Hot Hot Heat have announced that they are back on hiatus.
The band briefly returned late last year after a seven-year break with a new single, ‘Shock Me’. Following this, however, they have confirmed that their reunion is already at an end.
In a statement posted to Instagram, Hot Hot Heat said that they had other things planned for their reunion, including more new music and some live shows, but their plans were called off when singer Steve Bays “came to feel he could not participate.”
However, their statement also suggests that band members Dante DeCaro and Paul Hawley will potentially work on new music together as part of a different project.
“For everyone who has been following recently: I report with apology, sadness, and some embarrassment, that the Hot Hot Heat reunion came to an end shortly before the new year,” DeCaro and Hawley wrote. “We had made plans to release much more music and do some shows and short tours but Steve came to feel he could not participate so those plans have been cancelled.
“However, the brief comeback was an energizing and inspiring thing. We are proud of the one new song we did release, and the volume and quality of unfinished and unreleased material has left Paul and I, at least, with the feeling that we may continue to produce new music in some capacity in the future. What this will be exactly, we don’t know. But stay tuned.
“Thank you for your love and support. I was so grateful to be back playing with these guys and was also reminded of all the great tunes and experiences we shared over the years that I was in the band, and since. It was a fun, if brief ride that has left a spark still burning.”
The Canadian band – comprised of frontman Steve Bays, Paul Hawley, Dante DeCaro, and Parker Bossley – released their fifth and final self-titled album back in 2016, 14 years after their debut, ‘Make Up The Breakdown’, was released.
Released in 2002, the acclaimed first full-length project from the Canadian band was produced by Jack Endino (Nirvana, Soundgarden, Sonic Youth) at Vancouver, BC’s Mushroom Studios. The band did, however, come together to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the album.
NME hailed ‘Make Up…’ as “joyously bold [and] emotionally rounded” in a glowing review.
It added: “It’s a record that shakes all preconceptions from the tree, and should be talked about in hushed tones by self-congratulatory, music aficionados 20 years from now.”