CALUM HOOD: ORDER AMONGST CHAOS

Vasili Papathanasopoulos
Jun 2
12 min read

JUNE 2025

Photographs by Vasili Papathanasopoulos.

Styling by Victoria Knowles.

Calum Hood is no stranger to life in the public eye. At the age of fifteen, the Australian musician took to the stage for the first time at Sydney’s Annandale Hotel alongside his 5 Seconds of Summer (5SOS) bandmates. Now, in perfect symmetry almost fifteen years later, Hood is stepping out as a solo artist. In the coming weeks, he will unveil his debut solo album, ORDER chaos ORDER to the world. “I just hope people like it,” he tells me over zoom, weeks after our first meeting.

The album serves as a renaissance for Hood, who has spent the past fourteen years performing in arenas and stadiums across the globe as the bands career continued to catapult. We first meet at Route 66, a vintage store in the heart of Newtown. Arriving on set for his MILKY cover shoot, Hood’s calm demeanour filled the somewhat cramped space - his relaxed energy echoing his down-to-earth energy. He often cracks jokes between shots, and thoughtfully engages with each crew member on set. “I just had a lot of fun creating it [the album],” he says on set and throughout our virtual meeting. It is clear that the fun of creating ORDER chaos ORDER still lingers when speaking of the record.

Jumper, Jungles Jungles. Pants, Earls Collection. T-shirt, Route 66 Sydney. Boots, Dr Martens. Rings, Serge DeNimes.

Hood is the final 5SOS band member to launch his solo endeavour, following the realisation that making an album that was purely his own work was “the next step for me in terms of it being necessary for me to reach my full potential” he reflects. I ask him of the moment he realised that the songs he was making would purely reflect only him, and the emotions that were conjured upon that realisation. He tells me he sought the council of his bandmates, and that it was a slow-burning realisation, stemming from years of hoarding his own compositions and shying away from sharing them with the world. “I definitely had questions for the other boys kind of around that subject… I’m always kind of writing all the time, and there's plenty of songs that will forever stay in my phone; that will never be released. I think the hardest part, or learning curve, was actually committing to it and releasing them.” This in-turn led to self-reflection, and the opportunity to explore his own identity away from preconceived notions of who “Calum Hood” is. He remarks, the spark that made this register was the thought of “oh shit, this is who I am. Feel free to perceive, like all good.” ORDER chaos ORDER is a documentation of how Hood sees himself; both as a person and as a musician.

The journey to the body of work we hear today was not a straight forward one for Hood. Having begun writing for a solo project during lockdowns, an album began to reveal itself to the musician. However, from those initial tracks set to appear on the record only All My Affection remains. “I think at the start it was probably… my thought process was, it was a little more complex than it needed to be,” he recalls. “I can't even listen to those old demos anymore. They sound absolutely awful.” He ponders the evolution between both versions of the album, concluding that his resistance to outside opinions on the original batch of songs was ultimately holding both him and the album back. “I just had to let go of what I was kind of holding tightly on to. I had such a huge idea of what I wanted it to be at the start.” Things began to turn around with I Wanted To Stay. The track serves as the first collaborative effort between Hood and his primary partner for the record, Jackson Phillips, aka Day Wave. “I think that's when I was like, 'oh, okay, I get it now. I think I'm starting to understand it a little bit more' and I could let go of the other songs a little bit more.” His love for All My Affection stood the test of time.

Calum wears Jungles Jungles. Boots, Timberland. Rings, Serge DeNimes.

Finding himself without the safety blanket of his band mates, enlisting Phillips was the first piece of the puzzle towards realising ORDER chaos ORDER. Hood tells me his collaborators were “instrumental” in making the record. “Definitely couldn't have done it without them.” Having been a fan of Phillips’ musical project Day Wave, he always had the idea of working together on music and had him in mind as his first choice for collaborators. “It's a new creative partnership that I'm really grateful for.” Inspired by David Bowie and Brian Eno’s collaborative process, the pair undertook a new method of songwriting for them on Endless Ways. The pair chose a tempo and key before separating; Hood focused on writing the songs top line, whilst Phillips brought the songs soundscape to life. They then reunited and pieced the song together. Of course, Phillips wasn’t the only person instrumental in bringing the record to life. Hood teamed up with David Burris, TMS and Jack LaFrantz on songs across the album. He notes Burris had worked with one of Hood’s previous partners, and was drawn to his hyper-pop production. When meeting, they discovered they shared similar influences. The story rings similar for his partnership with TMS. Noting, “They all just kind of really complimented and respected how I wanted to approach making music.”

