Hodge - Big Splash (2026)

Following a flurry of releases from Hodge on Local Action across the last year, we’re very excited to announce his second full-length album Big Splash.

The plan was never for this to lead up to an LP. We’ve known Hodge for years and have spoke about releasing music together several times before it finally happened in 2025. But somewhere along the back-and-forth (and there was a LOT of back-and-forth, you should see the demos folder) that led to ‘Tom’s Tweaks’ and ‘Wiggler’, it became clear that there was a bigger project materialising. At some point, he just pulled the band-aid off and said ‘this is an album right?’. Duh.

And so, Big Splash. If there’s a connecting thread between these eight tracks, it’s a swaggy but classy take on house – inspired, in Hodge’s words, by “at a time where I’ve been enjoying deeper moments on the dance floor, inspired by partying at places that play deep house and garage, places like Glastonbury’s NYC Downlow and certain nights at Bristol’s Strange Brew and The Love Inn.” There’s plenty of variety here, but it typically sits in a certain pocket, and this is very much music for DJs and dance floors first – one of the first notes when we were workshopping the album’s tracklist was ‘no ambient intro’.

Something that really solidified the tracklist for us was watching Hodge play twice for us this summer, at Ormside Projects and our Hackney Wick boat party (this was originally meant to time with the album announce – ‘Big Splash’, geddit?). He played pretty much the entire album, plus a ton of demos that didn’t make it and some appropriate accompaniments from the Local Action-Clasico universe (Sobolik, Kade Young, JIALING), and hearing it all out together really emphasised how cohesive and floor-friendly the sound he’s developed here is.

Of course, if we’re making this all sound like a smooth ride, it wasn’t – there was a fair amount of chaos mixed up in the process. Appropriately, the album cover is a painting by Hodge’s daughter: in his words, “Big Splash also reflects a particular part of my life, inspired by having kids and the chaos and fun that goes with it.”