The Flashpot Moments turn hard times into huge hooks on new EP ‘Onward!’

‘Onward!’ is the sound of The Flashpot Moments taking everything difficult about the last eighteen months and throwing it into songs big enough to fight back.

The new EP leans fully into the project’s strongest contrast of massive, uplifting rock music carrying lyrics shaped by fear, frustration, uncertainty and resilience. Tim Cawley has always had a taste for anthemic songwriting, but here that instinct feels especially charged, as though every chorus is being used to drag something heavy into the light.

‘World-Class Trouble’ sets the tone brilliantly. Recorded at EastWest Studios in LA, it was designed to feel enormous from the outset, with Cawley aiming for the spirit of a festival-board recording from 1983. The result is gloriously oversized; with big drums, bright guitars, keyboards and backing vocals all pushing in the same direction. It’s the kind of song that wants open space, loud speakers and absolutely no restraint.

Then ‘Onward!’ starts having fun with itself. ‘Don’t Die, It’s Your Birthday’ takes the chaos of that one friend who always goes too hard on a big night and turns it into a rollicking rock song with real personality. ‘Walloped’ is even more direct, deliberately abandoning overthinking in favour of instinct. Recorded quickly and built around a yelled “Hell Yeah’, it lands exactly as intended: immediate, blunt and hugely enjoyable.

That looseness makes the EP’s final emotional turn hit even harder. ‘I Wanted to Believe’ began as melodies Cawley recorded on his phone during a lunch break at EastWest, but the song took on deeper meaning after a skin cancer diagnosis left him with 28 stitches in his face. A friend trying to reassure him that the scar looked “kinda badass” became the spark for the lyrics.

It’s a deeply human origin story, and it captures ‘Onward!’ perfectly. As ultimately, this is an EP about taking whatever arrives, such as fear, illness, embarrassment, friendship, or dark humour, and converting it into momentum.

And The Flashpot Moments make that process sound absolutely enormous.

The Flashpot Moments’ new EP ‘Onward!’ will be available to stream from the 22nd November.