vigor of the band’s music.

The track itself, off their new album Truth in Comedy released by Lame-O Records, features a heavy guitar rhythm, plenty of crash cymbals, and a cascading, nicely flowing keyboard combo to balance it all out. The song makes you want to stand up and march toward something important. It takes the listener to that familiar place where emotions are blinding, and you simply must do something about them, whether or not they make any sense.

The accompanying music video on the other hand, plays with the carefree nature of youth. Muted colors, a deserted coastal pier, and a cozy beach bonfire create a comfortable environment as the band runs around together, smiling and laughing. The video showcases a place everyone can relate to even if we’ve never been there – it’s the meetup spot, the Friday night haunt, the place for friends to gather and mess around. Though the song has a focused, almost frantic energy to it with the chorus featuring the line, “I don’t want to be here anymore”, in the video, these guys seem to be enjoying themselves just fine. Perhaps the combination of the song and video aims to show how youth often seems to be a constant struggle, even though much of the time life is actually pretty good.

Truth in Comedy is the band’s second full length release, following 2016’s Rude Boys of Bar Rock. Currently, there is no tour promoting the album.