The Jungle Giants Return with New Single 'Hold My Hand'

Australia’s The Jungle Giants return with their first release in over a year, “Hold My Hand.” The foundational taste of the group’s upcoming fifth album, a lot of life has been lived since 2021’s #1 ARIA Chart-topping Love Signs. In 2024, frontman Sam Hales was thrown headfirst into a phase of self-discovery following the end of a decade-long relationship and a jet-ski accident requiring surgery and two months of recovery. Searching for something that felt real in a period of numbness, “Hold My Hand” was the first time he was able to surface for a breath of air and punctuate an old chapter of his life. 

He shared, “These are all beautiful, beautiful, positive memories that changed me for the better. It was just really hard to figure out a way to write about it and figure out a way to define how I felt. This song really helped open up a lot of the writing for the album. All the songs I wrote before weren't feeling real enough. Once I landed on ‘Hold My Hand’, a lot of things fell into place for me. I had this real emotional reaction to it.”

From its inception, The Jungle Giants wanted “Hold My Hand” to feel like a collage of sounds. Bolstered by a live orchestra and layers upon layers of strings, the instrumentation of the song emotes in a way that words can’t. With a hypnotic, repeating mantra pleading “hold my hand,” you feel Hales’ conversation-like pain and release; an experience that will undoubtedly hit a live audience like a wall of sound and emotion — Stream. 

“Things have changed, but there's beauty to all this. I would not do anything differently," said Hales. "This is really important to me as an artist, really important to me as a friend, and a lover and everything. ‘Hold My Hand’ really captures the feeling of 10 years with someone, and watching the love just evolve.”

With The Jungle Giants’ fifth album arriving later this year, Hales is more emotionally grounded than he has ever been. Hales has spent the past few years traveling the globe with his bandmates, playing major festivals and meeting fans from all over, but the place he needed to settle in for the new album was internal. The Jungle Giants’ genre-agnostic sound has taken a memento from everywhere they’ve been, resulting in a pluralism of alternative pop, dance, rock and experimentalism all informed by the experiences that brought them here. 

ABOUT THE JUNGLE GIANTS:

In their almost decade and a half of existence, Australia’s The Jungle Giants have traveled to all corners of the globe for inspiration, but never had the time to sit still and look within themselves. Life has a tricky way of working and will stop you in your tracks when you need it the most, even if that moment seems to disrupt your perception of reality. Out of a year of life-altering heartbreak, and a jet-ski accident requiring surgery and two months of recovery, frontman Sam Hales from The Jungle Giants reemerges hopeful and emotionally grounded. From this was born the band's upcoming fifth studio album.

The crux of the album is its first single “Hold My Hand.” Hales describes the circumstances it was written within as, “It was just love changing. It wasn't love being lost. It was about the hope of what is to come.” The rest of the LP follows suit allowing for self-discovery to have the driver’s seat for the first time. 

Built up by Sam Hales (vocalist/ guitarist/ songwriter/ producer), lead guitarist Cesira Aitken, bassist Andrew Dooris and drummer Keelan Bijker, The Jungle Giants have pocketed nearly a billion streams worldwide, have a #1 ARIA-charting album, and toured in front of adoring fans globally. Grateful and centered, the upcoming album zooms in on the matters of the heart.

Photo credit: Byron Spencer

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