Hooveriii (pronounced Hoover 3) have announced the October 13 release of their newest album, Pointe via The Reverberation Appreciation Society / Levitation. The group also have shared the LP’s first single “The Tall Grass.”  Hooveriii frontman Bert Hoover shares, “born out of anxiety and necessity, ‘The Tall Grass’ is both part odyssey and part self deprecation. Presented as soft and atmospheric but rotting deep at its core. The never ending quest to leave the couch.”

Pointe is an album that references the past while stretching toward an unknown future. “I think that our intuition going forward is to keep ourselves surprised and keep people who like us surprised, hopefully without isolating anyone,” he adds. 

When it comes to the lyrics for Pointe, Hoover says that while some of these are more personal than his previous material, it’s important for him to leave the actual content up to each listener’s own interpretation. “I like songs where people can admit to being deadbeats even if it is more of a character or you’re reflecting on one aspect of your personality,” he explains. “It’s also a transitional record in a lot of ways because sonically we wanted to drift away for album number four.” Correspondingly, Hoover considers “This Rock” to be a love song. But it could just as easily be about existential dread or the way that another person can change one’s orientation to the universe. Or the countless small decisions that can lead up to an outcome and the way our own smallness can be a catalyst for putting something out into the world that can affect so many other people in unexpected and important ways. Or maybe it is about none of these things, it’s whatever it means to you. 

More than anything else Pointe feels like a full circle moment for Hooveriii, which has evolved from a bedroom solo project into an expansive band that features an army of talented musicians and contributors. “In a lot of ways, Pointe feels like an epilogue to one phase of the band and a prologue to the next one,” Hoover says of how the band’s latest release fits into their musical catalog. Pointe is a collection of songs that weren’t recorded in a linear fashion but that fit together in a way that feels almost cosmic in nature. In other words, it’s Hooveriii at their most creative and undistilled. “I don’t really care about trying to push the envelope forward,” Hoover admits, looking back at the long road leading up to completing the album. “I care about making a good record that sounds cohesive—and I feel like with this one, we did a good job.” 

On Friday and Saturday, August 4 & 5, Hooveriii will be previewing some of the tracks on Pointe and playing old fan favorites during their set at this year’s Pickathon Festival in Happy Valley. On October 12 they will kick off their first tour in support of the new album as the direct support for Mudhoney.   They make a stop in New York City at Le Poisson Rouge on October 28 and at the Teragram Ballroom in Los Angeles on November 14 before the tour concludes in Seattle for a two-night stop at The Crocodile Showroom on November 19 (21+) and November 20 (all ages). Hooveriii previously opened for Mudhoney on their 2022 European tour.

Photo Courtesy: Alex Bulli