The Hoosiers have spent the last two decades travelling the world with their bright, catchy tunes. Five records and no end of live shows later, this powerful pop-rock two piece show no sign of slowing, kicking off their 2025 with an anniversary tour celebrating 15 years of their second album ‘The Illusion of Safety’ before diving into a summer of festival dates – all while working on their sixth studio album!
Weeks away from hitting the road, The Hoosiers frontman Alan Sharland chatted with Heather Swift to give Exposed’s readers some exclusive behind-the-scenes insight into what they can expect from the band during what is looking like one of their greatest years yet.
So, how’s your year been so far and what’s it looking like for the rest of 2025?
We’ve had a really good start to the year. We’re working on our sixth album so we’ve started to get some mixes through, which is the really exciting bit because then you start to hear whether it’s good or not, whether all that time was wasted or not.
As for the rest of the year, we’ve got loads, we just never stop gigging! The diaries are starting to fill up with festivals now so we can probably hope – we don’t say no to many things – that most weekends during the summer we’ll be out and about around the UK, doing gigs and having fun. And then we’re aiming to release the album towards the end of the year.
Wow, is there anything you can say about that or are you still keeping it under lock and key?
No, there’s nothing particularly secret, it’s just another album. ‘Confidence’ was our fifth album and we loved the process, so we were really keen to just write another one quickly to keep the momentum going. I think it’ll probably be released later this year.
And how are you feeling about your upcoming 15 year anniversary ‘The Illusion of Safety’ tour?
We had our first couple of tour rehearsals last weekend, just working our way through the album tracklist. Because it’s obviously the ‘Illusion of Safety’ 15 years anniversary, some of those songs we haven’t played for probably 15 years. It’ll be nice to play those tunes because you get into a bit of a habit of playing the same songs when you go on tour, the ones that are the favorites, so it’s nice to dust off some alternative tunes.
How do you balance working on the new stuff while also celebrating a 15 year anniversary of an old record? Is it hard going back and forth in time?
It’s honestly not too difficult. As the old album is just rehearsal, it’s just knocking the songs together, and we won’t spend too much time doing that or lose sleep, just enough to make sure it’s a really good show. But the focus is always more on the new thing, that’s always more exciting than looking back. But when we’re on tour and on the road, it’ll be all about that.
What’s it like playing the old stuff again? Is there anything you’ve noticed that you’d change if you could do it again or are you still pretty happy with it all?
It’s funny, the nostalgia takes you back to first listening to the album. Album two was really difficult, like everyone’s second album supposedly, so it takes me back to some of the harder times. We were under so much pressure and we got a bit lost – we couldn’t see the wood for the trees at times with that album. I remember it being not very good in my head because we got dropped shortly after, but then I listened again and I’m like ‘No, it was actually really good! Why did they drop us? That’s crazy.’ We were working with really good people and we believed in ourselves and, yeah, it does stand strong. I don’t know what that says about modern music, but yeah, I think it was just good pop songs. Yeah, I say that’s a good thing.
15 years is a long time! What’s changed since the start?
It’s only me and Irwin left in the band and we sort of lead it now. We’re just thankful that we still get to do this for a living and people pay money to see us and pay money to book us (because obviously you need money) and the fact that people turn up and sing along… It’s an honour really. 15 years ago, I wouldn’t have guessed that I would still be loving it as much as I do now!
Is there anything you’d like to go back and tell the version of you that was first writing this album?
I think we were all a bit precious about everything. It was well intended, but I think there was an element of us that would be like ‘No, I need to have written this. I need to write this. I need to make sure this is good’. Whereas now we’re a little bit more like ‘If you’ve got an idea, bring it and we can try. If somebody else has written a song, they can do that.’ We could have been a bit more relaxed about the whole process. I’d tell me that, but then me back then would have just told me now to bugger off. So it wouldn’t have got through.
We were working with really good people and we believed in ourselves and, yeah, it does stand strong.
It’s so impressive how you’ve managed to keep the creative juices flowing all this time. Have your inspirations changed at all or is it still the same creative process?
No, the process has completely changed. After the second album when we left Sony, I got a writing deal. So I was writing for other people and during that process I started to realize that there were loads and loads of different ways to write songs. I would always start with piano and melody and I’d be on my own with it for probably months before I was willing to show anyone anything. But now it’s a bit more of an open process. If I have an idea and I can’t get anywhere with it, I’ll send it to Irwin, and he does the same. By nature I think we’re always thinking of new ways of doing it. On top of the fact that we’ve got such a good fan base, the idea of not doing music now feels crazy. So yeah, it’s really joyous.
What do you think you’d be doing now if you weren’t in music?
If I’d never had a music career, then I’d probably be in some boring business job doing sales or something. I guess I would have worked my way up to the top and I’d be highflying. But if I wasn’t able to do the music now, having been in music, I think it would be really, really difficult to know what to do. Once you’ve done this job, being in a band and playing music for a living, that becomes your identity quite strongly. So I think it would be really hard to do something completely different. I think I would’ve always wanted to do something creative that involved making something happen, probably something hands on.
Going back to the tour, what can fans expect and what’s the balance between old and new?
There’s going to be more from the second album than we’ve ever done, so if you like the album that’s good news for you! With live shows we always think, it’s about the audience and not about us. So there will be all of our biggest songs for people to sing along to. For us, the live experience and the live show and the live event is just about joy and being a sort of a safe place. So we’ll be doing as much as we can to make it a celebration, without sounding too cheesy, that’s what we like to do.
I think ever since we first played we always try to be different each time. So if you haven’t seen us before, you’ve got to come see us at least once. Come and enjoy and feel the love of a Hoosiers show!
The Hoosiers bring their anniversary tour to Sheffield’s Network on March 22nd. Tickets are £24 and available here.
