HighSchool have spent the past few years refining a sound that fuses post-punk textures with alt-rock introspection, and nowhere is that more potent than on “One Lucky Man”, a standout track from their self-titled debut album.
Recorded across London, Lewes (East Sussex), and Melbourne with producers Ben Hillier and Finn Bellingham, HighSchool is a meticulously constructed reflection on youth, desire, and the restless pulse of suburban adolescence.
“When you’re young and dumb, everything hits harder… love, hate, boredom, desire. It all feels sacred somehow. Then you grow up and it fades. Maybe that’s why everyone romanticises youth. This album is forty-two minutes of trying to feel that again,” HighSchool explain.
In a message to fans on social media, they added: “We wanted to make a record that serves you. Something that evokes feelings and memories you might have forgotten. Or brings on nostalgia for things that never even happened.”
“One Lucky Man” captures that tension perfectly. It opens the second half of the album, wrestling with the tension of discipline and desire, stability and fleeting pleasure. “Written in the spirit of early-2000s indie rock, an era of hedonistic nights and sleazy excess, ‘One Lucky Man’ is about the rush of giving in and the quiet that comes after,” the duo share.
It’s a perfect snapshot of the album’s core theme of navigating the impulses that pull us off course while trying to build something lasting.
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After cutting their teeth on London’s Windmill scene and touring alongside Wunderhorse, Sam Fender, Provoker, and Chvrches, HighSchool have honed an international stage presence.
Their debut album is so much more than just a collection of songs, it’s a sonic portrayal of youth, framed in the mythologised way only post-punk-tinged alt-rock can deliver.
HighSchool are taking the album to the UK and Europe for a series of in-store gigs later this month in London, Liverpool, Bury, and Berlin.
HighSchool’s self-titled debut album is out now.
