KLAXONS

Tried to get excited up the new Electric Six album coming out early next month but couldn't. Here's the Klaxons:



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Wikipedia:

Klaxons are a Mercury Prize winning English band, based in London. The word 'klaxon' is derived from the Greek verb klazō, meaning "to shriek", and most commonly refers to air-raid sirens or other warning devices. They are currently signed to Rinse Records, their own branch of Polydor Records.
Following the success of previous singles "Magick" and "Golden Skans", the band released their debut album, Myths of the Near Future on January 29, 2007. The album won the 2007 Nationwide Mercury Prize.[1]
After headlining their first tour (the 2006 NME Indie Rave Tour), as well as playing numerous festivals worldwide, the band are currently working on their second album.[2]
Contents[hide]
1 History
1.1 Formation (2005 - 2006)
1.2 Angular/Merok/Modular Records (2006)
1.3 Polydor Records (2006 - present)
2 'Nu Rave'
3 Musical Style
4 Discography
4.1 Albums
4.2 EPs
4.3 Singles
4.4 Contributions
4.5 Covers
4.6 Awards
5 References
6 External links
6.1 Interviews/Reviews
//

[edit] History

[edit] Formation (2005 - 2006)
Simon Taylor-Davis grew up in Stratford Upon Avon where he met James Righton, who was a year below him in school. James taught Simon how to play guitar, and later they (along with members of Pull Tiger Tail) were in a band called 'Hollywood is a Verb' which was very briefly active during the summer of 2004. While studying Fine Art at Nottingham Trent University Simon was approached by Jamie Reynolds, the boyfriend of one of his housemates, to form a band.
Jamie Reynolds grew up in Bournemouth and Southampton and was active in several bands from his early teens, however the bands quickly dissolved and he dropped out of school to work in record shops over the next few years. He later moved to London after he was made redundant, spending his redundancy money on a studio kit in order to record with Simon and James under their early guise of "Klaxons (Not Centaurs)"[3].
The lineup was recently bolstered with the addition of drummer Steffan Halperin (former drummer Finnigan Kidd left to focus on another band, Hatcham Social [4])), who was recruited for live gigs after appearing on the album version of the track "Atlantis To Interzone" (the rest of the percussion on Myths of the Near Future was provided by the album's producer James Ford). As of early 2007 Halperin had become a quasi-official fourth member of the band, being listed on the Klaxons MySpace page and present in several interviews. However he remains mostly absent from the band's music videos, appearing only in the early video "Atlantis to Interzone" and briefly in the 2007 re-release of "Gravity's Rainbow".

[edit] Angular/Merok/Modular Records (2006)
Klaxons' debut single, "Gravity's Rainbow" was released on March 29, 2006 on Angular Records. Only 500 copies were released, and all were printed on a 7" vinyl decorated by the band themselves. Radio 1's Steve Lamacq was the first DJ to play the band and band recorded a Maida Vale session for his show on the strength of 'Gravity's Rainbow'. The band's second single, "Atlantis to Interzone", was released on June 12 of the same year. It was their first release for new label Merok and led to further coverage in the NME. The song enjoyed even more radio coverage including play from Zane Lowe and daytime BBC Radio 1 plays from disc jockey Jo Whiley, who repeatedly, and mistakenly, called the song "Atlantic To Interscope". Zane Lowe also wrongly credited the song as "Atlantis To Interscope".[5].
They released their first EP, Xan Valleys in the UK on October 16, 2006 on Modular Recordings.

[edit] Polydor Records (2006 - present)
In 2006, the band signed to Polydor Records. Their first single for the label, "Magick", was released on October 30 and reached #29 in the UK Top 40 the following week.
In August of that year, Klaxons played at the Reading and Leeds festivals, playing in the Carling tent on each festival site. The Carling tent, at both festivals, is the smallest stage and as a result large numbers of people were forced to watch from outside the tent. Fans sounded "Klaxons!" and cheered loudly between songs, brandishing glowsticks, seemingly giving credit to the "New Rave" (see below) bandwagon label. This term was coined by Angular Records founder Joe Daniel and later used by NME to describe the burgeoning scene.
The first single from their debut album, "Golden Skans", was released on January 22, 2007. It reached #16 in the UK Singles Chart on download sales alone, two weeks before the official release of the CD. It climbed to #14 the next week, eventually peaking at #7 after the CD release. On January 24, Klaxons performed on the BBC Radio 1 Live Lounge, performing "Golden Skans" and a cover of Justin Timberlake's "My Love", to great acclaim from Jo Whiley.[6] The band then released "It's Not Over Yet", a cover version of a song originally by Grace. The track included the "My Love" cover as a b-side, and reached #13 in the UK Singles Chart.[7]
Their debut album, titled Myths of the Near Future, was released on January 29, 2007. It entered the UK Album Charts at #2, beaten only by Norah Jones's album Not Too Late.
The band have recently collaborated with The Chemical Brothers on the track "All Rights Reversed", taken from the duo's new album We Are the Night and have expressed on several occasions an interest in working with Dr. Dre or Snoop Dogg on their follow up album (plans for which have not yet been finalized)[8] but which will be called Myths of the Near Past.
On September 20, it was revealed that the band were to release a double album featuring 27 tracks mixed exclusively by the Klaxons. Entitled A Bugged Out Mix, the band follow in the footsteps of Miss Kittin, Erol Alkan, Felix Da Housecat and Simian Mobile Disco, who have all made similar contributions.[9]
Klaxons are currently on tour through the United States and will be playing gigs across the nation, including at the Fox Theatre in Boulder, Colorado on October 4th.

