Hideout is Film School’s second full-length for Beggars Banquet. Written largely in Greg Bertens’ Los Angeles apartment, recorded in both LA and San Francisco studios with engineer Dan Long, mixed by Phil Ek (Built to Spill, Band of Horses, the Shins, Stephen Malkmus), and produced by Bertens, Hideout builds on the band’s pretty, shoegazer pop and richly textured space-rock soundscapes by emphasizing powerful rhythms and beautiful melodies that take the songwriting to a new level. Bertens signature vocal delivery shows more breadth on this release, and evokes a plaintive longing that is magnified by the addition of female voices, courtesy of bassist Lorelei Plotcyzk and guest vocalists Tracy Uba (Timonium) and Leah Piehl. Other guest musicians loaning their talents to the album are Colm O’Ciosoig and Paul Wilson.

Film School’s 2006 self-titled debut for the label earned accolades across the country and across the pond. The band scored coveted opening slots for The National and the Rogers Sisters all over Europe before headlining their own tour of the states. But in the middle of that tour, frontman Greg Bertens got jumped outside a club in Columbus, Ohio; then in Philadelphia, somebody stole the tour van, plowing straight through the security gate of the motel parking lot, with all the band’s equipment inside. Once back home, the stress of a demanding show schedule, the ups and downs of a trying year, and emerging creative differences among bandmates ended with the decision to move forward with a change in personnel, and Film School looking to a fresh beginning with a new album.

“Hideout excels as mood music, with at least one stellar single (“Two Kinds”) that creates a new and better one than however you felt before.”
-XLR8R

“’Sick Hipster Nursed by Suicide Girl’ is Nu shoegazing with aggressive Spacemen 3 or Swervedriver edge”
-PLAYBOY

“Everything you dig about Film School remains intact on Hideout. The glistening sonics awash in heart-stopping frost. Strolling vocals looking for a home. Pure guitars that heroically strangle and singe” 8/10
-UNDER THE RADAR

“This San Francisco quintet has harnessed a psychedelic velocity that Joy Divison would applaud.”
-SENTIMENTALIST

“Hideout kicks off calmly enough with mid-tempo static guitars and various other tried and true tweaks of sound before the fuzz of the irregular heartbeat bass and rigid pitter-pattering drums lay on a sturdy foundation. Vocals are simplistic, but innocent and both shamelessly mature and shamefully young. These elements come together comfortably as they build up and collectively burst into an aural hallucination of red and black rainbows.”
-TREBLE

“The My Bloody Valentine and Jesus and Mary Chain influences are obvious, but so is Bertens’ talent for making self-absorbed shoegaze sound beautiful instead of annoying.”
-THE ONION AV CLUB

“Ever heard of the sophomore slump? Film School hasn’t…one killer of a follow-up release.”
-THE TRIPWIRE

“Newcomers to this still-underrated band are best advised to view both full-lengths as fitting counterparts in an emotional and cinematic journey”
-COLORADO SPRINGS INDEPENDENT