When delving in to the record, threads of themes begin to reveal themselves. Hood explores his own childhood and the nostalgia of his life pre-fame, relationships; both romantic and familial, becoming aware of your mortality and where life in the spotlight has led him - all through the looking glass of wonder. “I think you picked up on the themes really well, probably even better than I have [laughs],” he comments after I tell him my understanding of what is embedded within the albums DNA. Whilst penning the album, Hood did not set out with an intent of what to document on his debut outing. Instead, he allowed the process to conjure up the emotions and as he states, “whatever came to the surface.” He does note that whilst these ideas and themes are not necessarily new to him, ORDER chaos ORDER marks a turn in how he has been able to effectively capture the essence in an authentic perspective. “Maybe I've just been writing about kind of the same thing, all the same things for such a long time until I was able to kind of get to this place where I could articulate it the way I wanted to articulate it or have the skillset to be able to put it together properly as a package as a whole 360 thing and be able to release it.”

Jumper, Jungles Jungles. Pants, Earls Collection. T-shirt, Route 66 Sydney. Boots, Dr Martens. Rings, Serge DeNimes.

The album opens with Don’t Forget You Love Me, a plea to a former lover that finds Hood questioning self-worth. From there, Hood unpacks his inner most thoughts (Call Me When You Know Better), finding himself amidst people struggling with addiction (Sweetdreams), self-acceptance (Sunsetter) and more. I Wanted To Stay presents itself as a love letter to the musicians deceased dog, whereas Streetwise is inspired by a documentary of the same name that captures homeless youth in Seattle in the 1980’s. I pose the question; which three songs from the album would you play to a stranger to convert them into a super-fan. He pauses before chucking, “Unfortunately they'd probably be all the sad songs. I love how Call Me When You Know Better sounds. I think it's probably one of the more unique songs on the album. Don't Forget You Love Me is probably one of the more vulnerable moments of the album. I also Love SunSetter and Three of Swords just because they mean a lot to me concept wise. I think through those three or four songs, you probably get to know me pretty well.” The album is not an exercise in expelling these themes and thoughts from his own mind and psyche, but instead capturing their essence to bring new meaning to them. Ebbing between an intimate softness and a more brazen bravado, Hood says the album captures the juxtaposing sides of his own psyche. "There's like two halves of it for me where it feels like quite vast and cinematic and nurturing. And then the other half is pretty concrete and pretty cold. That's just kind of the two halves of me really.”Furthermore, the concept of time plays an integral part in ORDER chaos ORDER. It’s opening track, Don’t Forget You Love Me operates within a twenty four hour time frame. Sweetdreams takes place in a singular scene, whilst Streetwise is set in a distinct period of time. On Dark Circles, Hood ponders an alternate reality where the band never formed, and the chasm it would create. Alternately, time has also allowed him the space to arrive here. “Maybe one of the reasons why it took so long is just because I just wasn't ready to write about those things. So I think time has given me the gift of being able to put a bird's eye view over all these things.”

Where the dynamic of 5SOS seemingly allows the band members more discretion in how much of their personal lives are shared, and how much is directly taken from each band members experience, a solo endeavour pulls back the curtain to reveal more of its author. There is a delicate tightrope that an artist walks between intimacy and privacy. Throughout his lyricism, Hood shares unflinching honesty to create a visceral connection between himself as the artist and his audience. However, he strives to retain as much privacy as possible - a rule of thumb that dates back to his childhood. “Privacy has always been kind of a huge theme. Even just how I was brought up and raised within family dynamics, you know, we kept things pretty private.” His experience as a working musician over the past fourteen years and being a publicly known figure further stressed the need for privacy, and redefined how it related to him. With ORDER chaos ORDER, the levy began to break. “I allowed myself to kind of speak really truthfully and really direct about some things, while other things are a little more colourful, a little more poetic, a little more like living in kind of more of a fantasy world.” He notes that approach to lyricism excites him, even outside of his own songwriting, and pushes towards a sense of purity within his lyricism and offers the opportunity to lay his heart on the line.

Calum wears Jungles Jungles. Boots, Timberland. Rings, Serge DeNimes.

The true focal point of ORDER chaos ORDER is Hood’s matured and commanding vocals. Whilst his role within the band is that of bassist and vocalist, it is his debut solo offering where we are truly able to immerse ourselves within the breadth of his range and tone. I tell him this over our zoom call, asking him how he moulded his vocals as a solo artist - likening the idea of finding ones voice to the 2014 feature film Raise Your Voice, starring Hilary Duff. “I mean, there is that Disney kind of aspect in the whole kind of bit,” he responds. “Like someone told me that I was pretty much just a theatre kid and I was like, 'wow, you're so right. I'm literally just living my theatre kid dream right now' and it being disguised as me being something else.” The songs sit on the lower side of Hood’s register, most present on the albums closing track, Three Of Swords - a poetic cut inspired by his childhood, unifying his youth and adulthood. He shares with me that during the initial stages, the album was not as vocal-based, leaning into fuzzy vocal production and distortion. “I think I was a little bit insecure of me singing full songs, all like ten songs of just me singing. So I kind of wanted to disguise it a little bit.” As the record shape-shifted into the body of work we hear today, the layering began to shed and Hood’s vocals returned to a purer sound. “We started to just kind of remove those layers and it let the lyrics shine… I think that's just kind of testament to what I find comfortable in singing and the type of lyrics that I'm writing. I felt like it just suited that more crooney register of mine.” It’s an interesting thought, the idea of truly being introduced to an individuals voice, having ‘known’ them for over a decade. Hood himself says his vocals on ORDER chaos ORDER differs to the recordings he has made with the band. Perhaps being able to delve deeper into his own thoughts and ruminate on the first twenty eight years of his life has unlocked his voice in more ways than one.