[edit] 'Nu Rave'

Klaxons in concert, 2007.
Main article: New Rave
HMV describes Klaxons as "acid-rave sci-fi punk-funk", while their MySpace page touts 'Psychedelic / Progressive / Pop'. However, they are one of the isolated acts being referred to as 'Nu Rave', a genre term coined by Angular Records founder Joe Daniel, who released the trio's first single. Though the band's sound is decidedly art rock, they draw upon some less common influences - notably the rave culture of the 1990s, which they appropriate and redefine in a post-modern fashion. Their influences are perhaps most represented in their covers of rave hits "The Bouncer" by Kicks Like a Mule and "Not Over Yet" by Grace. Both tracks have since been released by the band, the first as part of a double a-side with "Gravity's Rainbow" in March 2006 and the latter as a single on June 25, 2007 titled "It's Not Over Yet".
While the band are consistently hailed as the defining act of the sparsely-populated Nu Rave movement, Klaxons have worked to avoid being typecast as champions of the disputed genre that may or may not exist. Even so, Klaxons member Jamie Reynolds expressed no regrets at the dubious honor, saying that "...it's great that it started as an in-joke and became a minor youth subculture"[10]
The Klaxons have been described as a 'manifestation of a Nathan Barley joke' by users of online communities.

[edit] Musical Style
Klaxons' music is often supernatural and magic-realist in theme, as shown in a number of song titles and lyrical content. Examples of this are "As Above, So Below" (favourite saying of Aleister Crowley), "Atlantis to Interzone" (a William Burroughs reference), "Magick" (Crowley) and "Four Horsemen of 2012"/"Gravity's Rainbow" (Thomas Pynchon references). The original name of Klaxons comes from a line in the art text, The Futurist Manifesto. "Forgotten Works" also contains references and lines from Richard Brautigan's In Watermelon Sugar.

[edit] Discography

[edit] Albums
Myths of the Near Future (29 January 2007) Polydor Records #2 (UK)

[edit] EPs
Xan Valleys (16 October 2006) Modular Recordings

[edit] Singles
Date of Release
Title
Uk Top 40 Chart Position
Album
March 29, 2006
"Gravity's Rainbow" / "The Bouncer"
N/A
N/A
June 12, 2006
"Atlantis to Interzone"
N/A
N/A
October 30, 2006
"Magick"
29
Myths of the Near Future
January 22, 2007
"Golden Skans"
7
Myths of the Near Future
April 9, 2007
"Gravity's Rainbow" (Re-recording)
35
Myths of the Near Future
June 25, 2007
"It's Not Over Yet"
13
Myths of the Near Future
To be announced
"Totem On The Timeline"[11]
-
Myths of the Near Future

[edit] Contributions
"4 Horsemen of 2012" - On Delete Yourself compilation 'Digital Penetration' (July 31, 2006)
"Magick (Simian Mobile Disco Mix)" - On NME compilation Club NME Presents Dancefloor Distortion (October 7, 2006)
"Gravity's Rainbow" (credited to "The Klaxons") - On Tony Hawk's Project 8 In-Game Soundtrack (October 17, 2006)
"Gravity's Rainbow (Van She Remix)" - On Kitsuné Music compilation Kitsuné Maison Compilation 3 (November 22, 2006)
"Gravity's Rainbow" - On Angular Recording Corporation compilation 'Future Love Songs' (December 11, 2006)
"Golden Skans to Interzone (So Me Remix)" - On Ed Rec Vol. 2 label compilation from Ed Banger Records (March 19, 2007)
"The Bouncer" (credited as "Bouncer") - On "Kiss Does...Rave: Original Rave V New Rave" compilation, Disc 2 (April 30, 2007)
"Golden Skans" - On "Magic Moves" Ski Film teaser (April, 2007)

[edit] Covers
"Golden Skans" covered by Kaiser Chiefs on Radio 1 Live Lounge Session
"Golden Skans" covered by Mark Ronson on Radio 1 Live Lounge Session
"Gravity's Rainbow" instrumental version by The Central Band of the Royal British Legion[10]
"The Bouncer" original by Kicks Like A Mule
"Trick or Treatz" original by Metronomy
"It's Not Over Yet" original by Grace
"My Love" original by Justin Timberlake
"The Night" original by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons
"No Diggity" original by Blackstreet

[edit] Awards
2007 NME Awards: Best New Band[12]
2007 Mercury Music Prize: Myths of the Near Future

Links:

http://www.myspace.com/klaxons
http://www.klaxons.net/


Klaxons