Clap Your Hands Say Yeah may forever be pigeonholed as one of the first “blog bands.” Its self-titled, self-released debut became popular through word-of-blog acclaim upon arrival in 2005. The Philly/Brooklyn quintet, led by Alec Ounsworth, navigated the success well, but 2007’s Some Loud Thunder revealed that CYHSY was as interested in outsider weirdness as it was in indie-pop hooks. Yet it suffered a seemingly inevitable backlash from the fickle blogosphere, as did 2011’s Hysterical. In that LP’s aftermath, the band shed members and disappeared until late last summer, when Little Moments arrived. That four-song EP set the tone for the vibe that threads through Only Run, the new CYHSY album, which updates one of the EP’s songs as its title track. Ounsworth will be guest editing magnetmagazine.com. Read our new CYHSY feature.
Ounsworth: I am not too keen on shoes with laces. I have been wearing laceless shoes for the past 10 years or so. It might have to do with having had to travel so much and simply not wanting to unlace and lace my shoes when going through security at the airport. That’s probably it. In any case, the shoes I wear are Clarks. I buy them in bulk. People tell me I look like a grandpa wearing these shoes. Maybe I do. I don’t know.