With his first solo outing, Hood also unlocks a new sound for his palette. Rich in tones and texturally dynamic, ORDER chaos ORDER could be categorised as an electro-rock undertaking. Fusing together organic and electronic musings to create a genre-bending listening experience. Vastly recorded in Hood’s Los Angeles home, threads of indie-rock and eighties synth production are fused together and propel Hood’s artistic integrity forward. “Jackson [Phillips] who I worked with was a big part of me discovering the sonic tone that I wanted... that I loved myself. Because I think it was really difficult to kind of find that in the beginning.” With Phillips guiding him towards the sound of the record, Hood was able to draw on his own influences, such as Teddybears, The Radio Department, Frou Frou, Bowie and Eno. “I think I've also just kind of been an artist that - I like so many different things. That's also a thread in my songwriting. There's so many different kinds of songs that I write, but I really love that. It has enough of that, but still has a through line of what it sounds like.” It is that marriage of organic and digital sounds that helps create a surrealism realm for the album to exist within. ORDER chaos ORDER offers a band-like quality, through its heavily present guitar-work and key influences, but is propelled by its production and synth-work into a whole new stratosphere for Hood.

Jumper, Jungles Jungles. Pants, Earls Collection. T-shirt, Route 66 Sydney. Boots, Dr Martens. Rings, Serge DeNimes.

Throughout the albums release cycle, it has become clear that Hood has adapted a distinct visual aesthetic for the album; leaning into blue-based hues, grittier settings and a juxtaposition of natural vs industrial. At the helm of the records visual integrity is Andy DeLuca, with whom Hood has rekindled an old working relationship (DeLuca has previously worked on projects with 5SOS). He has also began working with Undercard, who he cites as an integral piece to discover the albums visual aspect. He notes, “There were a lot of parallels in terms of the music and the visuals in terms of like, I had to let other people really have an opinion and a perspective on it. Because I love collaborating and I think that's how I get the best outcome, is through collaboration.” He began by compiling images and texts from an internet archive, entering key words that pertained to the record, with a particular focus on the word, ‘chaos’. “The album title… those are kind of the themes. Then there's the more like nature derivative visuals and then there's more like the construction concrete world that it also lives in. It's like the two dichotomies of those.” Vaporwave aesthetics and early ‘00s computer interfaces became the jumping board for the albums visual identity, which when paired with its moodier motifs echoes the albums organic vs electronic thread.

In the lead up to the albums release, Hood will host a variety of album launch events across Europe, the United Kingdom, Australia and North America. Having spent half his life on the road, I ask him of any plans to take the album on tour and his interest in fronting his own headline tour. “I mean, that's like one of the funnest parts of the job in 5 Seconds of Summer for sure. So it definitely interests me, and now having kind of experienced the unknowns of releasing music by myself, I feel like that would be really exciting for me to be able to do that.” Whilst the promise of a Calum Hood headline tour seems likely, it appears it might be some time before we see the musician step on stage without his bandmates. “I'm just kind of waiting for the right moment. It might be like if, or when I do another project and have enough songs to be able to properly tour and have a show that's long enough.” The thought of further solo music before ORDER chaos ORDER has had a chance to enter the world would surely delight Hood’s fans across the globe. I further questioned him on what he believes his biggest adjustments would be, should he ever embark on a tour. “I think I'd probably laugh a lot less [laughs],” he quips. “I mean the main reason why we're probably still together is because there's someone that you know has experienced relatively similar things with you and you can find familiarity in someone else and know that they kind of understand how you feel about certain things. Especially when you're in a band. So I feel like that would be a great absence of me not just being able to share those moments with them.” He does go on to note, “But also again, as like finding new people to service another part of yourself would be really exciting as well.” Whilst his upcoming album launch events have been billed as listening parties and album signings, the Sydney and Los Angeles stops have yet to be given context. Perhaps he could test out performing the album in his hometown, and the city he now resides in.

Jumper, Jungles Jungles. Pants, Earls Collection. T-shirt, Route 66 Sydney. Boots, Dr Martens. Rings, Serge DeNimes.

When we first sat down to unpack this new era of his career, Hood told me, “I've just naturally loved being an artist or a songwriter or just kind of like a creative in general. I think there was a realisation of this is kind of what I want to just be doing for the rest of my life.” As our time together draws to a close, he concludes, “I hope that people who have known me before kind of learn something new about me, and maybe just see me in a different light. I hope people like it as a collection and as an expression of art. I think I just decided a while ago that I just loved it [laughs]. No one will sway me from that… I just hope people like it.”