We chat with the band at End of the Road about their move from Paris to London and plans beyond debut single ‘Hey Man (Hey Man!)’.

Spanish Horses seem to be defined by an unstoppable energy, which inflects their music but is also felt beyond that. Their reputation was forged through raucous live shows which continues to evolve, combining hard edges and driving rhythms with a knack for impactful melodies. Doing well in Paris, where they formed, the band refused to rest on their laurels, organising blitzes of tour dates over in the UK whenever possible before finally moving to London full-time in 2025. Since then, they have continued to gather momentum on stage and off, recently signing with So Young Records and releasing their sun-kissed debut single ‘Hey Man (Hey Man!)’. We spoke to the band after a set in a packed-out Big Top at End of the Road, which offered just a flash of how much is still to come from this band.

The group speak fondly of their time in Paris, though their frustration with its limited guitar music scene is equally evident. Guitarist Albert Cocker explains, “I think we all felt that we kind of hit a glass ceiling playing in Paris. We had a lot of fun and it was a great time but there wasn’t really any community or scene there.”

What the band did have in Paris was the freedom to mess around, refine their live set and enjoy themselves without much pressure. Albert continues, “It was quite stress-free. We had this rehearsal space on the outskirts in this old refrigeration unit and we’d just kind of turn up.” At the same time, vocalist and guitarist Tom Morezine and drummer Cyril Stephan were working at Irish bar The Cork and Cavan, which became a natural locus for the band. “It was a lot more, not carefree, but…” Albert pauses, looking for the right word.

“Hedonistic”, Tom offers. (As the band have said elsewhere of this time, “We weren’t exactly disciplined, healthy or functioning”.)

The band moved to London full time in April 2025, with keys player Spike Davis Yuille joining “about three days later”. As Tom explains, the working relationship with So Young developed around this time through playing their nights and also sending in demos and new recordings. ‘Hey Man (Hey Man!)’ ultimately proved to be the song which pushed the label to take them on.

The single itself, an earworm which contrasts the ease of its languid guitars and singalong refrain against tight rhythm and staccato bursts of organ, was in fact a late entry for the band’s latest recording session. Another tune wasn’t working, so they picked up from a discarded voice memo recorded by Albert with bassist Victor Michee. Together, they fleshed out the structure of ‘Hey Man…’ within a day.

“It was a few days before we went into the studio to go record so it was a nice process of writing and… going in there with something completely new,” Spike remembers. The situation lent a kind of freshness to the process. “It’s good pressure to have”, Tom adds.

At the same time, the band are quick to point out that this single only shows one side of their style. Teasing further releases in the not-so-distant future, Spike notes, “It’s weird having just this one single out because we’ve got such a variation of all the kinds of music that we do. So when the rest of it does come out eventually, it will be nice for everyone to understand what our sound is properly.” As the live set shows, there is a lot of range to the band’s current roster of songs. In conversation, they mention influences and dream collaborators as diverse as Iceage, Worldpeace DMT and Kenny Beats. The latter’s hip-hop work is something Cyril occasionally tries to incorporate into his drumming style “to give a little dance to the music”.

It is still early days and it feels as though Spanish Horses are only moving from strength to strength. They have converted their fervent drive into an eagerly received single and a tight setlist promising exciting further releases on the horizon. With a number of high-profile shows coming up, including a slot at next month’s Left of the Dial and a newly announced spot among The Great Escape’s ‘First Fifty’ for 2027, it doesn’t look like their momentum is about to slow any time soon.