Hotel Fiction Releases ‘Enjoy Your Stay’.
Written by: Julia Hollander
Garrett Cardoso
Athens, Georgia-based band Hotel Fiction is giving us the Hayley Williams-meets girlpool-
meets Camera Obscura-meets Ella Jane vibes we’ve been waiting for all our lives. I was sold
from the beginning. The solo piano opening to the EP in “Athens GA” is all I needed to know
this EP would be a mainstay, never-skip delight for me.
Enjoy Your Stay somehow creates a sound of intimacy, feeling like you’re at a house show
watching your peers up onstage, while also creating a stadium anthemic feel. I can already
hear the audience chanting “Won’t You Stay If I Stay, Baby.” It feels like the soundtrack to the
next coming of age indie movie that everyone can’t shut up about (myself included.)
Regarding the release, the duo said: “Enjoy Your Stay is a project about following your heart
and living in the moment. It encompasses the range of emotions that we as early 20’s adults
have navigated over the last few years. Feeling stuck, feeling paralyzed, falling in and out of
love, learning to love yourself, and appreciating the deep friendships around us.”
Regardless of your age, most of us have faced a number of changes of pace in our lives due to
the pandemic as well as whatever else life throws at us. This EP provides a comforting, “you’re
not alone” vibe while also make you feel cool when you blast it in your car with the windows
down.
Favorite tracks (this is really tough, why did I do this to myself?):
“Athens, GA”
“Man on the Moon”
“I Like You All Around”
...I feel like I’m not supposed to list the entire album as my favorite, but it would be a miss not
to mention “Instead of Us.” This track feels like the conversation we’ve all had or wished we
had with someone who didn’t see our value. “I’m not sorry for putting myself first for once,
instead of us.” Ugh, and the EP culminates in this room-filling, ambient guitar sound... I just, I
cannot. I have to go listen to it again. You probably should too.