Song history written by TimelandIsWacky
“High Hopes Low” starts the second side of 12 Bar Bruise with a distinct, reverberated drum beat: the “disco 2” preset from the Casio SK-5 Sampling Keyboard. This leads into one of the rowdiest garage rock jams on the entire record featuring simplistic lyrics about expectations and intelligence.
In a track-by-track rundown of 12 Bar Bruise for Mess+Noise, Stu stated that the song is actually composed of two different attempts: “Recorded in two separate sessions a month apart. One was kinda hi-fi-ish, with all the instruments panned wide, and the other was really crunchy, with everything dead centre. Really different recordings. We spliced the two recordings up and now the song switches between the two. It sounds cool in headphones.”
Some fans have noted the similarities between “High Hopes Low” and the Osees track “Grease 2” released on the 2008 album The Master's Bedroom Is Worth Spending a Night In. The similarity doesn’t seem to be lost on the band as a setlist from 2012-05-10 seems to note it as “Oh Sees Rip.”
The song was released on August 7th, 2012.
The first reported performance of “High Hopes Low” was on 2011-07-08 at the World Bar in Eora (Sydney) with the first confirmed on 2011-12-09 during the Meredeith Music Festival. The song appeared a handful of times in 2012 and 2013 before disappearing.
2011 versions of the song do not feature the Casio intro while the 2012/2013 versions do.