Klaxons | |
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Jamie Reynolds, James Righton & Simon Taylor-Davis of Klaxons at the Eurockéennes 2007
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Background information | |
Origin | London, England, United Kingdom |
Genres | |
Years active | 2005–2015 |
Labels | Akashic Rekords, Polydor, tinyOGRE, Geffen, Ed Banger, Modular, Angular, Merok |
Website | klaxons |
Members | Jamie Reynolds James Righton Simon Taylor-Davis |
Past members | Finnigan Kidd Steffan Halperin George Latham |
Klaxons are an English band, based in London. Following the release of several 7-inch singles on different independent record labels, as well as the success of previous singles "Magick" and "Golden Skans", the band released their debut album, Myths of the Near Future on 29 January 2007. The album won the 2007 Nationwide Mercury Prize. After playing festivals and headlining tours worldwide (including the NME Indie Rave Tour) during late 2006–2007, the band started working on their follow-up album in July 2007. Klaxons' second album, Surfing the Void, was released on 23 August 2010. Their 3rd album, Love Frequency, was released on 16 June 2014.
Jamie Reynolds grew up in Bournemouth and Southampton. He dropped out of studying philosophy at Greenwich University to work in a record shop, Essential Records in Southampton, before moving to London after being made redundant. Simon Taylor-Davis and James Righton grew up in Stratford-upon-Avon, meeting at Stratford-upon-Avon High School. The trio formed in New Cross, London, after meeting through Reynolds' girlfriend. Righton had been working as a teacher at the time.
James taught Simon how to play guitar, and with Reynolds' redundancy money they purchased a studio kit. They recorded and performed live under their early guise of "Klaxons (Not Centaurs)", name inspired by Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's futurism text The Futurist Manifesto and the futurist literature. Initially the band played with drummer Finnigan Kidd in 2005, until Kidd left to play with fellow New Cross band, Hatcham Social. Replacement live drummer Steffan Halperin joined in February 2006, with the band announcing him as an official member in an interview in Prefix Magazine in early 2007. 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". Around this time, the band began playing under their new, shortened name of Klaxons.