Trials Talks Debut Solo Album ‘hendle’ And Premiering It Live In Front Of Arenas
A.B. Original and Funkoars member Trials opens up about his debut solo album, performing with Hilltop Hoods and his writing process.
Words Thomas Jackson // Image Richy Sandham
Trials (aka Daniel Rankine) has finally released his highly anticipated debut solo album, hendle. It’s a soul-bearing autobiographical 10 songs reflecting on resilience, cultural legacy and identity.
Rankine is used to performing with long-term collaborator Briggs and special guests in A.B. Original and before that as part of the legendary South Australian hip hop trio the Funkoars. This time, there’s no safety net, no bandmates and no laptops, just Rankine playing all the instruments and singing by himself.
“I think I got to a point where I was pretty satisfied to not do a show, if that ever came to it, ever again,” Rankine shares from his home in South Australia.
“I think I had almost ran my course just throwing your hands in the air and waving and you just don't care. I got the opportunity a lot of times with A.B. [Original] to do really meaningful shows, that really made a difference, and I think I figured out quite quickly, that's all I wanted to do.”
When Rankine wrote hendle he had no intention of ever doing a show for it. However, that changed when he sent it to Suffa from South Australian heroes Hilltop Hoods.
“He's one of the first guys I send something to, every single time, from the very beginning…he called me up and just said, ‘Hey, do you want to go on this little arena tour that we’re doing and perform the songs?’
“I said, ‘No, I really don't, but I'm absolutely gonna do that.’ It's because it was that exact thing that I wanted: it was those terrifying moments where I get to go up there and risk it all. High risk, high reward.
“The fact that it's my story and my story alone. I chose to take that confidence that Suffa has always really put in me and just tell nobody what I had planned until the very first time they saw it. The first show, I pulled up with two guitars, three samplers and no band members.”
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These shows supporting the Hilltop Hoods were on their sold-out Never Coming Home Australian arena tour. It was a sink-or-swim moment for Rankine as he debuted his solo project live in front of tens of thousands of people. Even with all of the experience of his other projects behind him, Rankine feels like it’s never enough to calm his nerves.
“I've never [performed] enough, like I constantly shit my pants up until the second I go on. I pray something stops the show until the second I walk on. The second that my foot steps on stage. I'm praying for an intervention from up above or below, anywhere I'll take it from, anything that can get me out of this. I'm just constantly questioning every choice I've made up until that second. Then I get on stage,” Rankine laughs.
“It was terrifying, but it was almost like the idea of not doing this and going up and trying to do the same old [thing] was soul-crushing. I didn't want to just do that because this story, the way I'm trying to present it, deserved more, it deserved a bigger thought.
“Having the support of those guys and being lucky enough to do two arena runs with them already as A.B….So if I'm gonna go and risk it all anywhere and get caught and picked up nine times because I've fallen over eight, it's with these guys. So I decided, ‘You know what?’ Let's just do what the album is intended to do and honour the intention of it and just stand up there and bear my soul, all alone.”
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The writing process for the album started as a cascading effect from Rankine’s sobriety. He now had more time to think about things, so he sat down and tried to piece together who he was as a person and how he got to this moment in time.
“My memories across the record are very, very fractured and compartmentalised due to a really spicy childhood. I started writing them down, trying to figure out a lot of these things because when you're looking at compartmentalised memories, people and places and everything kind of becomes one big amalgamated idea of an emotion or something.
“When I started writing it down, I realised that I was writing little paragraphs under these little headings and these little headings ended up starting to get a bigger heading and then living amongst themselves, and they became almost chapters. Then I realised, I was sort of writing a book.
hendle is not just an album, it’s a multidisciplinary project that combines music, a visual art series and a memoir.
“The album is a centrepiece to three parts of the whole project, so it's the album in the middle. The left is the art exhibitions, there's 20 paintings that I've done that come with it. All informed and supported by all the songs and influenced by the record, all painted around the record writing. The third part, which comes out at the end and sort of serves as the liner notes for the whole project, is the autobiography.”
hendle by Trials is out now. Listen here.
